NARRATIVE, &c. CHAPTER I. BATTLE OF CHUENPEE AND TY-COCK-TOW. List of Provincial Officers-Description of the Bogue and River-Western Branch - Ducks — Tay-wangkow Pearl River-French Missionary Captain Elliot refers to Commodore-Disposition of the Force -Capture of the heights of Chuenpee-Burning the Junks-Capture of Ty-cock-tow-Flag of TruceDestroying Forts-Preliminary arrangements-Chuenpee given up-Anecdotes-Hong Kong-Meeting of Keshen and Plenipotentiary-Keshen waveringTreaty broken off-Force proceeds to the Bogue. Alas! they liv'd too sure: I heard them roar : No mortal courage can support the fright.—DRYDEN. IN commencing a fresh Chapter with the new year, 1841, the accompanying list of the imperial cabinet at Pekin and the local authorities at Canton may assist the reader. Many of the high officers in this list have VOL II. B 2. CHINESE CABINET. already been spoken of, and their names will frequently occur in the following Chapters. NUY-KO, OR IMPERIAL CABINet. NAMES AND COMMON TITLES OF THOSE PRINCIPALLY CONNECTED WITH FOREIGNERS. * Imperial high commissioner at Canton. The policy of the Mantchow dynasty has ever been to divide the government officers between their own countrymen and the conquered Chinese; but the general-in-chief of an army is always a Tartar; the two next in rank probably may be Chinese. The operations, skirmishes, and battles, which took place in the Canton River, consequent on the bad faith of Keshen, the emperor, and his advisers, will be better understood by a short description of the river and its defences, which it became our duty to attack, and which speedily fell before the prowess of her majesty's arms. The Bocca Tigris, or Hoo-moon, but more commonly called the Bogue, is a narrow throat of the river, about forty-five miles from its entrance, and is formed by Chuenpee and Anunghoy Islands on its eastern, and that of Ty-cock-tow on its western side. It is nearly two miles across at its narrowest 4 FORTS IN CANTON RIVER. part, where the Islands of North and South Wangtong are situated. From Chuenpee, which has already been described, the land falls back to the eastward, forming between it and the point on which the Anunghoy, or Woman's Shoe batteries are placed, the extensive shallow bay, commonly known as Anson's. This point lies three miles north-north-west from Chuenpee. These powerful forts consisted of a new and well-built granite battery, forming two-thirds of the segment of a circle, and partly surrounding the old fort of Anunghoy. This fort mounted forty-two guns, four of which were Portuguese brass 68-pounders, purchased from the Macao authorities about two years since. The remainder were of Chinese construction, with an immense weight of metal in them, and of a large calibre. In a line from the northern end of this fort, and facing the river, was a straight work, mounting sixty heavy pieces, about one hundred and fifty yards of rocky beach intervening between it and the north Anunghoy battery, a circular fort mounting forty guns. Opposite to Anunghoy, and about threequarters of a mile distance from it, is North Wangtong, equally strongly fortified, and mounting one hundred and sixty-three pieces, while a chain extended from the southernmost, or new fort, to the Island of South Wangtong. This boom was composed of four parts of stout chain cables supported by immense wooden rafts; and it was lowered or hove up by windlasses at Anunghoy, or its eastern end, the western being secured round the rocks in the immediate vicinity of South Wangtong, An American gentleman who visited the ships during their stay at the Bogue, very quaintly remarked on the boom being alluded to, that the Chinese had asked his opinion of it: "Why, sir, I told them one of your line-of-battle ships would break it like a tobacco-stopper." Ty-cock-tow, or Great rising head, is on the west side of the throat, two and a quarter miles from and nearly opposite to Chuenpee. Upon this bold point was a powerful battery of twenty-five guns, while on the same shore |