Hardly had the siege begun in earnest when a small body of Uhlans, who had been directed by spies to the headquarters of General Leman, the Belgian commander, made a determined attempt to assassinate him by forcing their way into his office and shooting at him with revolvers. One of the General's brother officers lifted him up bodily, carried him to the yard at the back of the house, and dropped him over the wall into the yard alongside. This promptness, in the momentary confusion, was believed to have saved General Leman's life. Two Belgian gendarmes and an officer were killed; but the other Belgians present shot dead the Uhlans who had made the daring raid. There were eight of them in all--two officers and six men. In a despatch sent off in the evening of August 6th Dr. E.J. Dillon briefly summed up the early fighting. The invading army, he stated, at first expected a mere nominal resistance. Disappointed, they despatched forces to the north and south-east of Liège, where are the forts of Barchon, north of Evegnée, of Fléron and Chaud-fontaine to the east, and of Embourg and Boncelles to the south. The attacks proceeded at various points along this front. The position at Liège was defended by forts and also by field works, trenches, barbed-wire entanglement, and mines, with artillery served by mobile troops, under improvised cover, who occupied the spaces between the forts, but hidden behind them so that the Germans who endeavoured to pass through these spaces in order to surround the forts were unable to determine the position of the field works and direct their artillery fire against them. This piece of strategy proved fatal to the enemy's troops, who were exposed to artillery fire from the forts, and cut down piecemeal by the defenders within the spaces. The country was favourable to the invaders, owing to the ravines, woods, and winding roads, which enabled them to advance under natural cover. Despite this advantage, the Belgians, who displayed genuine heroism, drove them back with slaughter, but not without themselves making heavy sacrifices, which they did with a degree of valour that commanded universal admiration. The Russian Tsar sent his hearty congratulations.