Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun Part 10

I answered his question by informing him, in as few words as possible, of what had happened to the ill-fated _Kins.h.i.+u Maru_, and then we got down into the boat and pulled across to the _Idzumi_, where Kamimura and his officers were impatiently awaiting us. They gave me the warmest of welcomes, and would not even permit me to tell them my story, the lieutenant who had rescued me a.s.suring them that he had already obtained all the particulars and could tell it as well as I could. I was accordingly at once turned over to the care of the s.h.i.+p's surgeon, and made comfortable in the sick bay, the squadron immediately resuming its cruise.

Now that the tension of looking after myself was relaxed, a reaction set in, with high fever, and for the next four days I was really ill, with frequent intervals of delirium. But there were no complications of any kind, and by the end of the sixth day I was so far recovered as to be able to dress and sit up for an hour or two. Everybody aboard the _Idzumi_ was exceedingly kind to me, as kind indeed as though they had been brothers; and this fraternal feeling of kindly interest was not confined to the _Idzumi_ alone, Kamimura himself informing me, with a smile, that it had become quite a habit for the other s.h.i.+ps to signal an inquiry as to my condition, every morning. As the officers of the s.h.i.+p came off watch, they came tiptoeing along to inquire after me; and if I happened to be awake, and the doctor permitted it, they would sit and chat with me for half an hour or so before retiring to their cabins, by which means I gradually acquired all the missing links in the story of the squadron's abortive cruise.

From these conversations I gathered that after the squadron and the _Kins.h.i.+u_ parted company off Gensan, while we in the transport headed for Iwon, the squadron proceeded toward Vladivostock, being much delayed by a dense fog, through which it steamed at half-speed, each s.h.i.+p towing a fog buoy as a guide to the s.h.i.+p immediately following, though, even with this a.s.sistance, keeping touch was only accomplished with extreme difficulty. Thus they proceeded until, by dead reckoning, they arrived at a point seventy miles south of Vladivostock, when, the weather being much too thick to permit of fighting the enemy, even should the two fleets blunder together, Admiral Kamimura decided to retrace his steps, arriving at Gensan two days later. Here the j.a.panese consul boarded the _Idzumi_ and imparted to the Admiral the startling information that on the previous day four strange wars.h.i.+ps, accompanied by a couple of destroyers, had appeared off the port, the wars.h.i.+ps being later identified as those const.i.tuting the Vladivostock squadron. The destroyers had entered the harbour, boarded a small j.a.panese craft loaded with fish, ordered her crew to get into her boat and go ash.o.r.e, and had then torpedoed her; the expended torpedo being probably at least as valuable as the s.h.i.+p which it sank! Later on, the Russian cruisers had entered the harbour, but had left again without doing any damage.

In reply to an inquiry concerning the _Kins.h.i.+u Maru_, the consul replied that neither she nor her escort had yet returned. This information caused Admiral Kamimura some uneasiness, since there had been time for us to do all that we had been ordered to do, and to get back to Gensan; and the squadron was actually getting its anchors, preparatory to its departure to hunt for the transport, when Commander Takebe with his torpedo-boats arrived. Questioned as to the whereabouts of the _Kins.h.i.+u_, he expressed surprise at her non-arrival, briefly relating particulars of the discussion which had resulted in the transport leaving Iwon, unescorted, while he remained in harbour to see what the weather developments were going to be.

This was enough for Kamimura. Takebe's story, in conjunction with that of the consul at Gensan, convinced the Admiral that something very serious had happened; and he at once gave orders for the torpedo flotilla to proceed along the coast to hunt for news of the transport, while he, with his squadron, started off in chase of the Russians.

It was on the morning following this second departure of the squadron from Gensan, that they sighted the junk from which I was rescued. It is possible that, in his eagerness to overtake the Russians, he might have pushed on without pausing to examine a small, apparently derelict junk, but for the fact that, fortunately for me, two or three of the _Idzumi's_ officers recognised her as the junk which the _Kins.h.i.+u_ had taken with her to facilitate the landing operations at Iwon.

After they had taken me off the junk, the j.a.panese had pushed ahead direct for Vladivostock, in the hope of arriving there before the Russians. But in this hope they were disappointed. Upon their arrival, the Russian cruisers were seen to be already back in harbour; and all that was accomplished was to drive precipitately back into the harbour two Russian destroyers which had the impudence--or the courage--to come out and threaten them; and also to exchange a few shots with the Russian forts.

CHAPTER TEN.

ITO'S YARN.

We arrived at our rendezvous among the Hall Islands on the afternoon of May 3rd, and found the place practically deserted, those who were left behind reporting that Admiral Togo and the fleet had left for Port Arthur, the previous day, for the purpose of making a third attempt to seal up the Russian fleet in the harbour. I was by this time making excellent progress toward recovery, but the _Idzumi's_ surgeon considered that I should do still better in the hospital ash.o.r.e; I was therefore landed within half an hour of the s.h.i.+p's coming to an anchor, and that evening found me comfortably established in the roomy convalescent ward, in charge of an excellent and a.s.siduous medical and nursing staff. The latter was composed of young j.a.panese women, than whom, I think it would be impossible to find more gentle, attentive and tender sick-room attendants. I don't know whether they were more than usually kind to me because I happened to be a foreigner who was helping to fight j.a.pan's battles in her hour of need, but it appeared to me that they were vying with each other as to who should do the most for me.

Had I been a king, they could not have done more for me than they did.

On the following morning, having been a.s.sisted to rise and dress by the two nurses whose especial charge I was, and established by them near an open window overlooking the roadstead, I was making play with a particularly appetising breakfast when, glancing out of the window, I saw a big fleet of transports arriving--there were eighty-three in all, for I had the curiosity to count them; and while they were coming to an anchor another fleet appeared, consisting of the wars.h.i.+ps which had been to Port Arthur to a.s.sist in the attempt to seal up the harbour. So interested was I in these arrivals that, in watching them, I allowed my breakfast to go cold, and nothing would satisfy my nurses but that they must get me another breakfast, which they did.

I had scarcely finished my belated meal and been attended to by the surgeon, when the door of the ward was thrown open, and in rushed my former lieutenant, Ito, now captain of the destroyer _Akatsuki_. He had volunteered for service on the 2nd, it appeared, and upon his return had encountered the _Idzumi's_ Number 1, who had related to Ito my adventure aboard the junk, and the good fellow had straightway come to the hospital to see me "and pay his respects." Also, I shrewdly suspected, to spin me the yarn of his own adventures. But he insisted upon hearing my story first; and when I had told it, in the fewest words possible, he told me his own, which, stripped of his somewhat peculiar modes of expression, ran somewhat as follows:

"Two days ago," he began, "the news reached here that our soldiers had crossed the river Yalu; and thereupon the Admiral made up his mind that the moment had arrived for a further attempt to be made to seal up the Russian fleet in Port Arthur harbour.

"As you are aware, Togo has for some time been quietly making preparations for this attempt, the twelve steamers that have been lying at anchor here having been provided especially for that purpose. You know also that of those twelve, eight have been prepared in the usual manner, by placing heavy charges of gun-cotton in their bottoms, connected with the bridge by electric wires, so that the officer in command might be able to explode the charges and sink his s.h.i.+p at the proper moment, while, on top of these charges, the hull of the s.h.i.+p was converted into a solid rock-like ma.s.s by filling her with concrete made of stone, old railway metals and other iron, and cement. Five of the s.h.i.+ps were also fitted with searchlights, so that we might not again have to contend with the difficulty of finding the harbour entrance.

"Commander Hayas.h.i.+, whom I believe you know, was appointed to command the expedition; and volunteers were called for in the usual way. Of course I offered myself; and Togo was good enough to appoint me to the _Totomi Maru_, a small craft of some nineteen hundred tons, under a splendid fellow named Honda.

"We left here at noon of the 2nd, escorted by the gunboats _Akagi_ and _Chokai_, the second, third, fourth, and fifth destroyer divisions, and the ninth, tenth, and fourteenth torpedo-boat flotillas.

"When we started, the weather was everything that could be desired; there was no wind, and the water was like gla.s.s, while, for a wonder, the air was crystal clear; also there would be a good slice of moon to light us on our way after sunset. But the weather was too fine to last; you know how it is in these seas, my dear chap. Toward sunset the barometer began to fall very rapidly, and about eight o'clock a fresh south-easterly breeze sprang up quite suddenly; it became hazy, the sea got up rapidly, and by six bells in the first watch it was blowing hard, and the weather became so thick that we lost sight of each other. I heard to-day that Hayas.h.i.+, seeing what was coming, made the signal to postpone the attempt; but we never saw the signal, and went on, rolling and plunging through the short, choppy seas in the most uncomfortable manner.

"It appears that the alarm was first given to the Russians, about two o'clock next morning, by the appearance of what looked like a searchlight, far out at sea, directed full upon the mouth of the harbour. Of course the searchlight on Golden Hill was at once brought into play, and it chanced that as the beam swept the sea, five of our torpedo-boats were sighted, attempting to slip into the harbour. It was a thousand pities that they were prematurely discovered, for their skippers had formed a bold plan to enter the harbour and torpedo every s.h.i.+p they could find, taking their chance of being able to get away afterward. But of course their discovery frustrated that plan, for so hot a fire was opened upon them by three Russian gunboats which were guarding the harbour's mouth, that to have persisted would have meant their destruction. So they were obliged to retire; for the Admiral would not have thanked them for throwing away their boats uselessly.

"Then the searchlight picked up the _Mikawa Maru_, which was leading three other explosion s.h.i.+ps straight for the harbour, and a terrific fire was opened upon her, the Russians evidently recognising her as a merchant s.h.i.+p, and guessing at her business. From Sosa's report it appears that, having seen the flashes of the guns, firing upon our torpedo-boats, he was under the impression that certain of the explosion s.h.i.+ps had already entered the harbour and were being fired upon by the Russians; but, as he drew nearer in, his searchlight revealed his mistake, showing him that instead of being one of the last, he was the first to arrive; therefore he called down into the engine-room for every ounce of steam they could give him, and went, full pelt, for the harbour, through a perfect tornado of projectiles, great and small, few of which, however, touched the s.h.i.+p, though they were las.h.i.+ng the sea into spray all round her.

"Without sustaining any serious damage, the _Mikawa_ charged right into the narrow channel at top speed. At this point she came into violent collision with something that afterward proved to be a 'boom,'

constructed of stout balks of timber, steel hawsers, and ponderous chain cables, all strongly lashed together and stretched right athwart the channel, from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e. But she was of nearly two thousand tons measurement, and, with the way that she had on her, she went through that boom as though it had been a thread! On she went, until not only the searchlight but also Golden Hill fort was on her starboard quarter, and she had penetrated farther than any other j.a.panese s.h.i.+p had done since war was declared, when, having reached the point where the channel is narrowest, Sosa, her skipper, swung her athwart the fairway and, amid the cheers of his crew and the deafening explosions of guns and sh.e.l.ls, coolly blew her bottom out and sank her, he and his crew just having time to scramble into their two boats as the steamer foundered. Wasn't that fine?"

"Splendid!" I agreed, heartily. "And what became of that fine chap, Sosa, and his crew? Did they manage to escape?"

"Sosa and three men of his boat's crew contrived, although they were all wounded, to pull out to our torpedo-boats, and were picked up," replied Ito. "But the Russians fired upon the other boat and destroyed her and her crew, despite Sosa's desperate efforts to save them.

"The next s.h.i.+p to arrive was the _Sakura Maru_. She was about a mile and a half ahead of us in the _Totomi_, and we were able to see everything that happened to her.

"I believe it was her opportune arrival that gave the gallant Sosa and his companions the chance to escape; because of course as soon as the _Sakura_ was seen, the Russian gunners gave all their attention to her.

"It was a grand sight to see her--she was more than a thousand tons bigger than the _Mikawa_--rus.h.i.+ng straight for the harbour's mouth at her utmost speed, with the water foaming about her bows, a thin stream of smoke and sparks issuing from her funnels, her whole hull, spars, rigging, and funnels standing up, a black silhouette, between us and the white beam of the searchlight, with sh.e.l.ls exploding all about her, deluging her with foam, but apparently doing her no harm. She stood on, evidently under a full head of steam, for we could see 'the white feather' at the top of her waste-pipes, until she reached the Pinnacle Rock; and there they anch.o.r.ed and sank her. She was manned almost entirely by cadets; and as an ill.u.s.tration of the consummate coolness with which they behaved, let me tell you that when the s.h.i.+p went down, they actually had the presence of mind to take flares aloft with them, which they burnt from the crosstrees, to guide us into the channel!

"Of course the Russians fired upon them, and shot away first one mast and then the other. Then they were called upon to surrender, some of the Russians actually launching boats to take them off the floating wreckage; but the cadets were imbued with the true Samurai spirit, they preferred death to surrender, and they defended themselves with their revolvers from all who approached them, until every j.a.panese was slain.

"Then came the turn of the _Totomi Maru_, we being the third s.h.i.+p to arrive. Well, I have not much to say about what we did, or what happened to us; it would be merely a repet.i.tion of what I have already described. Like our predecessors, we went in at full speed, struck some floating object two terrific blows just as we entered the channel, swept on, amid a hurricane of sh.e.l.ls and bullets shrieking and whining about our ears, until we came to the wreck of the _Mikawa_, and there Honda-- who is about as cool a chap under fire as you are--stopped and reversed his engines, swung the s.h.i.+p athwart the channel, with our bows as close as we could guess to the _Mikawa's_ taffrail, let go two anchors, one ahead and one aft, and calmly sank the craft.

"The Russians kept their searchlight upon us, and peppered us well with rifle-fire, until the _Totomi_ went down; and then they had other fish to honourably fry, as you English say; for the _Aikoku Maru_ was now racing in toward the harbour's mouth, and it was high time for them to attend to her. They turned the searchlight upon her, opened fire upon her with every weapon that would hurl a shot, and presently, when she was within about a thousand yards of the entrance, they fired an observation mine as she pa.s.sed over it, and down she went, taking her engine-room and stoke-hold crew with her.

"Then there ensued a 'spell'--as you, my dear Swinburne, honourably call it--an interlude; possibly it was the end, for there were no more s.h.i.+ps in sight; the firing died down, the searchlight beam stared steadily out to seaward, and we who had survived that saturnalia of slaughter had an opportunity to slip out and rejoin the torpedo-boats which were lurking close in under the shadow of the cliffs, waiting to pick us up.

"Honda commanded the leading boat in which our party were making their escape, and I the other. We were both creeping along as close as possible to the foot of the cliffs under Golden Hill, in order to elude the notice of the Russians above; and Honda, with fourteen men, was about a quarter of a mile ahead. I had eleven men with me.

"We had arrived at a point which I believed to be, rightly as the event proved, immediately beneath the fort, and I was staring contemplatively up at the face of the cliff which towered above us, when we came abreast of a sort of cleft in the rock, at the foot of which lay several big boulders in a great pile, some of which were in the water. Suddenly, the idea occurred to me that it might be possible for active men to climb that cleft; and acting upon the impulse of the moment, I put the boat's helm hard a-starboard and, giving the word 'Easy all!' headed in toward the boulders.

"A minute later, we found ourselves in a miniature harbour, just large enough to receive the boat, the big boulders forming a sort of breakwater.

"'Men,' I said, 'have all of you your revolvers and cutla.s.ses with you?'

"They answered that they had. 'Then,' said I, 'let us give those Russians, up above, a little surprise. I believe we can climb that cleft, and I, for one, am determined to try. Who goes with me?'

"As I had quite antic.i.p.ated, they all agreed to join me in the attempt; so, making fast the boat's painter to a rock, and leaving her to take care of herself, we scrambled out, and I honourably taking the lead, as was my right, up we went. It was a very difficult climb, in the semi-darkness, for the moon was hidden by clouds, and the way was so steep that we were obliged to push and pull each other up; but at length we reached the top, and then lay down in a little hollow to recover our breath.

"The fort crowned the summit of a steep hill immediately in front of us.

For fully five minutes I patiently examined it, and at the end of that time came to the conclusion that only by the rear could we hope to approach it undiscovered. Accordingly, I led my men round to the land side of the fort and, taking our time, that we might save our breath, we crept slowly up the slope until we reached not only the summit of the hill but actually the parapet of the fort itself. Peering over this, I was able to see that it was armed with eight 11-inch Canet guns; and there were, including the gun crews, at least a hundred men in the place, all of them intently staring out to seaward, evidently in momentary expectation of seeing more explosion s.h.i.+ps arrive.

"Had it been possible for us to have entered that fort at that moment, I would have led my men in, and we would have honourably died for the glory of Nippon, destroying as many of the enemy as we could before 'going out' ourselves. But entry, at least swiftly enough to take the Russians by surprise, was not possible, the parapet being protected by substantial _chevaux de brise_ which we could neither have surmounted nor broken down without attracting attention; I was therefore obliged to content myself with giving them what you call a 'scare.' Ranging my men in open order along the rear parapet, so that only their heads and their levelled revolvers could be seen, I loudly called upon the Russians to surrender!

"My dear Swinburne, it was worth all the toil of that climb up the cliff, and up the steep slope of the hill, to behold the blank dismay of those Russians. It did not last long, though; to give them the credit due to them, they were brave fellows, and the moment they realised the situation, they simply laughed at us, regarding our exploit as a joke-- as indeed it was, more than anything else.

"But the joke had its grim side, too; for the commandant immediately ordered his men to cover us with their rifles, and then ordered us to surrender.

"'How are you going to take us?' I asked.

"'Throw your revolvers over here to me,' he ordered; 'and I will send out some men to conduct you to the town.'

"'No,' I said.

"'If you do not, I shall be compelled to shoot,' he said.

"'Then, shoot, and be hanged to you,' I replied; and giving a sign to my men, we opened fire with our revolvers at the same moment that the Russians blazed away at us with their rifles. And not until every chamber of our revolvers was empty did we turn and race down that hill toward the head of the cleft by which we had ascended."

"Did you suffer any loss?" I asked.

"None at all," was the cheerful answer. "The bullets hummed about our ears like mosquitoes in the summer-time, but not one of us was even touched. On the other hand, I saw several Russians fall before our fire, and I think that at least thirty of them must have gone down before we turned and honourably 'hooked it,' as you would say."

I smiled. Good old Ito! He was a splendid fellow, honest as the day, utterly una.s.suming, brave as a lion, everything in short that a s.h.i.+pmate should be; but it was evident that the habit of introducing that favourite expression "honourable" in conjunction with a bit of British slang, was inveterate with him, and I felt that it would be a long time before he would be able to recognise its incongruity.

"Well," I said. "What happened next?"