structive, whilst our gunners, though quite close, had to aim upward at the enemy. The experience of Sebastopol has shown that a horizontal fire will not dislodge a brave opponent from behind earthworks; of course it would be much less likely to do so when the assailants were so low as to have to fire in an oblique direction upward; and such was the relative position of the two antagonists at Taku. The body of the forts was soon found to be invulnerable, and the embrasures became the targets of our gunboats. Those on the cavaliers were subjected to a terribly accurate fire, yet, strange to say, the guns at these points were seldom silenced for any length of time. The Cormorant's bow-gun, on one occasion, in four successive shots, fairly knocked over the three guns in the face of the cavalier of the centre bastion-the whole squadron witnessed the fact, and saw the guns and crews shattered by the terrific effect of her solid 68-pounders-yet in a quarter of an hour other guns were there and stinging away as waspishly as ever. At 4.20 P.M., the Admiral was obliged to yield to the entreaties of the medical men, and to the faint ness arising from loss of blood: he handed over the immediate command of the squadron to the second in seniority, Captain Shadwell, who, supported by Captain Willes and Captain Nicholas Vansittart, carried on the battle. Of the individual acts of valour and devotion with which such a combat is replete, how many escape observation-whilst the mention of others often gives pain to the modest men, to whom the writer would fain do honour. At any risk, however, we must narrate an anecdote or two illustrative of the zeal and devotion displayed in this glorious fight. When the Cormorant's bow-gun did the good service of silencing, in four shots, the centre cavalier, the Admiral, lying on his cot, was so struck with the accuracy of the aim that he immediately sent an aide-decamp forward to obtain the name of the captain of the gun. The mes senger found worthy Corporal Giles* at the full extent of his trigger-line, the gun loaded and run out; his whole mind was intent upon one object-hitting his enemy. "Muzzle right," said the honest marine. "Who fired those shots?" interposed the messenger; "the Admiral wants to know." "Well!" shouted the man to his crew, adding, "I did, sir," (to the officer). "Elevate!" "What's your name?" rejoined the messenger. "John Giles," said the marine, leaning back, shutting one eye, and looking along the sights of the gun, his left hand going up mechanically to the salute-"John Giles, corporal. "Well!" (this to his crew)"Second company" (to the officer)— "Ready!-Woolwich division! Fire! Sponge and load!-I beg your pardon, sir, No. 1275." We need not add that the worthy corporal was far more intent upon his work than mindful of the kind compliment his Admiral was paying him, and his best reward was the hurrah of his gun-mates as they watched the shot plunge into the enemy's embra sure. "Opossum ahoy!" hails a brother gunboat captain; "do you know your stern-frame is all on fire?for smoke and flame were playing round one end of the little craft, whilst from the other she was spitefully firing upon the foe. "Bother the fire!" was the rejoinder; "I am not going to knock off pitching into these blackguards for any burning stern-posts. No men to spare, old boy!" "Werry hard hit, sir!" remarks the boatswain of the Lee to her gal · lant commander; "the ship is making a deal of water, and won't float much longer; the donkey - engines and pumps don't deliver one bucket of water for ten as comes into her!" "Cannot do more than we are doing," replies the commander-"it is impossible to get at the shot-holes from inside, and I will not order men to dive outside with shot-plugs, in this strong tide-way, and whilst I. am compelled to keep the propeller revolving." แ "There's no other way to keep the * We regret that we do not know the proper name of this gallant marine. ship afloat, sir!" urged Mr. Woods, "and if you please, sir, I'd like to go about that 'ere job myself." "As you volunteer, I'll not object, Woods," said the commander-" but remember it is almost desperate work; you see how the tide is running, and that I must keep screwing ahead to maintain station. You have the chance of being drowned, and if caught by the screw, you are a dead man. "Well, sir!" said Woods, looking as bashful as if sueing for some great favour-"I knows all that, and as far as chances of death go, why, it is 'much of a muchness' everywhere just now; and if you will keep an eye upon me, I'll try what can be done." Woods accordingly brought up & bag of seaman's clothes, tore it open, wrapped frocks and trousers round wooden shot-plugs, tied a rope's-end round his waist, and dived under the bottom of the Lee to stop up the shot-holes. Again and again the gallant fellow went down, escaping from the stroke of the screw as if by a miracle; for he often came up astern at the full length of his line, having been swept there by the tide. His exertions, however, were not successful, although he stopped as many as twenty-eight shot-holes; and the noble little Lee was soon found to be in a sinking condition. The Kestrel with colours flying, and still fighting under the gallant Lient.-Commander Bevan, went down in her station at 5.40 P.M., and affairs began to look very serious; yet the last thing thought of was defeat. One gunboat swings end on to a raking battery, and a shot immediately sweeps away all the men from one side of her bow-gun, as if a scythe had passed through them. "This is what they call a ratification, Billy! ain't it?" remarks the captain of the gun to one of the survivors; and raising his right arm, red with the blood of his slaughtered comrades, he cursed in coarse but honest phrase the folly and false humanity which in the previous year had allowed these mandarins to march off almost unscathed, "whilst we was a-looting brass-guns for the Tooleries" (Tuileries). Phirr! came along a bar-shot and a mass of woodwork and splinters knocked over and almost buried a commander and master of one of the gunboats. The remaining officer, a warrant-officer, rushes up and pulls them out from under the wreck. Though severely bruised, neither was, happily, killed. "All right, I hopes, sir!" rubbing them down-" legs all sound, sir!-ah! you will get your wind directly— but you must keep moving, sir; if you don't, they're sure to hit you. I was just telling the chaps forward the same thing-shot never hits a lively man, sir !-and, dear me, don't they work our bow-gun beautifully -that's right, lads! that's right! urged the enthusiastic gunner "keep her going! Lor! if old Hastings* could have seen that shot, Jim, he'd have given you nothing to do at the Admirality for all the rest of your born days." Thus manfully went the fight; explosions occurred now and then in the works, but nothing to indicate a destruction of any of the garrisonsthe two black flags in the upper battery still waved gently in the light air, and no sign of surrender or distress appeared on the Chinese side, except that all the embrasures showed a severe punishment must have been inflicted upon the men working the guns within them, and there seemed to be an inclination to cease firing upon the part of the enemy, or only to fire in a deliberate and desultory manner. Exhaustion was beginning to tell upon our men, just at the time that the shattered condition of their vessels called for most exertion. six o'clock all probability of forcing the barriers with the flotilla was at an end. The Kestrel was sunk, and the Lee obliged to be run on the mud to prevent her going down in deep water; many other vessels were filling owing to shot-holes By the Starling and Banterer aground -Plover disabled; and if the Nimrod or Cormorant, by any accident to their anchors or cables, fell across * A very irreverent allusion to Admiral Sir Thomas Hastings, who inaugurated the present excellent system of naval gunnery. Vansittart The gallant-hearted urged one last bold stroke to retrieve the honours of the day, and at any rate to save, if possible, the entire squadron from destruction. Captains Shadwell and Willes concurred in this view, though they well knew it was a neck-or-nothing attempt-in short, a forlorn hope, which might, if once fairly hand to hand with the enemy, drive him from his works, but at any rate the attempt would divert the fire from the shattered flotilla, and allow night to close in, and afford them an opportunity of saving all the vessels from destruction. And let any one weigh well what would have been the effect, throughout the seaports of China, to our countrymen and commerce, had those gallant officers lost all that squadron, as we believe they would have done in attempting a retreat at that juncture. The ingenious tactics of the enemy-Chinamen we will not call them-afforded just then an illusory ground for hope of a successful issue to an assault: they assumed the appearance of being silenced in many quarters, and only worked a gun here and there. An assault and escalade were at once ordered; the Opossum went to the rear, and, aided by the generous sympathy of the American Flag-Officer Tatnall-who, in his steamer the Toeywan, assisted very materially-the boats filled with the marines and small-arm men were brought up to the front. the stream, the channel would be for them to fight it out, and trust blocked up, and all the squadron be to their God for victory in a good lost. The senior officers saw that cause. nothing now remained but to withdraw, if it were possible, the squadron from the fight; the difficulties, however, in the way of such a manœuvre were almost insuperable. It wanted yet nearly two hours before darkness would set in-the passage over the bar could not be effected before dark, on account of high water not occurring until midnight-the night was moonless-the probabilities great against the vessels being able to find their way in the dark, down so narrow and tortuous a channel-and so long as the vessels remained within the bar, so long also must they be within range of those hard-hitting long guns, of the effects of which they had had that day such bitter experience. The reserve force of 600 fresh men had not yet been brought into action—they were begging to be allowed to retrieve the trembling fortunes of the day; even the crews of the sinking gunboats only asked to be allowed to land and grapple with the foe, who skulked behind his earthworks, whilst they (stripped to their trousers) had fought upon their exposed and open decks. There was yet another reason, which doubtless had its weight: out of the 1100 men and officers selected by the Admiral from his fleet to carry out the service which the representative of his Sovereign had called upon him to execute, only 25 were killed and 93 wounded at 6.20 P.M., after four hours' close hard fighting. That loss was simply insufficient to justify any officer in acknowledging himself thoroughly beaten, or in abandoning an enterprise. Uninterested spectators upon the bar may say, after the result, that they saw within ten minutes of the action being commenced, that the British would not succeed. It would have been an evil day for Admiral James Hope and his captains, had such an idea entered their heads at so early an hour. It is true, they felt that they had been inveigled into an ambush, but inasmuch as they went into it having taken every precaution against surprise, and prepared for battle, it remained alone At about seven o'clock, Captains Shadwell and Vansittart, Major Fisher, R.E., Colonel Lemon, R.M., Commanders John Commerell and W. A. J. Heath, and Commandant Tricault of the Imperial navy, headed this forlorn hope of seamen, sappers, and marines, their march across the mud being directed upon the outer bastion of the Grand Fort, as it appeared to have suffered most from the fire of our vessels. The cheers of the excited crews of the gunboats, the revived fire of the flotilla, and the dash of the boats to the point of dis barkation, warned the enemy but too well of the intended assault; and, to the astonishment of the assailants, strewn along their path. The flotilla had now to cease firing upon the point of assault, lest it should injure friends instead of foes. The excitement of the gun-crews may be imagined, as they saw the night closing around their comrades wrapt in the blaze of the enemy's fire, and they heard the exultant yells of the garrison, and marked the faint and desultory cheers, and ill-sustained reply of the assailants. It was with difficulty that they could in some cases be restrained from rushing to join the good or evil fortune of the fray; five hours' fighting had made all indifferent to life. As one gunboat went down, the crew modestly suggested to the commander, that as they could do no more good in her, it would be as well "to go over the mu1 and join our chaps on shore!" It is not fair to say such men can be beaten; all had become imbued with the heroic spirit of their chief -the infection had even spread to the American boats' crews. The calculating long-backed diplomatists of the United States, who had sent their Admiral and Envoy to reap the advantages for which Englishmen were fighting and dying, forgot that there were certain promptings of the heart which override all selfish considerations; and that, in short, as flag-officer Tatnall observed, "blood is thicker than water," ay, than ink either. An American boat visited one of our vessels, and on wishing to leave her, the officer found all his men had got out of the boat. After some delay they were found looking very hot, sinoke-begrimed, and fightish. Halloa, sirs," said the officer with assumed severity, "don't you know we are neutrals? have you been doing?" pardon," said the gallant fellows, looking very bashful; "they were very short-handed at the bow-gun, sir, and so we give'd them a help for fellowship sake;" they had been hard at it for an hour. Gallant Americans! you and your admiral did more that day to bind England and the United States together, than all your lawyers and pettifogging politicians have ever done to part us. or tidal ditch, and wading through its deep mud and some yards of perfect quagmire; beyond it another deep wet ditch was found, into which about two hundred men and officers recklessly dashed, wetting ammunition and muskets; only fifty of them, however, headed by Coinmanders Commerell, Heath, and Tricault, reached the base of the works; the rest, 150 in number, of the survivors in the advanced party, lined the edge of the wet ditch. Every attempt to bring up scaling-ladders resulted in the destruction of the party, and the garrison threw out light balls, by which they could see to slay the unfortunate men ontside the forts. The English were di inishing rapidly; there was no reserve or supports available; and at last, with deep reluctance, the leaders of this gallant band sent word to the senior officer afloat" that they could, if he pleased, hold their position in the ditches until daylight; but that it was impossible to storm without reinforcements." The order Was therefore given for a retreat; and in the words of Admiral Hope, this difficult operation in the face of a triumphant enemy was carried out with a deliberation and coolness equal to the gallantry with which the advance had been accomplished. The last men to leave the bloodstained banks of the Peiho, after having saved every wounded man that could be recovered, were the two gallant commanders, Commerell and Heath; and the severity of the enemy's fire upon this assaulting-party is best shown by the fact, that out of about six hundred men and officers, sixty-four were killed, and two hundred and fifty-two What were wounded. "Begs The issue of the assault was not long doubtful after crossing the first The management of the retreat devolved upon the able flag-captain, J. O. Willes-a most trying and anxious duty; for the enemy opened a perfect feu-de-joie from all sides, upon vessels and boats, and for a while threatened total destruction to the force. By 1.30 A.M. on the 26th the survivors of the forlorn - hope were embarked, and the process of dropping out the gunboats menced, with, however, but very partial success. The scene was terribly grand; the night was dark, the sea com |