Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall v3p1.djvu/431

 flotilla, has uniformly co-operated with me on this service, and another proof, if any such he wanting, of the gallantry, spirit, and enterprise displayed on all occasions by that part of H.M. navy serving on this expedition. * * * The guns taken by the light division of boats, are, to doubt, part of those intended for the defence of this place.”

About this period, Captain Ryves was invalided; and Lieutenant Edward Blanckley, of the Alligator, appointed acting commander of the Sophie; which sloop, we believe, took her final leave of Rangoon towards the end of the following month.

Early in May, the Hon. Company’s gun-vessels Sophia and Swift, the former loaded with provisions, the latter with ordnance and stores, foundered in a heavy squall, by which disaster one soldier and a camp follower perished.

The temporary repose enjoyed in the cantonments at Prome was, in the early part of the wet-season, enlivened by the accounts received of the success of Major Sale and Captain Marryat, whose departure from Rangoon, on an expedition against Bassein, we have mentioned at page 71: the following is an outline of their proceedings.

After a tedious passage, the Larne and her consorts arrived off Great Negrais, at the entrance of the Bassein river, on the 24th February; the next day, her boats, under Lieutenant Frazer, were sent in to reconnoitre and sound the passage, in the execution of which service they received a harmless fire from two stockades, apparently full of men, and distant about a mile from each other. On the 26th, at daylight, the armament weighed and stood in; the Mercury cruiser, on account of her light draught of water, taking the lead. At noon, the first stockade commenced firing; and shortly afterwards the Larne and the Mercury took their positions within 100 yards: the enemy soon fled, and the troops landed and occupied the work. The second stockade was taken in the same manner, without loss; both of them were burnt, and two 9 pounders, six sixes, two large