When I am ordered to execute them, the least that I can do is to put them out of sight. I will now tell you,’ continued he, ‘what I have never told you before—that three times I have received intimations from the queen’s brother to assassinate all the white prisoners privately; but I would not do it. And I now repeat it, though I execute all the others, I will never execute your husband. But I can not release him from his present confinement, and you must not ask it.’ I had never seen him manifest so much feeling, or so resolute in denying me a favor, which circumstance was an additional reason for thinking dreadful scenes were before us. “The situation of the prisoners was now distressing beyond description. It was at the commencement of the hot season. There were above a hundred prisoners shut up in one room, without a breath of air excepting from the cracks in the boards. I sometimes obtained permission to go to the door for five minutes, when my heart sickened at the wretchedness exhibited. The white prisoners, from incessant perspiration and loss of appetite, looked more like the dead than the living. I made daily applications to the governor, offering him money, which he refused; but all that I gained was permission for the foreigners to eat their food outside, and this continued but a short time. “It was at this period that the death of Bandoola was announced in the palace. The king heard it with silent amazement, and the queen, in Eastern style, smote upon her breast, and cried, ‘Ama! ama!’ (alas! alas!) Who could be found to fill his place? Who would venture, since the invincible Bandoola had been cut off? Such were the exclamations constantly heard in the streets of Ava. The common people were speaking _low_ of a rebellion, in case more troops should be levied. For as yet the common people had borne the weight of the war; not a tical had been taken from the royal treasury. At length the pakan-woon, who a few months before had been so far disgraced by the king as to be thrown into prison and irons, now offered himself to head a new army that should be raised on a different plan from those which had hitherto been raised, and assured the king, in the most confident manner, that he would conquer the English, and restore those places that had been taken in a very short time. He proposed that every soldier should receive a hundred ticals in advance, and he would obtain security for each man, as the money was to pass through his hands. It was afterward found that he had taken, for his own use, ten ticals from every hundred. He was a man of enterprise and talents, though a violent enemy to all foreigners. His offers were accepted by the king and Government, and all power immediately committed to him. One of the first exercises of his power was to arrest Lanciego and the Portuguese priest, who had hitherto remained unmolested, and cast them