“I’d like to have been the one--to find him for her.” “There never was a nobler thing done for a woman--than Routledge did,” the old man went on, after a pause. “There never was a nobler woman,” breathed the florid one. SEVENTEENTH CHAPTER FEENEY AND FINACUNE ARE PRIVILEGED TO “READ THE FIERY GOSPEL WRIT IN BURNISHED ROWS OF STEEL” As a matter of fact, Kuroki was only waiting for Oku and Nodzu to join him in the great concentration upon Liaoyang under Oyama. This battle was planned to finish the Russians in the field, as Togo was to do at sea, and Nogi in the Fortress. Roughly, the Japanese now stretched across the peninsula from the mouth of the Liao to the mouth of the Yalu--a quarter of a million men with eyes on Liaoyang--Kuroki on the right, Nodzu in the centre, Oku on the left. Oyama polished his boots and spurs in Tokyo, preparing to take his rice and tea in the field as soon as it was heated to the proper temperature. Late in June, Kuroki awoke and began to spread like a gentle flow of lava, filling the hither defiles of the great Shanalin range, making ready to take the stiff and dreadful passes which the Russians had fortified as the outer protection of Liaoyang. Right here it must be interpolated that Bingley had cut Kuroki for Nodzu’s fourth army a few days before, when the two forces had touched wings for a day. The “Horse-killer” was scarcely gone before Kuroki encountered one of the toughest and pluckiest foes of his stupendous campaign, General Kellar, who gave him terrific fights at Fenshui and Motien passes, and tried to take them back after they were lost. Again at Yansu, a month later, the doughty Kellar disputed the last mountain-trail to the city, and Kuroki had to kill him to get through.... The army was growing accustomed to the civilians, and these were days of service for the correspondents. It was given them now to see the great fighting-machine of Kuroki--that huge bulk of flying power--lose its pomp and gloss and adjust itself to the field. It faded into the brown of the mountains, took on a vulpine leanness and a nerveless, soulless complacence, like nothing else in the world. Food was king; fighting was the big-game sport; toil was toil, and death was not the least of benefits. It was now August, and Kuroki’s part in the Liaoyang preliminaries finished. A month later the battle was on.... In the gray morning light of the twenty-ninth of August, the sound of distant batteries boomed over the Shanalin peaks to the ears of the correspondents. Finacune leaped up with a cry: “Liaoyang is on! And what are we doing away off here?” “Smokin’ our pipes in the mountings,” Feeney answered huskily, reaching for a match, “‘an’ breathin’ the mornin’ cool.’” “We’re lost,” Finacune declared bitterly. “I can hear the London experts howling, ‘Where’s Kuroki and his lost army?’”