But why be foiled? Why come halfway round the globe to be turned back at the summit? There is another way--to the right. I hurry along it as day begins to break. The mists are heavy, the rain drizzling, the first light struggling. I find the conical hill in the center of the plain, quite detached from the fortress proper, taken by our troops the day before and called the Kuropatkin battery. I struggle through battered abattis and entanglement for the elevation. The foss is filled with water--the only moat before Port Arthur that has the traditional morass. The place is deserted and if I can reach the front trench the whole action will lie before me like a chessboard. Across the parapet lies a line sergeant, his head gone. There has been no time for the dead. The trail is thick with khaki bodies. Picking my way slowly forward, halting at each yard to be sure that I am not in range of the musketry whose wild rattle is now filling the air, I at length find myself near a bombproof partially splintered by shells. The plain now luminous, I pause for rest and safety, the din not lessening. But no sooner do I look around than I scramble quickly on--into danger. Two figures are rigid there in the half-light of the bombproof, one in khaki uniform, one in blue blouse and marengo pants. The one in khaki has his teeth in the throat of the other, whose eyes, popped like peas from the pod, peer over, rakishly curious, at his limp hand dropped over the khaki back and holding a pistol. The khaki hip is drenched with blood, partially dried. The sun is come and gone and is now here again since that happened. The faces are ghastly with bloat. I leave the half-light of the shelter and go out where bullets are. The star bombs cease, the searchlights die away, the artillery flags, the infantry grows noisier. Then I see the reserves falling back, the squads of twelve escaping from one terrace to another, in good formation, continually firing, but still falling back. This Kuropatkin battery may see other dramas like the bombproof duel. I hasten down. In the village I find the lieutenant busy with trenches, improvising the defense. He throws all his English at me as I come up: “The Russians--they come--I fix them. They are very wild. Our men are very wild. Ah, it is a wild war.” The telephone rings. He runs to speak with the general. Then the sergeant informs me.