Now they blackened some green field and looked a target that none could miss. But the country was broken and the corn was uncut, and though the enemy’s guns searched for them again and again they passed unscathed. Now the giant millet hid them, and they vanished as if the earth had opened under their feet. Again they came into view above the green bean stalks, they halted as if uncertain of their direction--for you can soon be lost in the corn--came back and plunged once more into the millet. Their objective was the North slope of Manjuyama, to the right of a village almost in the shadow of Kuropatkin’s Eye. So the hours dragged on, our guns covering the advance until rifle shots were heard, and the movements of the enemy, like ants disturbed, showed that our infantry was engaged at close quarters, and the fight for Manjuyama had begun in earnest. Wildly and with frantic haste the Russian guns in the ravine searched the fields in front of us, and a battery on our right joining the fray, tore up the crest of Manjuyama with deadly explosions. The sun sank blood-red below the horizon, and the Western sky was flooded with a crimson glow. The guns were silent, and we heard only the rifles like the crackling of thorns in the fire. Suddenly, and with one accord, every battery opened, and out of the darkness leapt tongues of flame. Hill and plain shook with thunder, and the air was filled with the roar and shriek and snarl of shells. It was a splendid, yet a dread spectacle. All night Russian and Japanese fought for possession of that hill, charging and counter-charging until the ground was sodden with blood and the trenches were filled with dead.