On January 30 the order to mobilise was received in Port Arthur. I happened to be in the naval quarters at the time, and everybody seemed to think that there wTas no longer any hope. The doctors had received orders to prepare to receive wounded, and vast quantities of lint and bandages were on their way from Europe.
I now watched the Russian fleet in the outer harbour with the same attention as I had watched it when it was in the inner harbour; but on looking for it one morning — February 3 — I found it had vanished.
I at once hurried into town, where they told me that the fleet had left at dawn "with sealed papers." There was a good deal of excitement at this time on account of the British Mission to Thibet, and it rather looked as if a universal war were brewing.
The excitement was considerably allayed, however, by the return of the Russian fleet at four o'clock on February 4, but was fanned again by the report that sixty Japanese vessels were off Wei-hai-wei — a report which led to new tirades against the English.
On the 5th many Japanese left Port Arthur, and we got a telegram to the effect that the Nisshin and Kasuga had left Singapore. But, hurrah! Admiral Wirenius has left Suez. The day after he left Suez Japan broke off diplomatic relations.
There had been so many false alarms, however, that there was not much excitement in town. Twenty Norwegian steamers full of coal were lying in the inner harbour, and on the jetty a number of Chinese coolies, under the direction of a soldier, were working on a submarine mine!
Before this time there had come overland from Europe a large number of bluejackets, among whom were the best gunners and mechanicians of the Baltic and Black Sea squadrons. I wonder what kind of a showing the Russian fleet wouid have made if these men had not come!
The last time I saw the Viceroy before war broke out was early in February, at a belated celebration of the Russian New Year, in the Realny Uchilishtch6, a fine Russian Government school in New Town. It was a function which did not tend to give any of those present the impression that the city would be bombarded in a few days. The class-rooms were richly decorated; there was a band in attendance; there were plenty of refreshments; the Viceroy was surrounded by his brilliant staff; the guests were numerous, and there was a surprisingly large number of clean, fair-haired boys and girls, who, after the Russian custom on such occasions, danced sedately together for hours. Among these children were about a score of fine Chinese lads, whose rich silk gowns and caps added a picturesque foreign touch to the scene. Every child seemed to get a prize of some kind, and, at the end of the distribution, the Viceroy went around among the children cracking jokes with them. After talking for some time in Russian to the Chinese boys, he turned to the Russian boys and told them that they should be ashamed of themselves for not being able to talk Chinese as well as these Chinese talked Russian.
As a matter of fact, the Viceroy was very keen on the subject of bringing the Chinese and the Russians together; and with that object in view he had, a few days before, induced the head master of this school to engage a Chinese-speaking Russian, probably the only one in Port Arthur, to teach Chinese to as many of the Russian boys as cared to study it.
He had also persuaded, or perhaps ordered, Colonel Artemieff, the proprietor of the Novi Krai, to make arrangements for getting out a Chinese paper at the same time as the new English paper; and a very intelligent Chinese, who spoke Russian perfectly, was engaged in advance as editor.
While visiting English steamers which touched at Port Arthur I discovered about this time that nobody was now allowed to leave or enter the port without a special permit; and that Japanese were continually travelling to and fro between Port Arthur and Chefoo. To put a stop to this latter practice, a military officer was told off to visit each ship before it left, but as he had a number of whiskeys and soda on board every vessel he visited, he was not always able at the end of his tour to distinguish a Japanese from a ship's binnacle, though I must say that he invariably began with the best intentions.
One or two Russian deserters, generally Germanspeaking Jews, now left by every steamer, generally bribing the Chinese crew to conceal them, for the English captains would not take them if they could not show their passports. It reminded me of rats deserting a sinking ship, although in this case the rats were deserting "the most impregnable of all first-class fortresses " for the unstable sea; and the event proved their wisdom. Was it instinct that made these intensely ignorant men fly from the doomed fortress, or had some sort of warning been circulated among the Jews?