enemy were coming in such force as to break through and overwhelm the half-armed peasantry at Paisas.
“We rowed smartly up the bay, but had scarcely doubled the point of land at the entrance of the harbour, when we observed a smart cannonading open from the gun-boats stationed near the Santiago road. This fire was promptly returned from the neighbouring heights by a continued discharge of musketry. The enemy, in fact, had pounced, unseen, on their prey; for we could now distinguish the French soldiers pouring into the wretched town from both sides of the valley. Many of the inhabitants rushed to the fishing-boats on the beach, and leaping into them, indiscriminately pushed into the stream. As we rowed up the harbour, we met hundreds of these poor people, half dressed, screaming, and struggling hard to get beyond the reach of shot. Others fled along the sides of the hills towards the bay, hoping to be picked off the shore by the boats, or, if they failed in this, to conceal themselves in caves amongst the rocks. Of these fugitives, great numbers were brought down, like hunted deer, or like game in a ‘battu,’ by the fire of the enemy, whose cruel measures had been taken with so much skill, that the devoted town was nearly surrounded before day broke. The whole face of the little harbour was soon covered with boats flying from this scene of destruction – and happy were those who escaped with their lives. The adjacent banks, too, were crowded with groups of men, women, and children, shrieking in a most touching manner, and entreating their friends to take them into the boats – already overcrowded. So completely hemmed in, were these wretched people, that escape was almost impossible. The horror and confusion of this frightful spectacle were increased by the conflagration of the town, in the streets of which deeds of still greater atrocity were going on. Of course, we could be of no use to such multitudes – fifty such boats as I was in would not have held half the people; and long before the frigate could have entered the harbour, all was over.
“As it was useless to land, I rowed past the flaming town towards the headmost gun-boats, to supply them with ammunition. The Spanish sailors were fighting as gallantly as possible. Unfortunately, the two headmost boats got entangled some how or other, and the second in the line, not being able to distinguish her consort in the smoke, fired a shot right into the magazine of the vessel a-head of her. In one moment the boat and most of her crew were blown high into the air. We were so near at the instant of this catastrophe, that the fragments fell on board of us; indeed, had we arrived twenty seconds sooner, we must have shared the same fate. We lost no time in distributing the powder with which we were loaded, to the other boats, and then busied ourselves in saving such of the blown-up seamen as were swimming about. Meanwhile, the French made such quick work of their task of destruction, that, as we rowed down the harbour again, they were retiring from the town and re-forming on the road beyond the bend or turn opposite to which the gun-boats were stationed.
