Of course, as soon as our disasters began, the papers started to accuse our troops of insufficient training, and they were not far wrong. In the first place, most of the men were reservists who had forgotten a great deal. In the second, this war was our first experience of smokeless powder, of quick-firing artillery, of machine-guns, and of all the recent developments in means of destruction, and much was strange and unexpected. Our preconceived notions were upset, and we were baffled by the deadly nature of indirect artillery-fire, by the new attack formations—when advancing infantry is rarely visible, and one man at a time crawls up almost unseen, taking advantage of every inch of cover. Our troops had been instructed, but what they had learned varied according to the personal idiosyncrasies of this or that district commander. The stronger the officer commanding a district, the less did he feel bound to abide by the authorized method of instruction and training laid down in the existing drill-books. General Grippenberg was no exception to this. In spite of the regulation as to the use of volleys for repulsing night attacks; in spite of war experience which in every way confirmed the necessity and value of volley-firing; in spite of the Commander-in-Chief’s instructions on this point, he made up his mind some days before a battle to re-teach the force under his command. He ordered the employment of independent fire at night. His “Instructions for the Operations of Infantry in Battle” [signed by him on January 4, 1905], printed and issued to the troops, aroused consternation and amusement throughout the army. In this book it was actually laid down that volleys were only to be resorted to if the enemy suddenly appeared at close quarters, and that immediately after a volley a bayonet attack should be made. While condemning the method in which our troops operated at the Ya-lu, he, in the above “Instructions,” gives a recipe for action whereby two of our battalions might destroy a Japanese division. After a summary of the amount of small-arm ammunition expended, he said: “If our two battalions had been deployed and had opened rapid independent fire, the Japanese division would have been destroyed, and we should have won the day.” Such a simple matter did General Grippenberg consider the annihilation of a Japanese division! But a few days later, when he moved against the Hei-kou-tai position with a strong force of 120 battalions, his own prescription proved to be valueless. In the first few days, when he was opposed by not more than two divisions, he was unable to take San-de-pu, got his troops into confusion, gave the enemy time to bring up strong reinforcements, and retired—to St. Petersburg.