At all events, for three months they took no decisive action on land, which enabled us, firstly, to mobilize the garrison, receive reserves, munitions and supplies, to look round and to draw up a scheme for the fortification and defence of the Fortress on land, and partly also from sea; and secondly, to get some knowledge of, and be able to appreciate the worth of the enemy and of ourselves. In the fights at Kinchou and on the advanced positions the enemy did not exhibit any extraordinary bravery or superiority over us. On the contrary, what was shown up was our inability to engage them and drive them back. Our field force, under General Fock, having made a slight attempt to meet the enemy on the position before Kinchou, quickly withdrew on to the prepared position itself, and then, having lost this in sixteen hours, and lost all its guns of position and batteries at Dalny and Talienwan, retired more than hurriedly towards Arthur, and occupied a strong (in the topographical sense) but long position along the hills--Khelaza, Upilazy, Kuen-san. But the force retired from here also on July 30 to the Fortress works, not defending the position on Wolf's Hills, which had to a certain extent been fortified, and which it had been decided to hold. All the schemes for the defence of Kwantun in general, and of Port Arthur in particular, which had been made out in peace-time, had to be abandoned or altered at the outbreak of war, and all those who drew up these schemes and were helping to carry them out left the district which was destined to be the arena of a long and bloody struggle. The brilliant ten months' defence was due to the fresh actors who appeared on the scene and the plans made out by them. During part of January and all February the arming of the land works and of two coast batteries (6 and 16) was energetically and incessantly carried on, chiefly by night. The work was often interrupted by the enemy's bombardment and attempts to block the harbour. The following guns were received in January and February: 6-inch guns (43 cwt.) 20 6-inch field howitzers 2 87-millimetre Chinese guns (selected) 20 From the Fleet: 2-1/2-inch guns 15 3-line Maxims 25 In February the following were sent to the fort at Yinchow: 1 officer, 72 men. 4 6-inch guns (43 cwt.). 8 light field guns. By March the land works had been armed as follows: _Fort No. 1._ 6-inch guns (68 cwt.) 4 Light guns 4 Machine-guns 4 Rocket troughs 3 _Open Caponier No. 1._ Light guns 4 _Fortification No. 1._ (Danger Hill). Light guns 4 _A Battery._ 6-inch guns (43 cwt.) 6 Light guns 4 Machine-guns 1 Rocket troughs 3 _Fortification No. 2._ 6-inch field howitzers 2 Light guns 4 _B Battery._ 6-inch guns (68 cwt.) 4 Light guns 2 Rocket troughs 3