the devoted town, the sound of their high shrill voices and the ring
of the clashing steel being audible for some time after they had
passed out of sight. At length it died away and all was still again,
so silent that I seemed to hear the quick and heavy throbbing of my
heart.

After waiting two or three minutes I told Chung to take the lantern so
that we might set out again. He did so, but as he was about to step
from the doorway he tripped over some object concealed by the darkness
and fell: it was a dead body. I examined it by the lantern-light.
There were several deep bayonet wounds and a terrific sabre-slash
across the face which had completely destroyed the left eye. The
abdomen was abominably mutilated. A knife was clenched in the right
hand of the victim, showing that he had not died without an effort to
defend himself. I swung the lantern about the recess, and perceived
further back three or four steps, ascending to a door slightly open.
These steps were covered with blood which seemed to flow from behind
the door. I pushed it open, and entered the place to which it gave
access. It seemed to be a kind of public office--a wide, low, bare
apartment, divided on one side by a massive wooden counter, surmounted
by a partition pierced at intervals with pigeon-holes, as if for
communication between persons on opposite sides of the division. It
may have been a bank or money-changer's office. It is not, however, on
account of the place itself, but of its contents, that I describe it.
The floor was covered with the corpses of men, women, and children,
mingled indiscriminately together, fugitives who had there taken
refuge and been relentlessly butchered. The bodies had been
decapitated, and the bloody heads stuck up on a long row of spikes
which surmounted the wooden partition over the counter. Both Chung and
the mandarin uttered a cry of terror as we caught sight of those