Taken from an ordinary Manchu family into the palace, she soon gained an extraordinary influence over Hsien Feng, and began to make her voice heard in affairs of State.

Always on the side of determined measures, she had counselled the Emperor to remain in Peking and face the barbarians; she is further believed to have urged the execution of Parkes and Loch, the order luckily arriving too late to be carried out.
For the next three years the Regents looked anxiously for the final collapse of the T`ai-p`ings, having meanwhile to put up with the hateful presence of foreign diplomats, now firmly established within the Manchu section of the city of Peking.

No sooner was the great rebellion entirely suppressed (1864), than another rising broke out.

The Nien-fei, or Twist Rebels, said to have been so called because they wore as a badge turbans twisted with grease, were mounted banditti who, here to-day and gone to-morrow, for several years committed much havoc in the northern provinces of China, until finally suppressed by Tso Tsung-t`ang.
Turkestan was the next part of the empire to claim attention.

A son and successor of Jehangir, ruling as vassal of China at Khokand, had been murdered by his lieutenant, Yakoob Beg, who, in 1866, had set himself up as Ameer of Kashgaria, throwing off the Manchu yoke and attracting to his standard large numbers of discontented Mahometans from all quarters.
His attack upon the Dunganis, who had risen on their own account and had spread rebellion far and wide between the province of Shensi and Kuldja, caused Russia to step in and annex Kuldja before it could fall into his hands.