Page:Tseng Kuo Fan and the Taiping Rebellion.djvu/399

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376
TSENG KUO-FAN

of the P'ing-ting Yueh-fei Chi-lueh, Some also are reproduced in the works of Brine, Lindley, Callery, and Yvan, and others. They were originally published in the North China Herald, having been translated by Br. W. H. Medhurst, Chinese secretary of the Hermes expedition to Nanking.

3. The Autobiography of the Chungwang. Translation from the Chinese by Walter T. Lay. Shanghai, 1865.

A Chinese text is published in a volume entitled Chung Kuo Pi Shi (Secret History of China), published, apparently in Japan, in 1904. The original confession as written by this chief before his execution at Nanking was much longer, but Tsêng Kuo-fan had it edited. The original is said to be in the Tsêng family home. From it we have a good account of the last days of the movement, but it flits from one place to another and from one date backwards and forwards in a bewildering manner. The best use that has been made of this, in a description of the campaign for the relief of Anking, is by S. W. Williams in The Middle Kingdom.

4. Taiping T'ien-kuo Yeh Shi (Unofficial History of the Celestial Kingdom of Taiping). Shanghai, 1923.

This book by an anonymous writer is a mine of information about the Taiping movement, probably written by one who was a secretary at Nanking and had access to official records, books, and pamphlets. A number of the books referred to in No. 2 are here given in the original. Moreover, lists of officials, civil and military, are included, which enable us to understand their government better. There are also biographical sketches of the chief men of Taipingdom. It is by far the most useful book for comprehending the insurgent side that has yet appeared.

5. The Kan Wang's Sketch of the Rebellion, together with sundry other statements. Translated from the Chinese by Walter T. Lay. Shanghai, 1865 (reprinted from the North China Herald, July 15-August 19, 1865).

This sketch is by the same man who furnished Theodore