male person belonging to the factory at Palimbang, not excepting even children, and of razing the fort to the ground. This horrible scheme he executed; the number of persons thus wantonly massacred being nearly a hundred, thirty of whom were European born.
The destruction of the fort being an act of hostility against those to whom the Dutch establishments had been transferred by right of conquest, Colonel Gillespie was sent thither with a thousand men, to assert the rights of the British Government, and to punish the faithlessness and cruelties of the Sultan. After a tedious progress, which was considerably retarded by currents and contrary winds, the expedition came to anchor on the 15th of April, 1812, opposite the west channel of the Palimbang river; on which the Sultan fled, having removed his treasures and his women into the interior, and left the fort, palace, and city in a state of inconceivable disorder.
On learning this state of affairs, Gillespie pushed on with a few men in the light boats to put a stop to the confusion and carnage that were taking place in the city, which on their arrival presented an awful scene of murder and pillage. The most dreadful shrieks and yells were heard in all directions, and conflagrations appeared in various places. An eye-witness declares that "romance never described anything half so hideous, nor has the invention of the imagination ever given representations equally appalling."
Amidst these horrors, Colonel Gillespie stepped on shore, accompanied by only seven Grenadiers, and proceeded into the city, surrounded by the glittering weapons of ferocious Arabs and treacherous Malays. On approaching the palace, the horrors of the spectacle were aggravated. The apartments had been ransacked, the pavements and floors were flowing with blood, the flames were rapidly consuming all that plunder had spared, and, while they were pursuing their devastating career, the crackling of the bamboos is said to have resembled the dis-
