294
Positions of the British and Chinese Forces.
MAY,
It is from such a state of inactive repose, in the very midst of the enemy, that the British forces have recently been aroused by the bold attempts which the Chinese had thereby been encouraged to make; and it is always during such a continuance of inactivity, that a crafty enemy is enabled to organize a system of espionage and secret ¡nfluence, to send into the invader's camp the vilest agents to kidnap or to poison. Of the proceedings of the Chinese in these respects, sundry accounts have from time to time appeared in the public prints, and others are daily reaching us: of their bolder operations, in the night-attack on Ningpò, and the resistance they offered when their advanced post at T'sz'kí was in turn attacked, full particulars are afforded in the circulars issued by H. B. M.'s plenipotentiary to the British community, contained in the last number.
At Amoy, a like state of inactivity has been rendered yet more un- avoidable by the smallness of the force left there, five companies of the 18th Royal Irish, at the moment of our writing reduced to three only, on the island of Kúláng sú,—and two or three ships of war in the harbor. Westward from Kúláng sú, au inlet or branch of the sea, for it is such rather than a river, runs up into the land in a westerly di- rection (soon becoming very shallow), to the departmental chief town of Changchau. Amoy itself, and Kúláng sú as its dependency, are not however subordinate to this city, but to that of Tsiuenchau (Chinchew), situated at the head of a bay somewhat farther up the coast than that of Amoy. More immediately, Amoy pertains to the district of Tungán, a dependency of the department of Tsiuenchau. It is chiefly in this department, as being within a convenient dis- tance of the capital of the province, that Iliáng the late governor of Kwángtung, now a special commissioner and (we believe) governor- general of Fukien and Chekiáng, makes at this time his residence. Another commissioner, Tuánkwá, is with him and also the late go- vernor-general Yen Petáu, disgraced for having been unable to save Amoy. Accounts received from thence to the 15th of April bring us rumors of an intended attack, to be made on Kúláng sú, from the direction chiefly of Changchau, by 20,000 men, with the aid of a band of pirates and robbers, and a squadron of fire-boats. Not a doubt can we feel, that captain Smith, who, in the Volage and Druid successively, has been so long among us, and has had such numerous opportunities of witnessing these dread attacks by fire-boats, and who so well knows how to temper firmness with kindness and moderation in his treatment of the people, will, aided by the timely warning