quarter, viz. from which Gough attacked the city; and some people suppose that if we had advanced from that side we should have met with some resistance.  My own opinion is, that the resistance would have been no great matter in any case, although, no doubt, if we had made the attempt in summer, and with sailors only, as some proposed when I came here in July, we should probably have met with disaster.  As it is, my difficulty has been to enforce the adoption of measures to keep our own people in order, and to prevent the wretched Cantonese from being plundered and bullied.  This task is the more difficult from the very motley force with which we have to work, composed, firstly, of French and English; secondly, of sailors to a great extent—­they being very imperfectly manageable on shore; all, moreover, having, I fear, a very low standard of morality in regard to stealing from the Chinese.  There is a word called ‘loot,’ which gives, unfortunately, a venial character to what would, in common English, be styled robbery....  Add to this, that there is no flogging in the French army, so that it is impossible to punish men committing this class of offences....  On the other hand, these incomprehensible Chinese, although they make no defence, do not come forward to capitulate; and I am in mortal terror lest the French Admiral, who is in the way of looking at these matters in a purely professional light, should succeed in inducing our chiefs to engage again in offensive operations, which would lead to an unnecessary destruction of life and property.  I proposed to Gros that we should land on the first day of the year, and march up to Magazine Hill.  He consented, and the chiefs agreed, so we landed about 1 P.M. at a point on the river bank immediately below the south-east angle of the city wall, which is now our line of communication between the river and Magazine Hill.  As we landed, all the vessels in the river hoisted English and French flags, and fired salutes.  We walked up to the hill along the top of the wall, which is a good wide road, and which was all lined with troops and sailors, who presented arms and cheered as we passed.  We reached the summit at about three.  The British quarter, which is a sort of temple, stands on the highest point, the hill falling pretty precipitously from it on all sides.  The view is one of the most extensive I ever saw.  Towards the east and north barren hills of considerable height, and much of the character of those we see from Hong-kong.  On the west, level lands cultivated in rice and otherwise.  Towards the south, the town lying still as a city of the dead.  The silence was quite painful, especially when we returned about nightfall:  but it is partly owing to the narrowness of the streets, which prevents one from seeing the circulation of population which may be going on within.  We remained at the top of the hill till about half-past five, during which time we blew up the Blue Jacket Fort and Gough Fort, and got back to our ships