field-piece his comrades had got ready to fire. We hauled up the anchor and got under weigh once more, but only to be hailed again by the next guard of soldiers at the battery some fifty yards farther down-stream. Once again we hove to. This time it was to take on a wounded man, who, they said, was a spy. I guessed that this was part of their joke, as we knew perfectly well that a suspicion of being a spy would have been more than enough to have sealed that man's fate. Just as we had got under weigh for the third time in our short run to Hankow, the Imperialists fired a volley at us from somewhere in the neighbourhood of the China merchant's godown. Most of the bullets fell short, some struck the water by the side of the boat just below where a group of Red Cross workers were standing. We then realised that the greycoats had worked their way back to the side of the river again. A few moments more, and the waterway between Wuchang and Hankow had become a veritable hell. Scores of boats were on the river, some being full of fleeing soldiers and others crammed with civilians, trying to get away from the greycoats; but orders had been given in Wuchang that all deserting Revolutionaries were to be shot, and so all craft on the river came in for a terrible cross fire from rifle, machine gun, shrapnel, and shell. We ran alongside and got off our thirty wounded, and a little later, when some of the boats that had weathered the storm of shot and shell began to drift down, I suggested that we should take the launch out into midstream and pick up the boats as they came down-river on the chance of finding some still alive. In this way we rescued three soldiers unwounded, six civilians and soldiers wounded, mostly of serious character, and then towed two boatloads of dead across to the Wuchang side and sent off the three unhurt soldiers with them. One of the wounded we had picked up died almost immediately. Our attention was next attracted to a big boat crammed with men, women, and children which was trying to reach the Wuchang side of the river. Destitute of oars, the panic-stricken folk were using the loose floor boards in frantic attempts to escape. On our approach they set up terrible cries for mercy. By the time we got alongside we were close in to the Wuchang shore, not far from a huge timber-raft. The scene was truly piteous. Women were on their knees imploring us to spare them. One man was so beside himself with terror that he jumped into the air and threw himself on to the deck, evidently under the impression that he was plunging into the water. In vain we tried to tell them that we had come to save and to heal the wounded who were lying about the boat. Then a new difficulty arose. Just as we seemed to succeed in calming the fears of the terrified creatures a company of Revolutionary soldiers raced down the banks and along the huge raft with their rifles at "the ready." One or two dropped down behind the logs,