His Aloofness Was In No Wise Due To Lack Of Ideas, Nor, I Should Say, To Pride - Unless, Perhaps, It Were The Pride Which Some Men Feel In Suppressing All Emotion By Habitual Restraint Of Manner.

Whether his SANGFROID was constitutional, or that nobler kind of courage which feels and masters timidity and the sense of danger, none could tell.

Certain it is he was as calm and self-possessed in action as in repose. He was so courteous one fancied he would almost have apologised to his foe before he remorselessly ran him through.

On our second visit to Amoy, a year or more after the first, we met with a warmer reception. The place was much more strongly fortified, and the ship was several-times hulled. We were at very close quarters, as it is necessary to pass under high ground as the harbour is entered. Those who had the option, excepting our gallant old captain, naturally kept under shelter of the bulwarks and hammock nettings. Not so Major Daniel. He stood in the open gangway watching the effect of the shells, as though he were looking at a game of billiards. While thus occupied a round shot struck him full in the face, and simply left him headless.

Another accident, partly due to an ignorance of dynamics, happened at the taking of Canton. The whole of the naval brigade was commanded by Sir Thomas Bouchier. Our men were lying under the ridge of a hill protected from the guns on the city walls. Fully exposed to the fire, which was pretty hot, 'old Tommy' as we called him, paced to and fro with contemptuous indifference, stopping occasionally to spy the enemy with his long ship's telescope. A number of bluejackets, in reserve, were stationed about half a mile further off at the bottom of the protecting hill. They were completely screened from the fire by some buildings of the suburbs abutting upon the slope. Those in front were watching the cannon-balls which had struck the crest and were rolling as it were by mere force of gravitation down the hillside. Some jokes were made about football, when suddenly a smart and popular young officer - Fox, first lieutenant of one of the brigs - jumped out at one of these spent balls, which looked as though it might have been picked up by the hands, and gave it a kick. It took his foot off just above the ankle. There was no surgeon at hand, and he was bleeding to death before one could be found. Sir Thomas had come down the hill, and seeing the wounded officer on the ground with a group around him, said in passing, 'Well, Fox, this is a bad job, but it will make up the pair of epaulets, which is something.'

'Yes sir,' said the dying man feebly, 'but without a pair of legs.' Half an hour later he was dead.

I have spoken lightly of courage, as if, by implication, I myself possessed it.

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