Page:Tseng Kuo Fan and the Taiping Rebellion.djvu/310

Rh and if necessary he would invite Li Hung-chang himself to come to Nanking.

His dilemma was not lightened by the fact that word came through spies of prevailing panic within the city. They reported that the T'ienwang had surrounded himself with firewood with which he planned to burn himself should the city fall. At the end of March Tsêng wrote home that the melon was almost ready to cut. Early in May another letter records that many of the rebels were shaving their heads and no longer killing people or starting fires, because they were preparing to scatter out and lose themselves among the population. His apprehension that the delays were injurious to his family's honor combated the fear that his brother, through excess of eagerness, might overshoot his bolt and fail to take ,advantage of any sudden chance presented by the adversaries. In warning he wrote: "Since the capture of Soochow and Hangchow there has been a keen desire for the capture of Nanking. I myself am not so concerned about its early capture as about its safe capture. Therefore I have written you several tens of letters enjoining caution. Hung and Nanking are entirely different from other persons and places. I am worried for fear that in your over haste you may wear yourself out and your soldiers may be too exhausted to seize the opportunity when the mine is sprung." To his brother at home he wrote: "Ch'angchow has been recaptured, also Tanyang. In the whole of Kiangsu only the one city of Nanking remains uncaptured. Our younger brother Yuan is terribly worried and his agitation is deep. I am constantly writing him letters to dispel it."