Meanwhile I most fervently thanked God that I had come into contact with the excited captain before this attack began. The officers around me were naturally excited by these terrible sights and sounds, and, rising unceremoniously, told me that I was free to go wherever I liked. But I was now in no mind to go, and I pointed out to them that if, according to their own account, I stood a good chance of being shot by a sentry before this attack began, I stood a still better chance now that the Japanese bullets were actually whistling overhead and the sentries were all in a state of intense nervousness. They said that they would send a soldier with me to the main road, a few hundred yards off; but I answered that this was not good enough, the soldier would have to come with me all the way to the city, else I would rather prefer to sleep in the trench all night. Without deciding one way or another they went away, leaving me sitting there; but in about an hour the chief of staff came back and told me that on account of the seriousness of this attack, he was going personally to headquarters in Liaoyang. Would I come with him? Of course I would go with him.
We reached the town without any mishap, and, on the way, my companion genially pointed out to me four different places where I would have been shot if I had tried to pass alone without the countersign.
About the time I was arrested, the Russians evacuated Shushan.
Next morning I went east with Mishchenko, to cut off Kuroki. I was with Rennenkampf in the attack on Pen-shi-hu, in October, and on this occasion I crossed the Taitsze river with a band of Cossacks, who advanced further south than any other section of the.
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Russian army, and succeeded for a time in severing all connection between Kuroki and the gallant little Japanese force that held Pen-shi-hu. After the battle of the Shaho I again joined Mishchenko. I had now two Cossack orderlies (" vyestovo'i"), one Philipoff, a Siberian from Verkhnyudinsk, whose business it was to ride with me; and the other a Buriat, who was charged with the care of my baggage.
Philipoff was a lad of twenty-two, and he reminded me very much of a strong, healthy, farmer's son in England, only that he was not quite so clean. In the morning, it is true, his face shone like a schoolboy's if water was handy and it was not too cold, and he always kept his teeth as white as if he were a Japanese; but I never knew his ablutions to extend as far as the back of his neck, save when he went to the steam bath which the Cossacks always established in a village where they were likely to remain any length of time.
Philipoff had the usual big sword, top boots, trousers with a broad yellow band running down each leg; and, cocked on his peculiar Cossack saddle, with a rifle at his back, this youngster was worth more to me than a cartload of duly stamped and sealed official documents. In short, he was a passport to every place over which the Russian eagles waved. Other correspondents, who had got all sorts of special permits, but who had no Cossack, were arrested at every step by soldiers who could not read; and even the attaches were not half as grand as I, for they had only got clumsy infantrymen whom they themselves supplied with horses.
Philipoff had left a young wife at home, but had as yet no children. The down of boyhood was still on his lip, and, except where horses were concerned, he was as simple as a child. As soon as he was placed under my orders he cautiously entreated me to take him to see Mukden, the glories of which ancient capital he had only as yet contemplated from the train which had brought him, some months before, from Harbin to Liaoyang. His longing to gaze on the ancient seat of the Manchus was like that of Jude the Obscure to see Christminster; and, of course, I at once brought him to Mukden, where he was as happy as if it were Paris. I was at first afraid, after all the terrible things that I had heard about the Cossacks, that he would promptly get drunk and perhaps assault me; but never once during the six months we passed together did this Russian lad get intoxicated or give me the slightest cause for dissatisfaction. He confessed to me, however, that he had got drunk once in his life, i.e., at his " knyazhenetsky stol " (princely table), which high-sounding name the Cossack gives to his wedding-breakfast. He never tried to make a " kopeck " of profit on the many commissions with which I charged him, and he used to tell me how disgusted he was at the way Chinese " mahfus " (grooms) of other correspondents defrauded their masters and starved their masters' horses. I think it is not egotistical of me to say that my horses were always in the pink of condition, for it is Philipoff that deserves the credit.