to see Donabew, come as friends, and I will show it you. If you come as enemies, LAND!”[309] On the 1st of April the batteries opened, and by the 2nd the enemy had decamped. It was discovered that Bundoola had met his death on the preceding day, by the bursting of a shell. All the courage of the Burmese warriors had fled with his departing spirit. The greatest general, since the golden days of Alompra, the devoted to Buddha; he had won his way to the most responsible position in the king’s service, only to be singled out, as it were, by some supernatural power, as the victim of the fireballs of the persevering islanders of the far-off ocean. No wonder, then, that the superstitious Burmese, on beholding the fate of their commander, gave themselves up for lost. What a mysterious power the English seemed to have of singling out the head of their army, and destroying him! So they fled, and the British became masters of Donabew, where they found much welcome supply of corn and military stores. Notwithstanding the momentary panic of the Avan government, it soon regained its customary arrogance. The _Edinburgh Review_ has some remarks, which, though rather premature for our progress in the history, I shall here introduce. “But blood and treasure might be still more unprofitably expended. The ignorance and arrogance of the court of Ava are almost beyond occidental credence. When its favourite general, Bundoola, invaded Chittagong, our southernmost district, at the commencement of the last war, he brought with him golden fetters to bind Lord Amherst withal; and had orders, after he had taken Calcutta, to march on to take London! Defeat after defeat seemed to produce little sobering effect upon the drunkenness of Indo-Chinese pride; the officers who were flying before our army in its advance upon the capital, and who must have felt the utter hopelessness of the contest, were obliged, as their intercepted letters vouched, to account in the most absurd manner for their inability to stop us; and the unfortunate wretch who commanded the troops that made the last stand against us, at a place called Pagahm Mew, was trampled to death by elephants on his return with the news of his defeat. It was not until our army arrived within three days’ march of the capital that the king’s eyes appeared to be opened to any rational sense of his perilous situation; and there was evidence enough, before we evacuated the country, that the effect even of such severe discipline as the exaction of a million sterling towards the expenses of the war, and the cession of some of his most valued provinces, was not likely to be permanent.”[310] CHAPTER VIII. 1825-1826. Arrival at Prome—Prome under English rule—Re-assembly of the Burmese armies—Negotiations for peace—Battle of Meaday—Melloon—Yandabo—Treaty of peace.