At his invitation I went with him later in the afternoon to look at some new guns that had just come in. They were very interesting and encouraging, but cannot be discussed at present. With them had come new artillerymen, and the general went about addressing each batch. His talk was something like this, freely translated, “Welcome to my command, my good children. You are looking fit and well, and I am glad to have you with me. Now I suppose that you think you have come here to help me hold back the Germans. Well, you are mistaken. We are not here to hold anybody, but to lick the enemy out of his boots, and drive them all clean out of Russia, Poland and Galicia too, and you look to me like the men that could do the job.” The Russian soldiers usually cheer to order, but these soldiers responded with a roar, and when dismissed ran off to their positions cheering as long as they could be seen. That night I dined with the General. In the midst of dinner some reinforcements passed up the street weary and footsore from a long day on the road. The General, dragging his staff with him, went out into the street, and stood, napkin in hand, watching each company as it passed him and calling to each a word of greeting. As the men passed one could see that each was sizing up the chief in whose hands rested their lives, and the future of their army; one could read their thoughts plainly enough. “Here is a man to trust. He will pull us through or die in the attempt.” After dinner I went for a stroll with him, and he did not pass a soldier without stopping to speak for a moment. Late in the evening I saw him walking down the main street of the primitive little town stick in hand, and at every corner he stopped to talk with his men. I have never seen an army where the relations between officers and men were as they are in Russia, and even in Russia not such as between this man and his own soldiers. Already he has lost his own son in the war, yet has accepted his loss with a stoicism that reminds one a little of General Nogi under similar circumstances. This then is the man to whom Russia has entrusted what for the moment appears as her most important front.