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men rode past the steamer, in the direction of Soochow, amid a shower of bullets; and when one of them was struck off his steed, the others waited for him and carried him off-a fine instance of Chinese courage and fidelity. The steamer got within a mile of Soochow, and did not turn till 6 P.M., being very uncertain as to what sort of reception it might meet with on the way back. The extraordinary good fortune which had attended this movement continued to befriend it. On the way down, a large force at Siaouedin opened a sharp fire of rifles upon the Hyson, but they were enfiladed from their position by a charge of grape, and some of them were made prisoners. Even the boat's steam-whistle seems to have done good service in frightening the Tai-pings, most of whom had heard nothing of the kind before; and it may be imagined how great must have been the effect on their untutored minds of this fiery dragon coming shrieking down in the darkness, with the glaring eyes of its green and blue lights, and its horrible discharges grape and shells.

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On returning to Chunye, tremendous firing and cheering were heard, the Imperial gunboats being found engaged with the stone fort, which in the darkness was literally sparkling with musketry. It was most fortunate that the steamer came up at this moment, for as it got to the scene of action a confused mass of men, but dimly discerned, were seen on the causeway. This was the garrison of Quinsan, amounting to about 8000 men, attempting to escape to Soochow. On the steamer blowing its whistle, this dark mass wavered, yelled, and turned back. Then followed one of those terrible scenes which are so useful in war, and may be on the whole so beneficial, but which are often so painful to witness and to read of. The number of

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Tai-pings was so great, and their state of desperation such, that they could easily have swept Colonel Gordon's small force away; and the Imperialists, being surrounded by the enemy, were so panic-stricken that they had commenced to abandon their gunboats when the Hyson arrived. Hence it was necessary to fire into the Quinsan garrison, which the steamer accordingly did, driving back the dense yelling masses, step by step, with great slaughter, and pursuing them up to the walls of the city. The shelling went on till half-past two in the morning, when as many of the garrison surrendered as could safely be made prisoners of; and, at a later hour, an Imperialist and disciplined force, which had been left at the East Gate, entered Quinsan, and took possession of that place unopposed.

In this engagement the loss of the Tai-pings was very great indeed. It was evident that between 3000 and 4000 men must have been killed, drowned, or taken prisoners; but it is impossible to say how many more of the 12,000 or 15,000 in Quinsan, or on the fatal causeway, failed to reach Soochow, and perished miserably drowned in creeks, choked in mud, and killed by the villagers, who, to show their appreciation of Tai-ping rule, rose en masse against the fugitives. About 800 prisoners were taken, most of whom entered the ranks of the Ever-Victorious Army; and 8000 might have been secured, had there been troops to collect them. In fact, almost the entire garrison of Quinsan must have been lost to the Rebels, while the casualties in Colonel Gordon's force, exclusive of the Imperialists with whom he acted, were only two killed, and five drowned.

This almost unparalleled disproportion between the two losses may readily suggest the idea of a mere

massacre, where superiority of arms on one side rendered the defence on the other a perfect farce; but such was not the case. It was the selection of the causeway as the weak point of the enemy, together with the hazardous, desperate, and totally unlooked-for character of the attack, which made it so wonderful a success; and at almost any point up to the occupation of Quinsan, the state of matters might easily have been reversed. Had the Rebels stood to their stockades and forts; had they returned to stone forts which the Hyson had to leave unoccupied, or held by only a few men; had they attacked the steamer on its return to Taedin, where it had a narrow escape from being taken; and had the Quinsan garrison not wavered in its fugitive attack when the steam-whistle began to sound,then there might have been a very different conclusion to this bold adventure. This was one of those occasions which occur pre-eminently in Asiatic warfare, when a little hesitation on the part of the commander, and a little suspension of confidence on the part of the troops, might easily have led to a disaster on the side of the assailants quite as great as that which, as it turned out, befell the assailed.

The importance of Quinsan to the Rebel cause could not easily be over-estimated. It contained a manufactory for ordnance, shot, and shell, which was conducted by two Englishmen, whose fate I cannot discover; and it afforded a central point communicating by water with Soochow, Sungkiang, Taitsan, and Chanzu. The boldness of the attack and the completeness of its success paralysed the Tai-pings and gave confidence to the country-people. Moreover, Quinsan afforded an excellent place for the headquarters of the Ever-Victorious, and one where the reins of discipline could be

drawn tighter than at Sungkiang, where many Chinese resided who had been demoralised when serving under the lax system of General Ward. It can easily be conceived that this anomalous Chinese force was "disciplined" only to a very limited extent. Not a few of the officers were what are usually called "rowdies," yet exceedingly jealous of their position and presumed privileges; while the Chinese rank-and-file expected to be humoured, and, though brave enough at times, would, in the matter of plunder, have outgeneralled Bardolph and Ancient Pistol. These worthies did not at all like being quartered at Quinsan instead of being restored to their old location at Sungkiang. When this change of residence was communicated to the troops, the artillery refused to fall in, and threatened to blow the European officers to pieces with the big guns, and the Chinese authorities with the small ones. This intimation of serious mutiny was conveyed to Colonel Gordon in a written proclamation. He ordered up the non-commissioned officers, being convinced that they were at the bottom of the affair, and inquired of them who wrote the proclamation, and why the men would not fall in. They professed ignorance on these points, and were then told that one out of every five of them would be shot-a piece of information which they received with groans. As it was absolutely necessary to restore discipline, the commander ordered a corporal, one of the most prominent of the groaners, to be dragged out and shot, which was immediately done by two of the infantry who were standing by. The remaining non-commissioned officers were then put in confinement for an hour, with the assurance that if the men did not fall in, and if the name of the writer of the proclamation were not given up by the time that period elapsed, the arrangement of

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shooting every fifth man would be carried out; and this energetic measure brought them to their senses, the men falling in and the writer's name being disclosed.

At the time this fracas occurred, another serious dispute was going on between Colonel Gordon, whose hands must have been pretty full, and General Ching. This Imperialist leader had been annoyed at Gordon's method of taking Quinsan, because he had previously written to the Futai, stating that he himself only required guns to make a breach at the East Gate in order to get in; and he was also opposed to the disciplined force being established at that place. Whether purposely or accidentally, but most probably the former, some of his gunboats opened fire with grape and round-shot on 150 men of the Ever-Victorious under Majors Kirkham and Lowden, who were co-operating with another Imperialist force under General Lí. Ching at first affected to treat this contretemps as a joke; and on being rather forcibly informed it was nothing of the kind, he affected ignorance of the unmistakable green-and-red flag on which his troops had fired. Gordon wrote to the Futai about this matter, and then, with a larger force, started for the neighbourhood where the event had occurred, determined to fight Ching as well as the Rebels, if that general showed a disposition to make any more such mistakes. Mr Macartney, however, formerly surgeon in H.M. 99th Regiment, who was then, as now, in the employ of the Chinese Government, and had undertaken charge of the Futai's arsenal at Sungkiang, was sent up to arrange matters, and the affair ended in a humble apology.