The folly of this course is obvious to the veriest tyro in military science. Kuropatkin's line was already too far extended for safety. On his left flank, creeping gradually closer and working round to the northeast to effect a wide turning movement, was General Kuroki, with the 1st Army; General Nodzu, with the 3rd Army, was advancing from Takushan in the direction of Kaichau; while in the extreme south General Oku, having received large reinforcements, was able to hold Port Arthur securely invested and to march northwards with forces numbering 60,000 men, flushed with recent victory. The southward march of Baron Stackelberg, therefore, was doomed to disaster from the first. Not only was it highly improbable that he would ever succeed in getting through to Port Arthur, but in case he had to retreat, he ran a grave risk of being cut off by General Nodzu, and imperilling the position of General Kuropatkin himself. This was exactly what happened in actual fact. [Sidenote: Old Tactics versus New] The ill-fated expedition, after some preliminary skirmishing, met General Oku's main body at Wafangkau or Telissu on the 15th of June. Telissu is a village situated to the east of the railway line about 20 miles north of Port Adams. Nothing could better prove the superiority of the Japanese over the Russians in the matter of tactics than the dispositions which were made for this battle by Oku and Stackelberg respectively. Kuropatkin's lieutenant fought in the old-fashioned style, with his men closely packed together over a narrow front. The Japanese, on the other hand, advanced in an open formation over a widely extended area. At dawn General Oku ordered his troops to attack. They advanced in two columns, the main body proceeding along the railway line against the enemy's centre and right, while a second and more mobile force worked round to the west to turn Stackelberg's right flank. The Russians threw themselves fiercely upon the Japanese right and centre, and for some hours the battle was hotly contested. But in the meantime the turning movement to the west was proceeding with entire success. Before he realized the imminence of the danger, Stackelberg found that his right flank was driven in, and that his rear was threatened. He withdrew troops from his left and centre to meet this new danger; but it was too late, and he merely weakened his position in one part of the field without strengthening it in another. From three sides the Japanese now pressed their attack home, gradually encircling the Russians with a ring of fire. The terrible effectiveness of Oku's artillery was borne witness to afterwards by the Russians themselves. Their positions were heaped with dead. General Stackelberg in his dispatch describing the battle said that the 3rd and 4th batteries of the 1st Artillery Brigade were literally cut to pieces by the Japanese shells, and thirteen out of sixteen guns were rendered completely useless.