Directory_and_Chronicle_1841 — Page 532

1841.

Six Months with the Chinese Expedition.

515-

In the several engagements which have taken place. between the British and Chinese forces, there have been instances of brave con- duct, which would do honor to the people of any country. Speaking of an affair of the Blonde at Ningpo, our author says, "the Chinese are described by those engaged here to have shown no want of personal courage; nor did it appear that any imputation could be cast upon them at Chusan, where our force was so infinitely superior and their defenses so utterly puerile." So at Chapon, "a mandarin ou the ramparts made himself particularly conspicuous, vauntingly parading his person and directing his soldiers, whilst the shot from the Alge- rine was falling around him in all directious." The Chinese lack discipline more than courage. Let then be trained and well found with European implements and munitions of war, and depend on it they will prove themselves no contemptible foe.

The following is lord Jocelyn's account of the fire which occurred in the suburbs on the night of the 5th of July.

"Before sunrise that morning a fire had broken out in the suburbs where some of the regiments were quartered, and where the guns from the squadron on the previous day had done their chief havoc, At the hour it was first perceived the boats of the men-of-war were collecting with their seamen, to act as a reinforcement in the attack on the town. They were immediately countermanded, aud directed to land with fire-buckets to assist in extinguishing the flames. It was still dark; and the large warehouses on the beach were stored with samshu, a composition something like whiskey, and extracted from rice. The ammunition of the dismounted ordnance was scattered on the ground; and amidst the fallen ruins of the place the killed and wounded Chinese still lay stretched. The fire burst out in a sudden flame; it soon communicated with some of the tubs of aminu- nition, which went off in loud explosions. The flames were then seen to leap along the tops of the houses containing the samshu; and these, blazing out in volumes of light, communicated with one ano- ther, until all the shipping in the harbor was illuminated with the blaze, the glare from the spirits shedding its sickly light over the sol- diery and seamen. Every endeavor had been made by the officers the previous evening to destroy the sainshu, but it afterwards appear- ed the whole place was a manufactory, and flooded with the spirit. Some people imagine that the fire was occasioned by the Chinese, but it seems far more probable that it arose from the carelessness of the soldiery themselves." Page 61