Obtaining an exact and truthful account of any occurrence even from an eye-witness of the event is a matter of great difficulty, as Sir Walter Raleigh experienced, but the difficulty is exceedingly great with reference to all things connected with the war, as every informant is more or less biassed in favour of one of the belligerents. Sift, and probe, and examine, and compare as carefully as we might, we were rarely quite satisfied that we had the real unvarnished plain statement of fact. On the few occasions we did succeed we did not always get credited even. I know that once I met a man of learning and position, one of the best informed, most intelligent and highly respected foreign residents in Vladivostok. He was on his way from that town to communicate something of importance to his Legation at Peking. We had long been acquainted, and although, as he explained, he could not give me all the information he had about Vladivostok yet he would give me something of general interest respecting the recent Japanese bombardment of that port, and of the extent of the damages. Part of that information I cabled home at once--to be informed curtly from Peking, “You are not justified in wasting _Times’_ money upon wild reports reaching you from Vladivostok.” The newspaper men had no opportunities for lotus eating in the wilderness of Newchwang, but some of them had not enough of danger there to satisfy them and must needs seek extra risks by attempting extraordinary adventures. There was Colonel Emerson, an American, who with insufficient papers pushed on to the Russian headquarters at Liaoyang, and there got his marching orders to proceed home by way of Moscow and report himself to the authorities at Mukden, Harbin and other places _en route_. He went as far as Mukden, did not report himself, but got carried through the Russian lines to Hsinmintun by one of the Chinamen in the employ of Bush Brothers, a man who has rendered other correspondents signal service but whose identity must not be revealed as long as any are liable to need his assistance. The Russians, missing Emerson, concluded that he must have tried to escape and consequently must be dead, for nobody _could_ pass out of the Russian lines. So his death was reported in the _Harbinski Viedomosti_, and the authorities telegraphed in Emerson’s name for his effects to be forwarded to Mukden. As it happened, Emerson, who had not sent the telegram, was back again in Newchwang at the time. There was another American who determined to go from Newchwang to Port Arthur in a junk, and told so many people about it that the junk was stopped; and there was Etzel, who did get away, but only to be shot before he was out of Chinese waters. That disastrous termination put an end to similar enterprises, but only for a time.