held their fire until the party of grenadiers were close to them, and then let fly with some effect. Lieutenant I. H. Hewitt with fourteen men hurried up to reinforce Venour’s detachment, and the street was cleared after sharp hand-to-hand fighting. Hewitt had a narrow escape: a Tartar cut at him with his sword, and the blow would have been fatal had not Private M‘Carthy “raised his musket and parried it, though unfortunately with the loss of his thumb, the sword cutting right through the bone, and also through Hewitt’s forage cap, slightly raising the skin of his head. We left a picket there,” continues Lieutenant Murray, “as occasional shots were still fired from the houses. A short time afterwards a Tartar soldier rushed in amongst the men and stabbed one of them in the side with his knife: he was shot instantly. We were obliged to set fire to the houses to drive the Tartars out of them, for we would not let the men follow them into the buildings.” Although the troops did their best to stop the frenzy of rage and terror which seized upon the population after we had captured the town, the number of people who committed suicide at Chinkiangfu was as great or even greater than at Chapoo. One instance among hundreds will prove how determined the Tartars were not to survive the disgrace of a defeat. When their General realised that the day was lost he retired to his house, ordered his servants to set fire to the building, and allowed himself to be burned to death. It was fortunate for the success of Gough’s little army that the overweening contempt of the Chinese for foreigners had prevented the employment of European adventurers to mould and lead their armies. Had the Tartar troops been trained and disciplined by Continental soldiers of fortune, as were the Sikhs, the enemies whom Gough was to encounter in a few years, a great array of British soldiers would have been required to win on the banks of the Yang-Tse-Kiang victories as decisive as those of Sobraon and Goozerat.[141] In the capture of Chinkiangfu two officers and thirty of the other ranks were killed, eleven officers and ninety-eight other ranks wounded, and three privates missing. The casualties among the small Naval landing party were three killed and twenty-one wounded. The XVIIIth lost one officer, Captain Collinson, and two private soldiers killed; one officer, Lieutenant S. Bernard, two sergeants, and fifteen privates wounded.