The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-03 00:00:00

motions, given the order to my chief boatman, who
steered, to keep straight on our own course with-
out paying the least attention to the 1 irates, and
precisely as if there was no other i essel in the
river but our own. This order hs now strictly
observed ; and the pirates had in consequence the
deliberate and undisturbed selection of the position
they thought most effective. They were about 30
or 40 yards from each other. The leading one had
one gun and about 15 men, the second two guns
and some 20 men, and the third two guns and
some 25 men—in all five guns, six or nine
pounders, and some 60 men, who must have been
partly, if not altogether, southern fellows, as, in
the morning, my people had heard the two that ap-
proached us hailing each other in Canton and Fuh-
keen dialects. On our side we were two Europeans
armed with small arms, and ten Chinese, the latter
non-combatants, except in so far as they aided me
in loading. My craft was slipping along at about
three miles an hour through the water, which was
scarcely ruffled by a ripple. We were going along in
6 or 8 fathoms, and in the middle of the river, which
is there four miles broad. The weather was clear
as well as quiet, only a thin layer of white clouds
somewhat obscuring the sun:
As we got nearly abreast of the rearmost pirate,
all three simultaneously hoisted the lower portions
of their mainsails; and though, with the exception
of the men doing this work, their red-capped crews
were clustered in front of or under the house abaft
the mainmast in seeming indifference, there could
no longer be the least doubt what their intention
was. I then rose, told my servants to put the rat-
tan chair into the cabin, and taking up my four
revolvers, moved forward and placed them on the
dog-hold hatch, just abaft the foremast, where there
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to port or starboard to
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was most space forme
either side of my craft. I then took my Jacob.
As I did so, a man in the rearmost pirate waved a
red flag, and the attack began. All three turned
their heads towards us, their crews raised a
clamour of ferocious yells and cries, and the
pullers took to their oars and pulled hard. I still
did not fire. I expected that, from the Chinese
usual mode of aiming along the line of metal, their
shot would pass over us if we were even closer,
while I should have a better chance with my
smooth bores. I was at last just about to take
aim,. when the leading boat, then about 60
yards distant, fired and sent not a round shot but
a shower of grape across us. It was well aimed,
so far as level was concerned, but passed a few yards
in advance of myself, just across our bows where
no one was standing. At the same instant rattan
shields were raised and somehow shipped all round
the pirate craft, one in advance of each puller, and
others round the bows screening the fellows at
the gun there. Catching sight, however, of
one of their red head-dresses over the top of one
shield on the starboard bow, I aimed about a
foot below it at the shield, and the fellow got the
bullet through his shoulder. This I was told after
the fight by my boatmen who, from their position
aft, could see better, and who said that this man
was very badly hurt in the shoulder. I myself
had no time to watch the effect of my shot, for the
two leading craft were coming very near indeed—
looked, in fact, as if they must in thirty or forty
seconds close with us. I therefore fired my smooth
bores in rapid succession into them, beginning with
the long singles and ending with the short doubles.
By the time that was done my head coolies had
reloaded Jacob, which I again fired. Marking then
that our assailants' onset had been somewhat
checked, and that they could not immediately close
with us, I reserved my revolvers for their original
purpose, that of repelling an actual attempt to
board, and commenced recharging the smooth bores.
M'Cutchem, who was immediately in front of
the cabin door, had fired the Sharpe into the
leading vessel immediately on my beginning,
and then , kept steadily on recharging an d
firing, aiming like myself always at the most avail-
able mark in that pirate craft, which at the mo-
ment seemed pressing nearest, and more especially
at the pullers. The pirates in the meanwhile dis-
charged all their guns at us, and then reloaded and
again fired, again with grape, with the exception
of one gun that fired a round shot. But our fire
checked the pullers so much that all three craft,
instead of coming alongside, fell astern, so that
after the fourth or fifth rifle shot (I did not again
discharge the smooth bores), I and my man were
obliged to jump up on to the roof of the main
cabin, aen to the after part of it, and fire thence.
Before, however, they fell much astern, the third
boat had passed somewhat on to the starboard
quarter, and thence made an attempt to set fire to
our mainsail, as it projected out on that side before
him. I had just discharged from the cabin roof
my rifle down the line of the pullers' shields in
the second craft (the oars were going, yet I
could not, high up though I was, see anything of
the men), when a fellow rushed out openly from
the house of the third craft, with a thick bam-
boo tube at the end of a stick, and from which he
discharged a shower of balls of white fire, one of
which fell short of the mainsail only by a few yards.
By the time I had fired about 12 Jacobs, and
Andrew had nearly exhausted his stock of 20 cart-
ridges, the action we s nerrly over. The pirates
could have almost maintained, with their sails alone,
those distances of 50 to 70 yards astern of us, into
which they first fell on bee-ing down slantingly on
vs; and if their oars had been kept steadily and
vigorously going they could have gained upon us.
But at the period indicated they had not only all
ceased pulling, but had got their three craft close
to the wind, endeavouring to got out of the reach of
the dangerous missiles that were being sent into
them. The Sharpe was made over to me when
was in England by Mr. Kerr, the superintendent
or the works of the London A*moury Company,
who had himself brought it from. the United
States. Fired at :200 or 300 yards distance
against an iron target, it flattens a conical bullet
of two-thirds of an ounce weight into a little
leaden cake ; and I have knocked the sand
up with it in the midst of a flock of wild geese, on
a bank that was at least 1,000 yards off. The Jacob,
which throws a still heavier bullet, is well known
to be the very king of shoulder weapons. No small
arm has yet been proved equal to it for power and
accuracy; and mice is an excellent example, made
expressly for me by Blanch. The smooth bores
did invaluable service in checking the spirit of the
first rush at us, but it is to the two rifles that I at-
tribute the definitive repulse of our assailants.
What was originally the leading craft went off
first, with not a man s:sible about it, even the
steersman managing to keep out of sight; and I am
inclined to think that its crew must have suffered
most. Apart from such loss as they may have suf-
fered in killed and wounded, it was satisfactory to
think that all of them must have felt considerably
humiliated and discouraged at the signally abortive
result of their deliberate attempt to murder and

rob a peaceful foreign gentleman and Lis set,

rants. They had sent nine showers of grape and
one round shot at us, besides the fire-balls above

mentioned.

Yet the two foreigners, though

they had been fighting exposed to full view, re-
mained un hurt, and were still actively engaged in

assailing them. As they were going off, I sent
after them first two rifle shells at 600 and 1,000
and then a solid bullet at 1,500 yards elevation.
The 1,000
yards shell was seen to strike the water
in very good line with one of them, and only a little

short. The 1,500 yards bullet, sent chiefly to show
them the range of the weapon, must have gone right
over the middle craft, if it did not actually strike
her. Shortly after that, they were in a cluster
with their heads together; and wishing them JOY
of their mutual felicitations I descended to put the
arms in order again, and attend to our further pro-
gress.

We havo no loss to grieve us on our side. My
English servant received without injury a spent
grapeshot on the waistband; and the coolie -who
loaded my rifle was also struck, but also without
being' hurt. All the Chinese behaved very well.
None went down below ; and the coolies just
mentioned and a body servant who helped him
in loading, stood up to their work quite exposed,
although several of the first volleys of grape flew
with great force about U. The steersman stuck to
his post and kept the vessel steadily on her course,