Under the conditions laid down by the Viceroy as to keeping screens on the Fen-shui Ling (Passes), and leaving a reserve at Hai-cheng[66] until such time as fresh reinforcements had been received, a direct advance on Port Arthur could only be made with one corps of twenty-four battalions. In view of the possibility of Kuroki taking the offensive in superior force (after reinforcement by the troops already beginning to land at Ta-ku-shan) against our cordon, which extended along the Fen-shui-ling range for more than sixty-six miles, and in view of the possibility of the Japanese cutting off any detachment moving on Port Arthur by landing somewhere in its rear, the despatch of this corps 130 miles to the south could not but be considered a most risky and difficult operation. As our numerical weakness absolutely precluded a general assumption of the offensive on our part, I pointed out that by such a movement for the relief of Port Arthur we risked disorganizing the whole army. I also drew attention to the fact that, according to the report of Captain Gurko, who had just arrived from the fortress, its combatant strength amounted to at least 45,000 men (including sailors), and that the enemy could not therefore have any very overwhelming superiority. My views upon the inexpediency of any movement towards Port Arthur were communicated to the War Minister in my telegrams (Nos. 692 and 701) of May 28 and 30. But in a telegram of the 31st the Viceroy urgently requested me to advance to the relief of the fortress, and expressed the wish that four divisions should be detailed for the operation; while on June 6 he quoted to me a message from St. Petersburg in which it was stated that the time was “ripe for the Manchurian Army to assume the offensive.”