the French General, it is a feather in Grant’s cap.  The Chinese are just the same as they were when I knew them formerly.  They fired the cannons with quite as little accuracy, but there was one point of difference in their proceedings.  On previous occasions we have always found their forts open on one side; so that, when they were turned, the troops left them and escaped.  In this instance they were enclosed with ditches, palisades, stakes, &c., so that the poor fellows had nothing for it but to remain in them till they were pushed out by bayonets.  Almost all our casualties occurred during the escalade.  I went through the hospitals yesterday, and found very few who had been struck by round shot.  A very small portion of the force was engaged, so that my opinion of its unnecessary magnitude is not shaken.  I need not describe the action for you, as you will no doubt see elsewhere a detailed account of it.  My own personal history will not be indifferent to you.  I left the ‘Granada’ at about 5.30 P.M. on the 20th (Monday).  Found some dinner and a tent at the camp at Sinho.  Started next morning at about 5.30 A.M.; rode into Tangkow, where I now am, and mounted to the top of the Head-quarters’ House, whence I had a very good view of the operations.  I was dislodged after a while, because a battery opened fire at about fifteen hundred yards from us, and some of the balls fell so near, that we began to think they were perhaps firing at me.  On being dislodged from my Belvidere, I took some breakfast to console myself; and soon after, seeing the British flag on the fort which we had been attacking, I rode over to it.  We met a good many of our own wounded, and all round the fort were numbers of the poor Chinamen, staked and massacred in all sorts of ways.  I found the two Generals there, and soon after the Admiral came up from his ship under a flag of truce.  Two letters came to me from the Chinese; but, true to my policy of letting the fighting men have all the prestige of taking the Forts, I would not have anything to say to them.  The messengers were told that they must give up the forts to the Commanders-in-Chief before I would listen to them; and that, in the meantime, the army would proceed with its operations.  They moved on accordingly, and I returned to my post of observation at Tangkow.  I had hardly reached it when the rain began, and in about an hour the roads had become absolutely impassable for artillery, and nearly so for everything else.  The troops met with no resistance at the second fort, and the indefatigable Parkes having gone over to the unfortunate Governor-General, extorted from him a surrender of the whole, which he brought to the Commanders-in-Chief on the morning of the 22nd, having, I believe, dictated its terms.  Of course, Grant’s triumph is complete, and deservedly so. ...  The system of our army involves such an enormous transportation of provisions, &c., that we make, however, but slow progress.  I have, therefore, urged the Admiral, who has got