The Bund skyscrapers were shaking for the first time in several days yesterday morning as Japanese warships fired into Pootung and Chinese batteries replied when a small tug have in sight, and steamed directly across the line of fire. The tug, it was later discovered, was the Hailing, belonging to the Shanghai Power Company, and left the company's wharf downriver at about 11 o'clock on its way to the USS. Sacramento, anchored off the French Bund. It carried a guard of five U.S. marines and two bluejackets.
The hundreds of onlookers who were having a front seat view of the heavy firing on both sides, which was unpleasantly close to their, offices, gaped as they saw the impertinent little craft steam slowly along right in front of the Japanese transport, near the Japanese Consulate-General, at which the Chinese were directing! a goodly proportion of their shells.
It was not until shells started bursting within a few yards of the tug, sending up columns of water into the air, that the little craft wavered, stopped completely in a most exposed position, turned around and then steamed back across the bows of the transport, stopping close in to the wharf. Even here, however, there was a very good chance of being hit,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.