Of all the departments those connected with the administration of the affairs of the commercial port were undoubtedly in the most hopeless state of muddle and remained so. In the private houses everything was topsy-turvy owing to all of the assistants being absent from duty. In the official departments the confusion was often due to there being too many engaged in each division, as every department worked its full staff overtime or obtained additional hands. The departments were on a war footing. There were many zealous persons without sufficient duties assigned to them to keep them fully employed who interfered in matters outside their own business, and there were some who insisted upon doing other people’s work and only attempting to do their own. All matters connected with mercantile shipping were now helplessly mixed. After the torpedo attack no vessels were allowed to move in the harbour, but the _Columbia_ escaped from the quarantine station and sailed away unnoticed and unchallenged. We were informed that she was sunk at sea by the enemy--quite untruly. The _Foxton Hall_ was abandoned within the inner harbour and allowed to drift; the _Wenchow_ was detained once because she had Japanese on board, next because she had no Japanese on board; the _Pleiades_, with many thousand sacks of flour for a consignee who had run away, was allowed to sail, conveying from the port provisions all needed. One knew not what to do. The first vessel given full permission to leave port, papers granted after the bombardment and after official inspection and all other formalities and requirements had been complied with absolutely, was fired upon by the guardship as soon as the captain attempted to obey the Port Admiral’s commands. The shells from the guardship killed two of the Chinese passengers, a girl had both legs blown off by the shot, and several Chinese were wounded severely. All these vessels were British-owned steamers sailing under the protection of the British flag. The _Fuping_ was fired upon in broad daylight, when she was within the harbour, and had her flag and signals flying. The firing was just as much a mistake or an outrage as was the unprovoked attack upon the Dogger Bank fishermen by Admiral Rojdestvensky’s fleet nine months later. It was unnecessary, unwarrantable, and only explicable by assuming that each bungler holding office disregarded every authority but himself, and acted as he thought best for the defence of the port according to his own lights and on his own responsibility.