The effect of the Allies’ fire, on the contrary, was soon visible. The pagodas dotted all over the city, which were used by the Chinese as look-out towers, crumbling up and falling in, burning themselves, and setting light to other buildings, was indeed a sharp reminder of the past three weeks, when the Allies had been impotent to reply. The city, like all other Chinese towns, was densely built, and thickly populated; and under the fire, which lasted for four hours, many of the inhabitants must have lost their lives. One very sad incident occurred at the height of the artillery duel. The shells used by the captured Chinese guns were of a variety known as ringed shell, and were of an excessively sensitive nature. To prevent accidents, while loading they had a plug in the head of each, which acted as a safety arrangement until the weapon was fired. In some way this had become displaced in one of them, and on placing it in the breech it exploded, blowing one of the marine gunner’s arms off, and wounding several others. The two guns were not afterwards employed; they are now filling the position of trophies at Whale Island—the Naval School of Gunnery near Portsmouth. About half-past two, another move was made in the direction of the object of the morning’s reconnaissance; the composition of the force being the same, with the addition of a 9-pr. gun for which it was hoped to find a position, whence the enemy’s gun could be silenced, before starting the attack. Unfortunately the Chinese had evidently anticipated some movement of the kind, for they had reinforced their position strongly, and fighting commenced before the attacking force had got 300 yards away from the French settlement. It soon became evident that a hopeless task lay before them; the position for their gun, which had been selected carefully in the morning, was now full of the enemy, and the houses in their front were positively teeming with Imperial troops who kept up a hot fire on anything in the shape of a hat, boot, or rifle that was visible. A flanking movement was impossible because of the very limited space in which they fought, and for the same reason only a very small number of the troops engaged could come into action. This did not apply to the enemy, because the Allies were in reality attacking the vertex of a triangle, whereas the Chinese were defending the base. The Wei-Hai-Wei regiment was in the fighting line, and fought most doggedly for some time, but finding it impracticable to advance, and the casualties becoming rather heavy, the whole force fell back on the French barricade, their rear protected by the two companies of seamen from the “Barfleur,” who retired by sections, firing as they went, until the whole force moved into safety. It was just before the retirement commenced that the officer in command of the fighting line (Major Bruce) was severely wounded, at the same moment that Midshipman Esdaile received two wounds which shortly proved fatal.