considered.  There are nothing but small Chinese houses and walls on every side, making it impossible to move beyond our lines without demolishing and breaking through heavy brickwork.  The marines went forward as gallantly as they could, and surprised some of the nests of sharpshooters protecting the gun; but the Chinese, as they retreated, set fire to the houses on all sides, and in the thick flames and smoke it was impossible to move save back by the way they had come.  Under cover of the smoke the Chinese soldiery opened a tremendous fire on the sortie party, who were picking up some of the rifles and swords with which the ground was strewn, and seeing that our men could not possibly advance, the enemy pushed forward boldly, rapidly firing more and more energetically.  The British captain received a terrible wound, but refused to retire; a marine was shot through the groin and died in a few minutes; bullets cut the men’s tunics to pieces; and in a hailstorm of fire, poured on them a few yards away, they retreated.  H——­ covered the retreat all the way, wounded as he was, and shot three men with his revolver, who were heading a last desperate rush at his men as they made for the hole in the wall.  Dripping with blood, this brave man staggered all the way to the hospital alone, refusing all support, and gripping his smoking revolver to the last.  His battered appearance so frightened all the miserables who swarm in the British Legation that everyone was very gloomy until the next meal had been eaten, and they had restored themselves by garrulous talk.  The German doctor says that H——­ will probably die.

Meanwhile the Americans on the Wall are behaving more erratically than ever.  They have retired and reoccupied their position three or four times since the siege began, and the men are now more than mutinous.  Yesterday they came down twice—­no one could quite make out why—­and after a lapse of an hour or two in each case, they returned.  Matters reached a crisis this morning, and a council of war was called by the British Minister, composed of all the officers commanding detachments.  The meeting took place under the American barricade on the Tartar Wall itself, apparently to give confidence to the men and to make them ashamed of themselves.  But the most curious part of it all was that our commander-in-chief excused himself on the diplomatic ground that he was sick, and amid the smiles of all, Captain T——­, the Austrian, presided and laid down the law.  This clearly shows how absurd is our whole system.  Everyone says the Americans were quite ashamed of themselves when the meeting was over, for the general vote of all the detachment officers was that the position was well fortified, easy to retain, and absolutely essential to hold.  They say the whole reason is that there is internal trouble in the American contingent, and that one of the officers is hated.  Whether this is really so or not, I do not know; we never know anything certain now.  But although