When this passage was thus cleared, Yang Tsai-fu set out on a romantic voyage through the Taiping region down the river, capturing cities as he went until he reached Anking. From thence without taking cities he continued for three hundred miles until he met ocean war junks from Tinghai. There was great surprise on these junks when they beheld the battle flags of the relatively small Hunan boats from the upper reaches of the river, for they looked on their presence so far from home as little short of miraculous. The fleet returned up the river after this feat, which was of importance because, if only for the moment, it had proved that the imperial boats were free to sail the entire length of the lower Yangtse River, through the very heart of Taipingdom.[1]
The operations about Kian in southern Kiangsi were long drawn out. During the summer the forces of Chow Hung-shan had suffered a defeat, in which the contingent belonging to Tsêng Kuo-ch'üan had behaved with conspicuous bravery, retiring in good order to Anfu. The governor then asked that Tsêng Kuo-ch'üan be recalled and put in active control of these operations. He arrived at Anfu towards the end of the year.
During January, 1858, Shi Ta-k'ai again entered Kiangsi, from which he had been absent for some time, and attacked Huk'ow, which, however, under the defence of Li Shou-i, resisted his efforts stubbornly. He then went through Jaochow and Fuchow hurriedly on his way to Kian, where he was met by all the available government troops and defeated at a small place called Sankütan.[2] This forced his retirement from the province. Lingkiang-fu was then taken by the Hunan army, January 22, 1858, and of all western Kiangsi only Kian and Kiukiang
