From a letter of Mr. Boardman’s we take some extracts.  He says:  “On Lord’s-day morning, the 9th instant, at four o’clock, we were aroused from our quiet slumbers by the cry of ‘Teacher, master, Tavoy rebels!’ and ringing at all our doors and windows.  We were soon awake to our extreme danger, as we heard not only a continual report of musketry within the town, but the balls were frequently passing over our heads and through our house; and, in a few moments, a large company of Tavoyans collected near our gate, and gave us reason to suspect they were consulting what to do with us.  We lifted our hearts to God for protection, and Mrs. Boardman and little George were hurried away through a back door to a retired building in the rear.  I lay down in the house (to escape the bullets), with a single Burman boy to watch and communicate the first intelligence.”

On the kind invitation of Mrs. Burney, the wife of the English resident, who happened to be absent, they sought shelter from the storm of bullets in the Government-house.  Mr. Boardman continues:  “We had been at the Government-house but a short time, when it was agreed to evacuate the town and retire to the warf—­a large wooden building of six rooms.  Our greatest danger at this time arose from having, in one of the rooms where many were to sleep, and all of us were continually passing, several hundred barrels of gunpowder, to which, if fire should be communicated accidentally by ourselves, or mischievously by others, we should all perish at once.  But, through the kind care of our Heavenly Father, we were preserved alive, and nothing of importance occurred until the morning of Thursday, a little before daybreak, when a party of five hundred advanced upon us from the town, and set fire to several houses and vessels near the warf.  But God interposed in our behalf, and sent a heavy shower of rain, which extinguished the fire, while the Sepoys repelled the assailants.”

Mrs. Boardman’s biographer says:  “What could be more appalling to the stoutest heart than the situation of Mrs. Boardman and her helpless family?  Forced to flee from her frail hut, by bullets actually whizzing through it, and to pass through the town amid the yells of an infuriated rabble, her path sometimes impeded by the dead bodies of men who had fallen in the conflict; driven from the shelter of the Government-house, again to fly through the streets to the warf-house, and there, with three or four hundred fugitives crowded together, to await death, which threatened them in every form; hearing over their heads the rush of cannon balls, and seeing from burning buildings showers of sparks falling, one of which, if it reached the magazines under their roof, was sufficient to tear the building from its foundations, and whelm them all in one common ruin; or, if they escaped this danger, to know that hundreds of merciless barbarians, with knives and cutlasses, might, at any moment, rush into the building and destroy them,—­can the female heart, we are ready to ask, endure such fearful trial?  Yes:  her mind was stayed by a ‘courage not her own;’ ... its calmness was that of a child who, in its utter helplessness, clings to its father’s arm.”