The following day the village of Bequah was taken, and further severe skirmishing took place at the passage of the Ordah, which had to be bridged, and while the baggage convoy was being packed at Ordahsu, a further effort was made to disturb the column, and Lieutenant Eyre was killed. Here the defence was half-hearted, and the capture of the capital, Coomassie, was not opposed. It was “a town over which the smell of death hangs everywhere and pulsates on each sickly breath of wind--a town where, here and there, a vulture hops at one’s very feet, too gorged to join the filthy flock preening itself on the gaunt dead trunks that line the road; where blood is plastered like a pitch coating over trees, floors, and stools--blood of a thousand victims yearly-renewed; where headless bodies make common sport; where murder, pure and simple, monotonous massacre of bound men, is the one employment of the king, and the one spectacle of the populace.”[68] One of the many reasons for the war was a wish to put down the barbarous horrors of King Koffi Calcali’s reign, and a stipulation to that effect was made in the treaty, but it was disregarded. It required a second expedition to carry the measure into effect, by the deposition of the king’s successor, Prempeh, and the bloodless occupation of the capital--measures over which gloom was cast by the death of Prince Henry of Battenberg. Finally, in the first expedition, the city was set on fire, the king’s palace destroyed, and the army turned back to the coast. It was quite time; the rains had set in, and what were rivulets on the march up were now unfordable streams on the march back. Men half swam, were half dragged over these, their clothes being carried on the heads of natives. In one case, the bundle was lost, and, it is said that the unfortunate owner paraded the next morning with nothing but his helmet and rifle! The war was over, and a treaty of peace signed; but after the retirement of Sir Garnet Wolseley from Coomassie, Captain Reginald Sartorius, who led the advance of Captain Glover’s force from the Volta, rode alone through the ruins of the city to communicate with the general commanding, and won thus the Victoria Cross. But this expedition was too late to join hands with the main column, though it had some skirmishing on the way; as also were those of Captain Butler with the Akims, and Captain Dalrymple with the Wassaws. Small as the war was, and of very short duration, it was sufficiently deadly. By July 9, 1874, thirty-eight officers of the whole force were dead.[69]