"In spite of the failure of this first attack, another was ordered to begin at two on the following morning (August 30th). The cold grey morning witnessed another scene of slaughter on the Russian right as the defenders again hurled the attack back. The Japanese attacked with valor and deserved success, but the enfilading fire on every salient swept each rush away before the men could even lay hands on the entanglements. But the 5th Division had more success against the Russian left. The position here was composed of a brush-covered hogsback, sloping to the east, defended by a triple line of trenches with a glacis protected by a 10 foot entanglement covering a honeycomb of pits containing spikes at the bottom. In the semi-darkness of the morning the 41st Regiment carried this underfeature after losing seventy-five of the one hundred pioneers who hacked their way through the entanglement with axes. The men, rushing through the gap, overpowered the sentries in the trenches before the supports, sleeping in splinter proofs behind, could reinforce them. But daybreak brought a tragedy of the kind which is so common in modern war. Shell fire, believed to be from Japanese guns, drove this gallant storming party from its hold, filling the Russian trenches with Japanese dead. But now for the fighting on the 31st. The weather was now fine, and the energy of this southern attack all the morning was concentrated in an artillery fire on the bushy hill that had been won and lost. At 10 o'clock we could see the 5th Division moving up against the Russian left. There is a moment of intense excitement while the summit of the Russian position is like a miniature Mount Pelée in eruption owing to the bursting of dozens of Shimoshi shells. The head of the assault is in the gap in the entanglement. The artillery is supporting the assault. Three or four ground mines explode in the midst of the leading assaulting groups. Then as the smoke clears the black-coated Russians are seen leaving the position. In a moment the Japanese are in, and the whole of the lines in support on the crest are firing down the slope into the retreating Russians. But one swallow does not make a summer. Although the underfeature of the bushy hill was carried, the rest of the assault failed miserably. No Japanese could live within 500 yards of the bastion hill, and though the Japanese came out of the corn until the groups were so numerous that I can liken them only to swarming bees, it was only to be swept backwards into cover again, leaving behind the heavy price of their valor." [Illustration: CAPTURE OF THE "RESHITELNI" AT CHIFU.] CHAPTER XI.