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130 HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVY.
attack Gheria, or any of the forts south of the three specified
in the stipulations.
On his arrival off Severndroog he found that the Mahratta
troops had invested three of the forts, but in so pusillanimous
a manner were they carrying on the siege, that their batteries
were thrown up at a distance of two miles from the works, and
even at that range they had taken sedulous care to entrench
themselves.
This style of conducting operations did not suit Commodore
James, who determined to exceed bis instructions rather than
expose the English arms to the disgrace of certain failure.
He, accordingly, at once detached boats from the squadron to
reconnoitre and sound the harbour, and, finding plenty of water
for the ketches to run in and bombard the forts, and for the
Protector'
' to cannonade, he stood in to within 100 yards of
the western face of the great fort, mounting fifty pieces of
ordnance, and called " Severndroog," after the island.
The attack was forthwith commenced, and, in the course of
the day, he expended eight hundred shot and shell, with con-
siderable effect. At night a deserter arrived with the information
that the Governor and many people were killed in the Castle,
and that a large number had been wounded. This man further
informed Connnodore James that it would be impossible to make
a breach on the side of the fort he had been bombarding, as the
walls, being cut out of the solid rock, w^ere, in that spot, nearly
eighteen feet thick, and at least fifty feet high. Accordingly he
decided on shifting his station, and, finding that the water to the
eastward between the island and the mainland was deep enough
to allow the flag-ship and the other vessels to stand in and open
fire upon all the remaining forts, three in number, determined
upon renewing the attack on the other side. Early on the
morning of the 3rd, the 'Protector' was warped into within
half-musket shot of these formidable batteries, one mounting
forty-two guns, and the two others twenty-four each, and the
action w-as recommenced with only one foot of water nnder his
ship's bottom at low tide. During the time he was occupied, by
means of a spring, in getting the broadside of the ' Protector' to
bear npon the enemy, a hot fire was opened upon him by the
batteries ; but, when in position, he returned the compliment
with spirit, bringing one broadside to bear on the north-east
bastion of the great fort, and the other on Fort Goa, the largest
of those on the mainland. The bastions of Severndroog were,
however, so high that the ' Protector' could only point her upper
tier of guns at them ; but being anchored within 100 yards, the
musketry fire from the tops drove the enemy from their guns.
His efforts were ably seconded by the ' Swallow' and ' Bombay,'
and the bomb vessels ; but his cowardly allies, the squadron of
Mahratta grabs and galivats, declined to advance within gun-