on, more or less, of the coast line. Early in that year a
famous Burmese general, one Maha Bandoola, who had marched through
Arracan bearing with him heavy gold fetters wherewith to bind and make
captive Lord Amherst, appeared before Rangoon. The “Lord of the golden
foot” who ruled in Ava was exasperated at the capture of the place.
His first order had been: “British ships have brought foreign soldiers
to the mouth of the river. They are my prisoners. Cut me some thousand
spans of rope to bind them.” The Burmese army therefore took up and
entrenched a strong position at Kokaing, whence Rangoon was harassed;
but, attacked in rear by Cotton with the 13th Regiment (which lost 53
men and 7 officers killed and wounded, out of a total of 220) and some
Sepoys, and in front by Campbell with a force in which were the 38th,
41st, and 89th (recently arrived), the enemy, 25,000 strong, was badly
beaten by about 1500 men, and fell back on Donabu. The 47th and Royals
having arrived as reinforcements, Campbell pushed on toward Sarawak,
but Cotton, attacking Donabu, was not in sufficient force to carry out
his object; so the two wings united and attacked the place a second
time, and after desperate fighting carried the defences of the town,
and Bandoola was slain. He was a man of an inquiring disposition, and
was anxious to see the properties of the common shell, one “with a very
long fuse having been projected by the British. The live ‘creature’ was
brought fizzing at a dreadful rate to him; and he, at some distance,
surveyed with great curiosity the unfortunate men bringing the fiery
fiend along. Another second or two and it burst, killing the carriers
and every one beside it! Bandoola was thunderstruck, and for the whole
of that day his courage left him.” The stockades were “made of solid
teak beams about 17 feet high driven firmly into the earth. Behind this
wooden wall the old brick ramparts of the place rose to a considerable
height, affording a firm and elevated footing for the defenders. On
the works we