From this, and from the general appearance of the town, it may be assumed that the actual damage done in the last twenty-four hours’ incessant shelling was nearly equal to that which was the effect of many days’ dilatory bombardment on the part of the Chinese. The casualties, which were the result of it, were undoubtedly heavier than those which occurred in the settlements, from a similar cause, during the whole month’s siege. The further one went into the city, the more horrible were the scenes with which one was confronted. Shrapnel, common shell, and lyddite had spared no one; every type was to be found there lying where they fell, killed, one might almost say, by an accident,—male and female, old men and little naked children. Brutalised as one gets when fighting against a merciless foe, it makes one shudder even now to look back on it! The numbers were largest towards the north gate, but in this case men were looking on the bodies of their proper enemies, the paid soldiers of the hostile government; and, after gazing on the scene just pourtrayed (one hundred times more lightly than the reality, out of respect for the feelings of those who peruse this chapter) there was for them no room for sentiment. Rather sad too was the sight of the ten or twelve corpses, all laid on hastily improvised stretchers, to be seen in most of the courtyards of the Yamens, which had evidently been turned into hospitals for the occasion. Some of these had been attended to while still alive, but the bandages were put on in a careless and slovenly manner, and testified neither to the skill nor the attention of the native doctors. No wounded were found in these places, which points to the fact that the Chinese, even in their hasty retreat, retained some of the cohesion without which any body of armed men quickly becomes a rabble. There was plenty of evidence to prove that anarchy had reigned supreme for the last day or two; many houses had been forcibly entered, and their less valuable contents strewn about the streets; and the severed heads of several Boxers were to be seen hanging to poles by their pigtails, which showed dissension had been rife between the Regulars and their fanatical Auxiliaries. All sanitary arrangements had been disregarded, and a most unpleasant reek of decomposing garbage offended the senses at every turn.