A very calm courteous young officer rides up, dismounts, salutes — bad story to tell — " Japs awfully close, sir." Projectile whizzes viciously overhead, but young officer remains quite unmoved, his hand still to the salute. Colonel says things cannot be quite so bad. Still, to my unpractised eye, the outlook is black enough. A circle of fire, a thunder-striking girdle of artillery seems to be slowly closing in around us. A ring of shrapnel looking clearer and more dreadful in the gathering night is bursting round ninety degrees of a circle; the little gap, the tenth degree, may be closed at any moment. If I were in command of the Volinsky regiment I am afraid that I would lose no time in making a bee-line for that gap. A young Polish officer, who has been looking at this awful scene for some time, quotes some of Mickiewicz's terrible verses describing Napoleon's advance into Russia, and immediately after gets into a violent argument with the Volinsky colonel. Rikacheff and I make another effort to get news of staffs and armies, but the colonel leaves us absolutely in the dark. He is kind enough, however, to remark that if we don't like to go away, we may remain with him in Towtaidze for the night. It is like an invitation to remain on the top storey of a burning house. All indications point to the likelihood of the Japanese making five or six bayonet attacks on Towtaidze under cover of the darkness, so we hastily excuse ourselves and
* This is not an imaginary conversation.
mount our horses, which, having fed, are now standing sleepily by, with sad, pendulous under-lips which occasionally move as if in prayer. The colonel gives each of us a feeling handshake, and says that we both deserve a St. George, but he refuses to give us the password. "You may be challenged by Japanese, and give it to them involuntarily," he argues, " and, anyhow, you don't need it. If our people arrest you, they'll bring you direct to the staff, and isn't that exactly where you want to go??
Thus we parted with this brave, unsympathetic man, and lucky it was for us that we did so, for, perhaps, on that very night the terrible circle of steel and fire closed in around Towtaidze. I cannot say for certain, however; for in those troubled days it was as hard for me to get any information of what was happening at a distance as it would be to get news about friends in England in case primeval chaos had returned to earth and upset all the postal arrangements of the nations.
Just then, however, we are too much concerned about ourselves to mourn for the doom impending over this shell-battered hamlet. We hurry off like men pursued by a tidal wave. On right of us, on left of us we hear the roar of the Japanese advance grow louder and louder. It is like the deep rumbling of a sea that has burst its bounds. High above the plain on right of us, on left of us, far as the eye can reach, are long lines of fleecy shrapnel cloudlets, the foam and the spray of that on-rushing ocean. Two projectiles burst with an appalling crash right in front of us. We go forth, feeling like men going out on a torpedo-boat which stands a thousand chances to one of being sunk. It is a beautiful evening; the sky is lovely; I count six villages burning on the horizon. Miltonic images arise in my mind as I contemplate this terrific battle-field. Can the pen of poet, can the brush of painter ever convey an adequate idea of the horror of such a night as this? Never! Never!
I have not the least notion where we are heading for. I soon became aware, however, that we are in a hot place, for the whizz of the bullets is unceasing; and ominous, unseen things strike the ground in several places close to us, raising little puffs of dust. Shells hurtle overhead with long shrieks. The r-r-r-rip, r-r-r-rip, r-r-r-rip of the musketry is getting louder. The furnace roar of the battle now becomes deafening, We are going the wrong way! We are approaching the enemy! Panic-stricken, I persuade my companion to come back. Back! Whither? To Towtaidze? Impossible! Towtaidze is nought now but one of half a score of burning villages, which flame like red torches in the immense black night above innumerable multitudes of men trampling by. Even if it still exists it will be impossible to find it. Whipped by the mad wind of panic, we gallop — I don't know in what direction. At last we meet several military waggons advancing, and join ourselves on to them. The drivers of these waggons are visibly perspiring. Vapour rises from their faces like steam, and they are crossing themselves briskly with large, unsteady hands. We notice that one of the flaming villages is Meturan, the former headquarters of Kaulbars. Alone and unprovided with the password, there is a great chance of our being taken for Japanese. But what information could a Japanese §cout get on such a night?