Page:Chinese account of the Opium war (IA chineseaccountof00parkrich).pdf/34

 's ship first, and succeeded in damaging her bows, so that she reeled over, and some marines were drowned. For a long time we surrounded her, until all her ammunition was fired off; but the other ships sent a dozen or so of boats to surround 's junk, and, whilst was engaged with those, 's ship managed to escape. We picked up several corpses, and captured some arms and a flag: the facts were duly reported to the Emperor, who said "had caused the war by his excessive zeal, and had killed people in order to close their mouths." The meaning of this was that the Chê Kiang authorities were totally unable to do anything for the recovery of Ting-hai, and there was no possibility of anyone doing so except by fighting at sea, at which exercise the foreign ships excelled us; whilst it had been whispered to the Emperor that the foreigners might take advantage of China's unreadiness for war to invade the country. The Emperor had also now heard that, before the opium was surrendered, a promise, since broken, had been made to pay for it, which was the cause of hostilities: others told him that the Viceroy 's report of the Amoy affair was untrue. , Viceroy at Nanking, was therefore sent as Imperial Commissioner to Ningpo, and orders were sent to all the Governors of the Coast