The new general showed himself an able tactician, by seizing upon one of the most impracticable and difficult positions in the vicinage, at a place called Kummeroot, five miles from the Shoe-Dagon Pagoda. This place it was highly necessary should be captured, and accordingly, on the 8th of July, the enterprise was determined upon. The following account, by an eye-witness, is the best that has been given us:[296]— “There were two roads leading from the Pagoda in the direction we wished to pursue, one a mere footpath, the other passable for guns. General Macbean preferred the former, and left his artillery behind. The enemy not expecting us by this path, we marched through the jungle for three miles without seeing a soul, although in the wood to our left voices could be distinctly heard, and also the sound of the axe falling on trees, which they were felling to erect their fortifications; but after marching this distance, two stockades were descried a few yards in advance. The general instantly halted, to enable the troops, which were marching in single file (and consequently occupied a great length of ground), to form column, during which time we could observe small parties of Burmahs, armed with muskets, coming from the opposite wood to reinforce the stockades. Firing, also, was heard to the left, which indicated that Sir Archibald Campbell was engaged; and General Macbean, therefore, made his dispositions for an attack. Brigadier McCreagh, with five hundred men from his Majesty’s 13th and 38th regiments, commanded by Majors Sale and Frith, were formed in a column of subdivisions, and with unloaded muskets and fixed bayonets directed to advance on the work. This movement was effected with so much rapidity, order, and regularity, that to be in possession of this stockade, and moving on to attack the next, was the affair of a moment. The second was abandoned on the approach of the column, and we then discovered, in a large plain backed by the jungle, a succession of stockades, amounting in all to seven. This did not deter the troops from escalading and capturing a third stockade, and then rushing on to the largest: there the column experienced some loss, in consequence of the delay in bringing up the scaling-ladders through the muddy paddy-fields; but when they arrived, the work was assaulted at all points.... The panic that now took place among the Burmahs can scarcely be described; rushing in crowds towards the only gate through which they might escape, they completely choked it up: others then attempted to climb over the walls, but were mowed down by our shot, and those at the gate were falling by dozens. Some became quite desperate, and with their long, dishevelled black hair streaming over their shoulders, and giving them the most ferocious appearance, seized their swords with both hands, and dashed on the bayonets of the soldiers, where they met with that death which they seemed alternately to fear and