The question whether, under these conditions, the citadel was in immediate danger of capture by assault is one upon which experts will differ. It must, however, be borne in mind that the Japanese were not likely to renew the attacks that ended so disastrously in August and September. Experience had taught them to temper the bayonet with the sap and the mine. They had reconciled themselves to a scientific siege, and would not easily have been tempted to abandon this slow yet sure method for the hazard of another series of hand-to-hand encounters. Had General Stoessel been resolute to resist to the end there were positions still capable of defence that could have been reduced only by weeks of sapping and mining. I come now to the chief reason assigned by General Stoessel, General Reiss, and naval and military officers, with many of whom I discussed the subject:--That ammunition and food were running short. Except in an official report of General Stoessel, it was never pretended that these supplies were exhausted. The Japanese declared that when they entered Port Arthur they found one of the principal magazines untouched. This, Russian officers emphatically denied. They asserted that the only shells were those in the forts, that there was no reserve of heavy ammunition, and that the magazine contained nothing save shells for small quick-firing naval guns. Of powder and rifle cartridges they acknowledged that there was a limited supply, and the shallow waters of the harbour showed that many shells and rifles were deliberately thrown away. Official statistics published by the Japanese gave the number of shells left in the fortress at 82,670. We were not told whether they were for heavy or for light guns, though we may fairly assume that the greater part were for heavy artillery. Moreover the Russians were able to make use of the eleven-inch howitzer shells of the Japanese, a small proportion of which remained unexploded owing to the nature of the soil where they struck. The difference in the rifling of the Russian and Japanese guns made these shells available. Of rifle cartridges there remained 2,266,800, together with over thirty tons of powder, and the means of converting it into small-arms ammunition. These supplies cannot be described as great, yet they would have sufficed to prolong the defence for at least one month.