The Russellville Democrat., 1881-03-03

sacked, as Tacna and Pisagua had been,
 when it fellintothc handsof the Chiliaus.
 Its fall was even more important to the
 conquerors than the capture of Tacna.
 The town was garfisoned by 700 men,
 of whom 700 were killed, 100 wounded,
 and 800 captured. The Chilians lost l3O
 killed and about 200 wounded. Mean
 while tho Chilian fleet appeared off Cal
 lao, but was unable to approach sufi-
 ciently near to the city to keep up an
 efficient bombardment, and suffered
 severely from torpedoes, two fine ves
 sels being destroyed. The advance on
 Lima began by land from Pisco on Nov.
 10. Eighteen Gillian war vessels and
 transports appeared off Pisco, but their landing was so hotly resisted by the
 Peruvian force on shore that they were
 fain to land 10 miles away from the city. The Peruvian force amounted to only
 200 men, which was soon surrounded. The troops having been landed, the transports returned to Africa, and the troops marched by the shore on the Peruvian capital, distant from Pisco about 126 miles. Three divisions of Peruvian troops, with 8 guns, left Lima to oppose this force at every possible l point. The Chilians moved from Pisce ! with about 35,000 men. The force de- lending Lima has been yariously esti- mated at between 50,000 and 60,000 men. | The first news received here from the l time of the departure of the Chilian 1 troops from Pisco, in December last, was that they had reached the Peruvian de | fensive works erected near the beautiful
 seaside town of Chorilles, nine miles from the city of Lima, formidable posi- 1 ton, the capture of which in 1854 had | decided the fate of the dictator Echen- 1 ique. Yesterday came the news of a
 battle before Chorilles, resulting i'll the l defeat of the Peruvians, and to-day comes a circumstantial story of the fall of Lima. l The war has besn waged with great de- termination, and, unfortunately, also with great feroeity and a terrible waste of life and treasure. In the early part
 of the conflict fell the Gillian, Capt. Ar thur Prat, a sort of southern Paul Jones. 1 He commanded small wooden vessel of five hundred tons, which, after three hours fighting with the iron-clad Huas- car. went down with her flag flying. Arthur Prat jumped from his sinking vessel on board the Huascar, shot the first officer, and fell, covered with wounds Afterward some English ofli- cers, who had witnessed the fight, sent divers down for some memento of the fight. They recovered the flag, and pre- sented it to the Gillian government. In September last the Peruvians sank the
 Chilian ship Covadonga off the port of Chaucay by the following ingenious device: A valuable boat, finished in such a style that it would not escape atten- ton, was fitted with an explosive appar- atus containing tremendous charge of nitro-glycerine. The machine was at tached to keel and carefully boarded over, so that nothing butthe exploding of the charge could discover it. The fulmi- mating compound was connected by wire with the hoisting rings of the boat, so that immediately the falls were hauled out to lift her out of the water this dia- bolcal engine would explode. As soon as the boat drifted toward the Cava- donga boat was lowered to examine it.
 The boats crew swept lines under her
 keel and used other precautions, and then the Chilian commander ordered the boat to be brought alongside. No sooner were the falls hauled upon than the mine exploded and in three minutes the Covadonga sank. Of her crew of 330 men just half perished. Twenty escaped in the boat which had brought the
 derelic alongside, and which, curiously enough, was not destroyed, and 45 were taken prisoners by a Peruvian launch sent out from Chaucay. The organized
 force of Peru must now be utterly
 broken, and prolongation of the struggle
 can only lead 10 the ruin of both states.