When Mr. Taylor arrived in Hong-Kong he was received with the same kind hospitality which his very countenance secured for him in every land. The United States Commissioner, the Hon. Humphrey Marshall, who happened to be at Macao, and whom Mr. Taylor met there on crossing the bay from Hong-Kong, offered to attach Mr. Taylor to his staff, for a trip to the seat of war. The great rebellion in the Kiangsu province, lying north-westerly from Shanghai, had assumed such threatening proportions that the emperor at Peking trembled on his throne. Exaggerated accounts of the fiendish atrocities of the rebels, and rumors of great battles and successful sieges had reached the seaports, and even the peaceful American merchants at Shanghai feared capture and death. In view of all this, Mr. Taylor anticipated an exciting experience. Together with the whole ship’s company, he felt, when the United States steamer left Hong-Kong for Shanghai, as if there was a measure of uncertainty if he ever returned. But the reports had been so much enlarged in their transmission to Hong-Kong, that when they arrived at the port of Shanghai they were delighted to find the place in no immediate danger of attack from the Chinese. In order to show the rebels that the Americans were neutral in all the Chinese quarrels, the Commissioner undertook the hazardous task of ascending the Yang-tse-kiang River to the beleaguered town of Nanking. It seems to have been a foolish undertaking, and viewed from any diplomatic stand-point, to have been indirectly an encouragement of the rebellion. It was not so intended, however, and Mr. Taylor did not give his opinion of the “good faith” which prompted the sending of envoys to a local rebellion in the interior of a “great and friendly nation.” But what good sense could not do, the shoals and incompetency of the native pilots did accomplish; and the Commissioner who was going up the river to pat the rebels on the back and ask them not to hurt their friends, the Americans, was compelled to return to Shanghai. It would have been better for the United States if the second undertaking had been equally unsuccessful; but as Mr. Taylor had no share in it, it is of no further importance here.