Chap. I. 



MR. MEADOWS' INQUIRIES. 



13 



chow on the following day. On the 13th he 

 passed the city of Chang-chow, and on the 14th 

 he arrived at a place called Tan-yang. At this 

 place his boatmen and servants seem to have 

 objected to proceed, and, meeting a man whom he 

 had previously despatched to procure information, 

 he returned to Shanghae in order to communicate 

 to Sir Greorge Bonham the information he had 

 been enabled to gather during his journey con- 

 nected with the movements of the insurgents. 



Mr. Meadows was led to believe that the army 

 of the insurgents numbered from thirty to forty 

 thousand of " trusted and voluntary adherents," 

 and in addition they had from eighty to one hun- 

 dred thousand of pressed men and other adherents. 

 " The strangest," says Mr. Meadows, " and what 

 will probably prove by far the most important fact 

 connected with them, is, that they have got a 

 sacred book, which the chiefs and the older mem- 

 bers of the army not only peruse and repeat 

 diligently themselves, but earnestly admonish all 

 new comers to learn." 



The information communicated by Mr. Mea- 

 dows, and the well-known fact that the Chinese 

 authorities in Shanghae had been endeavouring, 

 by every means in their power, to make the insur- 

 gents believe that foreigners were to take the part 

 of the Imperialists in the quarrel, induced Sir 

 Greorge Bonham to proceed himself to Nanking in 

 the " Hermes." 



From a careful perusal of the published account 



