This embittered our men very much against the Chinese, and we may almost wonder that their prisoners, when they fell into our hands, received such lenient treatment in return. The story is well known of Captain Anstruther's capture at Chusan, at the distance of only two or three miles from the town, his being tied up in a sack, and subsequently carried over in a boat to Ningpo on the mainland, and the curious history of his confinement in a bamboo cage, three feet long by two feet broad; and other instances of a similar kind, in which the prisoners were treated with the utmost barbarity, have been so often recounted, that a passing allusion to them will here be sufficient. Captain Anstruther, however, would seem to have been more leniently treated than many of the other prisoners: and I have heard him declare that, with respect to the better class of mandarins at Ningpo, he had little cause of complaint to urge against them, considering that he was a _prisoner_ in an enemy's hands. His talent for drawing, however, enabled him to conciliate their good will, and to earn for himself some indulgences which others were not fortunate enough to procure. He sold his drawings and particularly his portraits, for a tolerable price. Many of the other prisoners, however, were treated with frightful barbarity, and, in some instances, they were put to death. A much more formidable enemy to us than the Chinese was soon discovered, in the terrible sickness which broke out among our troops at Chusan, and carried off many a brave man prematurely to his grave. The low, swampy rice-grounds surrounding the town, the want of proper drainage, the exposure to the hot sun, and the use of the deleterious spirit which the Chinese call samshoo, made from rice, (of which a vast quantity was manufactured on the island for exportation,) all these causes combined sufficed to produce fever, dysentery, and various complaints, which committed great havoc among the men. The island was subsequently, however, rendered less unhealthy by better arrangements, and by enforcing greater cleanliness. At Amoy, after the affair of the Blonde, a strict blockade was maintained by the Alligator and other vessels, which interrupted the whole trade of that important commercial city. But none of our ships astonished and alarmed the Chinese so much as the steamers; they were particularly alluded to in the official reports to the emperor, and were described as "having wheels at their sides, which, revolving, propelled them like the wind, enabling them to pass to and fro with great rapidity, acting as leaders;" and it is not surprising that the Chinese should soon have christened them the "Demon Ships."