A frightful scene was before me.  I have said that the land by which I had come out on the lake inclined steeply upwards, and the water was about fifteen feet below me when I arrived in sight of it.  It was surrounded by crowds of Japanese soldiers, who had driven large numbers of the fugitives into the water, and were firing on them from every side, and driving back with the bayonet those who attempted to struggle out.  The dead floated on the water, which was reddened with blood.  The soldiers, yelling and laughing with vengeful glee, seemed to gloat over the agonies of their victims.  It was fearful to see those gory forms struggling in the agitated water, those who still lived endeavouring to extricate themselves from the mass of corpses, falling fast, but often rising again with their last energies, streaming with water and blood, and uttering piteous cries and appeals for mercy, which were mocked by the fiends around them.  Many women were amongst them; one I noticed carrying a little child, which, struggling forward, she held up to the soldiers as if in appeal.  As she reached the bank, one of the wretches struck her through with his bayonet, and with a second stroke as she fell transfixed the child, which might have been two years old, and held its little body aloft.  The woman rose and made a wild effort to regain the child, but evidently exhausted and dying, fell back again into the water.  Her body—­and in fact it was done with everybody that came within reach—­was hacked in pieces.  Fresh batches of victims were being driven in, until there threatened soon to be no room in the water for any more.  I could bear the spectacle no longer, but turned and fled from the ghastly spot.

I now knew my whereabouts, and once more set out for the inn, along the line from which I had strayed.  Heaps of dead and spectacles of murder were continually presenting themselves.  In one place I saw some ten or twelve soldiers with a number of unfortunates whom they had tied back to back in a batch.  With volley after volley they despatched them, and proceeded to mutilate their bodies in the usual horrible fashion.  Nobody was spared, man, woman, or child, that I could see.  The Chinese appeared to offer no resistance.  Many of them prostrated themselves on the ground before the butchers with abject submission, and were shot or stabbed in that posture.

I was now to have a close shave.  I came suddenly and unawares upon a party engaged in slaughtering some shrieking wretches—­women and children amongst them—­and being perceived was shot at by one of the soldiers.  I rapidly retreated, but he detached himself in pursuit.  I entered a house; he followed, but I had the start of him, and for a while evaded him.  I got into what looked like a kitchen or scullery, and amongst some other utensils I came upon a curiously shaped hatchet, very heavy and sharp.  I waited for about a quarter of an hour, and then, judging that the Jap must have