off Gheriah. At Dabul, where they had called in for news, they learned
that the _Phram_ and the _Chandos_ might soon be expected, but that there
was no prospect of Captain Johnson's machine being ready to take part in
the expedition. What Captain Johnson's machine was we do not learn, but
the intelligence 'mightily disconcerted the soldiery.' The squadron
consisted of the _London_, which acted as flagship, the _Victory_ frigate,
the _Revenge_ and _Defiance_ grabs, the _Hunter_ galley, two gallivats, a
bombketch, a fireship, and a number of fishing-boats for landing troops.
The troops for the expedition consisted of 350 soldiers and topasses and
80 chosen sepoys. Brown appears to have been thoroughly incompetent for
such a command, and the undertaking was destined to add one more to the
dismal list of failures. His first act was to make the _London_ exchange
useless shots with the fort at a mile distance. The following day, the
bombketch was ordered to run close in within pistol-shot, and bombard the
place at night. One shell and one carcass were fired, neither of which
went halfway, by reason of the mortars being so faultily constructed that
the chambers could not contain a sufficient charge of powder. 'This
misfortune set the people a-grumbling.'

On the 21st, Brown held a consultation of his officers, and proposed to
land three hundred men, at night, a mile from the town, so as to surprise
it at daylight. The officers protested against the scheme; they justly
remarked that it would be folly to make such an attack before the arrival
of the whole force. The _Phram_ and the _Chandos_, with the platoons of
Europeans, were still to come. They represented that the garrison of the
fort alone was a thousand strong, to say nothing of the small walled town
which must be taken before the fort could be attacked. Such a proposal was
not likely to increase their confidence in Brown. Sickness had already set
in among the troops, and that evening Captain Jeremiah Easthope died of
fever. Brown was all for immediate action, without having any definite