A great soldier would have seized the opportunity when our left was held in check to deliver a counter attack on our right centre where there was a manifestly weak point. The distance between our centre and our right wing was great, and the only defence was a regiment of cavalry and one battalion in reserve. There appeared a clear opening for breaking through and turning our whole position. The advantages of situation, and of artillery were decidedly with the Russians. They had had weeks in which to prepare roads and emplacements, and their guns were, for the most part, skilfully placed, though, as usual, they affected sky-lines, so that their fire was visible. The Japanese gun positions were not well chosen. This defect was due partly to the inferior range of their artillery, and partly to the extremely difficult nature of the country in which they were suddenly called upon to make selection. They, too, exposed their guns against the sky-line, not having learned thoroughly the lesson of indirect fire. Chapter XXV ATTACK ON YU-SHU-LING. A DRAMATIC ENCOUNTER. For dramatic incident, not less than tactical interest, the attack on Yu-shu-ling--to which reference has been made in describing the general advance on Liao-yang--is worthy of separate record. The action which ended disastrously for the Russians brought into relief the fighting qualities of the two armies, and proved once more that superior numbers, even when joined with desperate courage and strength of position, cannot avail against a skilful and determined foe. It may be urged that the element of chance entered into the victory, and that had it not been for the arrival of reinforcements from the centre, the Russians might have remained undisturbed behind the barrier which nature and military art opposed to the advance from the East. But chance is always a factor in war, and the greatest general is he who neglects no occasion for turning it to account. Nor could the appearance of four battalions on the Russian flank be ascribed solely to chance. Their presence was designed, their purpose was to threaten the enemy’s right, and their dramatic success was due to the neglect of a precaution as obvious as that which placed at the mercy of the Japanese the sleeping camp on the left wing. Until the occupation of Mou-tien-ling it might have been contended that in every encounter with General Kuroki’s army the Russians were inferior in number, and were fighting in country peculiarly adapted to the soldiers of a mountainous island. This apology for defeat could be made no longer. Since that date the enemy had been in greater force; their artillery had been of greater weight and range and mobility; they had had the choice of positions, whether for attack or for defence, yet every engagement, offensive and defensive, showed more clearly their want of