The town had been entirely sacked by the Chinese soldiery, who had lately made a practice of devastating all towns and villages through which they passed, and who had on this and other occasions caused a very great loss to their own countrymen. Had the force arrived at Ho-si-wa three hours later, the advance would have been seriously retarded, for it was discovered that the banks of the river had been tampered with to such an extent that another hour or two’s work would have sufficed to pierce them, in which case the water level would undoubtedly have sunk about two feet, thus necessitating the future transportation of stores by land—a task by no means to be lightly undertaken, with the limited means at hand. The Chinese were extremely fond of this mode of harassing the advance, and one of these occasions gave rise to a very plucky action on the part of a midshipman with the Naval Brigade. Some lock gates had been forced open against the current, and had been held open by large hawsers and strong stakes which had been driven into the mud; broken glass, bricks, and other rubbish were also requisitioned to back up the stakes. It can be thus seen that it would be a very dangerous task to dive and clear away the various impediments at the bottom of the river, for so great would be the rush of water that in all probability the hawsers would carry away and nip any one who attempted it. However, the river was wasting itself into a canal, and over the surrounding country, and the water was getting lower and lower, so a midshipman volunteered to close the gates, which he only succeeded in doing after two or three hours’ constant diving into 9 feet of muddy water!