The lines of the two armies on the eve of the great battle, stretched from the Hun River, on the west, in a southeasterly direction south of the Sha-ho River, along that stream, then bending more southward, across the Taitse River, near Bensihu, at a point thirty-five miles east of Yentai Station, on the Harbin--Port Arthur Railroad. These lines had been determined by the battle of the Sha-ho River, October 6-13, the end of the campaign of 1904. Strategically the advantage lay with the Russians. Though defeated in the memorable battle along the Sha-ho, General Kuropatkin had secured a position south of Mukden far superior to any below Tie Pass, the gateway to the great plains around Harbin, always regarded as the ultimate decisive battleground of Manchuria. [Illustration: RUSSIAN RETREAT IN MANCHURIA.] [Sidenote: Lone Tree Hill] The whole lay of the land was adapted to defensive fighting. Along most of the front lay the Sha-ho River, broad enough and deep enough to demand bridging except when frozen over. The culminating event of the battle of the Sha-ho had been the recapture by the Russians of Lone Tree Hill, a mile east of the railroad, just south of the Sha-ho, at the very centre of the battlefield. From this point the Russians commanded a territory five miles in radius. The hill, naturally adapted for defense, was strongly fortified to a point nearer impregnability even, than achieved by any of the boasted fortifications of the mountains around Port Arthur. Thousands of Japanese were ultimately to immolate themselves on the slopes of Lone Tree Hill in vain efforts at its capture. It still stood invincible when events elsewhere demanded retreat and its abandonment. Westward the Russian line spread across a rolling country dotted with Chinese villages. The low, stoned walled cottages of these clusters of hamlets formed the basis for defenses which were well calculated to offer enormous resistance to troops advancing across the wide-stretching flats along the Sha-ho, and the east bank of the Hun, the only approach for the Japanese. [Sidenote: The Russian Position]