Captain Anson's object was to remain here during the monsoon, and to obtain a supply of provisions for his voyage home. During his stay in the river he had to submit to various annoyances. The Chinese authorities treated him in a way for which they were then and have ever since been notorious. The provisions they promised were not forthcoming, and the traders endeavoured to cheat the strangers in all sorts of ways. The fowls which had been brought on board quickly died, and the crew thought that they had been poisoned. On examining them it was found that they had been crammed with stones and gravel, to increase their weight. The hogs also which had been purchased ready killed had had water injected into them, and even the live ones had had salt given them to increase their thirst, so that they had drunk vast quantities of water, and were inflated. Even at the last, hearing that the barbarians, as they called the English, never ate anything which died of itself, the Chinese managed to drug the animals so that they died before the ship was out of harbour, numbers of boats following to pick up the carcases. Anson's greatest difficulty was to obtain food, and Anson had himself to go up to Canton, the contractors not having prepared the bread they had promised, nor any other articles of food. At last the authorities had the impudence to demand port dues for the ship. This Captain Anson, answering that she was a man-of-war, and that he had not come to trade, refused to pay. He at last dispatched a letter to the Viceroy, insisting that his various demands should at once be complied with. He, with some of his officers and a boat's crew, had gone up to Canton, when a fire broke out in the town, which threatened to burn down the whole place. Chiefly by his and his men's exertions the fire was got under, although not until a large amount of damage had been done. It consumed a hundred shops and eleven streets full of warehouses. When the fire was subdued, many Chinese merchants came to Captain Anson and requested him that he would allow each of them one of his "soldiers," as they called his boat's crew, to guard their warehouses and dwelling-houses, which they feared might be pillaged, should any tumult arise. He granted their request, and had the satisfaction of finding that his men had behaved themselves with great diligence and fidelity. Next morning many of the inhabitants waited on the commodore to thank him for his assistance, frankly owning that they could never of themselves have extinguished the fire. Captain Anson's conduct on this occasion greatly assisted him in his subsequent proceedings with the timid and treacherous Chinese.