so little to defend themselves, that a day of reckoning had at last
come when they would be able to do as they liked towards this
detestable Palace, which had given them so many unhappy hours. It
would all be destroyed, burned. Little did they know!

Soon enough these small French batteries of light guns came into
action, and sent a stream of little shells into the Palace enclosures
a couple of thousand yards away. The majority pitched on the gaudy
roofs of Imperial pavilions far inside the Palace grounds, bursting
into pretty little fleecy clouds, and starting small smouldering fires
that suddenly died down before they had done much damage. But a number
fell short, and swept enclosures where I knew American soldiery had
already penetrated. I drew my breath, but said nothing....

The view from here was perfect. The sun had risen and was shining
brightly. Directly below lay the ruined Legations, with their rude
fortifications and thousands of surrounding native houses levelled
flat to the ground; but beyond, for many miles, stretched the vast
city of Peking, dead silent, excepting for these now accustomed sounds
of war, and half hidden by myriads of trees, which did not allow one
to see clearly what was taking place. The Palace, with its immense
walls, its yellow roofs, and its vast open places, lay mysteriously
quiet, too, while this punishment was meted out on it. You could not
understand what was going on. To the very far north a heavy cloud,
which had already attracted my attention, now rose blacker and
blacker, until it spread like a pall on the bright sky. Cossacks or
Japanese, who by this time had swept over the entire ground, must have
met with resistance; they were burning and sacking, and a huge
conflagration had been started.