Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/507

Book XI inland countries. Salabadjing consented to receive the deputy, and Mr. Johnstone was sent to his camp on the 1st of April. The three batteries continued a hot fire from the 25th of March to the 4th of April. On the 5th, the weather, which had hitherto been gentle, changed to a hard gale of wind, with thunder, lightning, and immense rain, which brought in the southern monsoon, with the return of fair weather on the 6th. In the evening the artillery officers reported, that there was no more than two day's ammunition left for the service of the batteries. Intelligence was likewise received, that Salabadjing was advancing from Bezoara, and that the French army of Observation, which he had invited, were very near his. It was now no longer possible for the English army to retreat the long way they had come, as the whole garrison of Masulipatam and the army of observation would join the Subah's in the pursuit. However, the camp might embark; for the shore at Masulipatam is still, and the only part on the coast of Coromandel, on which the sea does not beat with a strong surf. But Colonel Forde regarded this mode of retreat as intolerable disgrace, and resolved to storm the fort; judging, moreover, that the garrison would not suspect the attempt at the very time when the excess of the rain had rendered the approach over the morass much less practicable than before. He accordingly ordered the fire of the batteries to be kept up with double vivacity through the next day, and all the troops to be under arms at ten at night.

The ditch of the fort, at the ebb of the tide, which would happen at midnight, has only three feet water, and having no glacis, nothing prevented the immediate access. Notwithstanding the garrison had constantly repaired in the night the damages of the day, the hot and continued firing of this day had ruined the bastions sufficiently to mount; and each of the three had been equally fired upon, to confound the enemy's guess of the assault. As no outworks obstructed a full view of the body of the place, it was seen from the batteries, that the two bastions upon the sound on the extremities of the fort to the s. w. and the s. E. were in barbette, that is, without embrasures and merlons, but with a parapet low enough for cannon