But the end was drawing near. The right flank met with little resistance and moved toward the centre of the fight. In time they came to the South of the hamlet where the enemy held the houses on each side of the road. The only approach was a fire-swept triangle commanded by a low wall and flanked by cottages. It was still night, and out of the black veil in front of the Japanese sprang tiny jets of flame from the rifles of the enemy. Into this deadly angle our infantry crowded after their leader. The officer who bore the regimental flag was shot down. From his nerveless hand the flag was taken by a second officer, who carried it forward a few yards and then dropped with a bullet through his body. To the front sprang the regimental commander--Colonel Yasumura--and seizing the flag bore it onward. The air hummed with rifle bullets and men fell on every hand. Still they pressed into the front rank, trampling dead and dying under their feet. No man paused or looked back after entering that deadly angle. The wall was nearly reached when the flag dropped from their leader’s hand. He, too, had fallen. “Fire the houses!” was the cry that rang through the night. Toward a little mud-walled cottage darted a handful of men. Door and window were forced and the thatched roof went up in flame. Through the red glare Russians and Japanese were seen shooting and stabbing. A gap was made in the wall of the compound and through it poured a torrent of dark uniforms. Another fierce struggle and another house was in flames while men fought under the burning rafters. Thus from house to house and from compound to compound swept fire and bayonet until the sky was crimson and the earth red. It was a scene that only Wiertz could have painted. When I visited the village the Chinese were raking among the embers of their homes: the ground was littered with pieces of uniform, fragments of rifle stocks, charred bones, and here and there a skull which the dogs had knawed. Some Japanese soldiers were exhuming their comrades, over whom a few shovelfuls of earth had been thrown, and were placing the black and fearful forms on funeral pyres. Step by step the Russians were driven out of the houses. On the hill behind they rallied again and prepared to renew the conflict. Up the steep Western spur the Japanese were already climbing, and toward the grey craig on the East another force was fighting its way.