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.