This was indeed the master stroke of the battle, nevertheless a way had to be prepared for it by tremendously desperate work on every quarter of the long battle line. As vigorous as was the assault made on the Russian front, there can be no doubt that this was nothing more than a feint. The readiness with which the Japanese Commander-in-Chief sacrificed thousands of lives in assaults of a secondary nature is one of the significant things of the story of the battle. Such methods are reminiscent of Grant's massed attacks in the closing days of the Civil War, when life was counted as nothing when in the scale beside the value of victory. No pang for the sacrifice reached the heart of Oyama or the Generals under him who were directing the assaults. Victory was the stake, and the soldiers were there to die, if need be. They died by files and ranks and regiments. But victory was won. Over against the total of the blood-letting in their own ranks was the awful slaughter of the enemy, here, as in every battle of the war, far heavier in the Russian totals than with the Japanese. Two generations have come since the famous struggle of Gettysburg, yet statisticians are still struggling to determine the exact number who fought and died there or who remained alive, as victor and vanquished. The actual figures are still only approximately known. Multiply the difficulties of accounting for the less than two hundred thousand who fought at Gettysburg an hundredfold, and something of the difficulty of getting at the actual facts of the battle at Mukden begin to be realized. Ultimately, the Japanese may give the details, but no actual statement of the number of Russians engaged, of the losses in killed, wounded and missing, may be expected. The story forms too tragic a page in the history of the nation ever to be willingly spread broadcast. [Illustration: ON BOARD A JAPANESE BATTLESHIP DURING THE BATTLE OF THE JAPAN SEA.] CHAPTER XVIII. Prelude to the Great Battle--Gripenberg Fails and Quits Army--The Battle Begins--The Struggle on the East Front--The Battle at the Center--Battle Culminates on the West--Village by Village Taken--Russian Artillery Impotent--When the Crushing Blow Fell--A Cloud in the West--Kuropatkin Ignores Danger--Center Positions Abandoned--Japanese Ingenuity Marvelous--Retreat a Carnival of Slaughter--Oyama's Prophecy Fulfilled. [Sidenote: Prelude to the Great Battle]