CHAPTER TEN.
ITO'S YARN.
We arrived at our rendezvous among the Hall Islands on the afternoon ofMay 3rd, and found the place practically deserted, those who were leftbehind reporting that Admiral Togo and the fleet had left for PortArthur, the previous day, for the purpose of making a third attempt toseal up the Russian fleet in the harbour. I was by this time makingexcellent progress toward recovery, but the _Idzumi's_ surgeonconsidered that I should do still better in the hospital ashore; I wastherefore landed within half an hour of the ship's coming to an anchor,and that evening found me comfortably established in the roomyconvalescent ward, in charge of an excellent and assiduous medical andnursing staff. The latter was composed of young Japanese women, thanwhom, I think it would be impossible to find more gentle, attentive andtender sick-room attendants. I don't know whether they were more thanusually kind to me because I happened to be a foreigner who was helpingto fight Japan's battles in her hour of need, but it appeared to me thatthey 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 assisted to rise and dress by thetwo nurses whose especial charge I was, and established by them near anopen window overlooking the roadstead, I was making play with aparticularly appetising breakfast when, glancing out of the window, Isaw 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 ananchor another fleet appeared, consisting of the warships which had beento Port Arthur to assist in the attempt to seal up the harbour. Sointerested was I in these arrivals that, in watching them, I allowed mybreakfast to go cold, and nothing would satisfy my nurses but that theymust get me another breakfast, which they did.
I had scarcely finished my belated meal and been attended to by thesurgeon, when the door of the ward was thrown open, and in rushed myformer lieutenant, Ito, now captain of the destroyer _Akatsuki_. He hadvolunteered for service on the 2nd, it appeared, and upon his return hadencountered the _Idzumi's_ Number 1, who had related to Ito my adventureaboard the junk, and the good fellow had straightway come to thehospital to see me "and pay his respects." Also, I shrewdly suspected,to spin me the yarn of his own adventures. But he insisted upon hearingmy story first; and when I had told it, in the fewest words possible, hetold me his own, which, stripped of his somewhat peculiar modes ofexpression, ran somewhat as follows:
"Two days ago," he began, "the news reached here that our soldiers hadcrossed the river Yalu; and thereupon the Admiral made up his mind thatthe moment had arrived for a further attempt to be made to seal up theRussian fleet in Port Arthur harbour.
"As you are aware, Togo has for some time been quietly makingpreparations for this attempt, the twelve steamers that have been lyingat anchor here having been provided especially for that purpose. Youknow also that of those twelve, eight have been prepared in the usualmanner, by placing heavy charges of gun-cotton in their bottoms,connected with the bridge by electric wires, so that the officer incommand might be able to explode the charges and sink his ship at theproper moment, while, on top of these charges, the hull of the ship wasconverted into a solid rock-like mass by filling her with concrete madeof stone, old railway metals and other iron, and cement. Five of theships were also fitted with searchlights, so that we might not againhave to contend with the difficulty of finding the harbour entrance.
"Commander Hayashi, whom I believe you know, was appointed to commandthe expedition; and volunteers were called for in the usual way. Ofcourse I offered myself; and Togo was good enough to appoint me to the_Totomi Maru_, a small craft of some nineteen hundred tons, under asplendid 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, andthe 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 glass, while, for a wonder,the air was crystal clear; also there would be a good slice of moon tolight 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 thebarometer began to fall very rapidly, and about eight o'clock a freshsouth-easterly breeze sprang up quite suddenly; it became hazy, the seagot 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. Iheard to-day that Hayashi, seeing what was coming, made the signal topostpone the attempt; but we never saw the signal, and went on, rollingand plunging through the short, choppy seas in the most uncomfortablemanner.
"It appears that the alarm was first given to the Russians, about twoo'clock next morning, by the appearance of what looked like asearchlight, far out at sea, directed full upon the mouth of theharbour. Of course the searchlight on Golden Hill was at once broughtinto play, and it chanced that as the beam swept the sea, five of ourtorpedo-boats were sighted, attempting to slip into the harbour. It wasa thousand pities that they were prematurely discovered, for theirskippers had formed a bold plan to enter the harbour and torpedo everyship they could find, taking their chance of being able to get awayafterward. But of course their discovery frustrated that plan, for sohot a fire was opened upon them by three Russian gunboats which wereguarding the harbour's mouth, that to have persisted would have meanttheir destruction. So they were obliged to retire; for the Admiralwould not have thanked them for throwing away their boats uselessly.
"Then the searchlight picked up the _Mikawa Maru_, which was leadingthree other explosion ships straight for the harbour, and a terrificfire was opened upon her, the Russians evidently recognising her as amerchant ship, and guessing at her business. From Sosa's report itappears that, having seen the flashes of the guns, firing upon ourtorpedo-boats, he was under the impression that certain of the explosionships had already entered the harbour and were being fired upon by theRussians; but, as he drew nearer in, his searchlight revealed hismistake, showing him that instead of being one of the last, he was thefirst to arrive; therefore he called down into the engine-room for everyounce of steam they could give him, and went, full pelt, for theharbour, through a perfect tornado of projectiles, great and small, fewof which, however, touched the ship, though they were lashing the seainto spray all round her.
"Without sustaining any serious damage, the _Mikawa_ charged right intothe narrow channel at top speed. At this point she came into violentcollision with something that afterward proved to be a `boom,'constructed of stout balks of timber, steel hawsers, and ponderous chaincables, all strongly lashed together and stretched right athwart thechannel, from shore to shore. But she was of nearly two thousand tonsmeasurement, and, with the way that she had on her, she went throughthat boom as though it had been a thread! On she went, until not onlythe searchlight but also Golden Hill fort was on her starboard quarter,and she had penetrated farther than any other Japanese ship had donesince war was declared, when, having reached the point where the channelis narrowest, Sosa, her skipper, swung her athwart the fairway and, amidthe cheers of his crew and the deafening explosions of guns and shells,coolly blew her bottom out and sank her, he and his crew just havingtime to scramble into their two boats as the steamer foundered. Wasn'tthat 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 allwounded, to pull out to our torpedo-boats, and were picked up," repliedIto. "But the Russians fired upon the other boat and destroyed her andher crew, despite Sosa's desperate efforts to save them.
"The next ship to arrive was the _Sakura Maru_. She was about a mileand a half ahead of us in the _Totomi_, and we were able to seeeverything that happened to her.
"I believe it was her opportune arrival that gave the gallant Sosa andhis companions the chance to escape; because o
f 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 tonsbigger than the _Mikawa_--rushing straight for the harbour's mouth ather utmost speed, with the water foaming about her bows, a thin streamof smoke and sparks issuing from her funnels, her whole hull, spars,rigging, and funnels standing up, a black silhouette, between us and thewhite beam of the searchlight, with shells 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 whitefeather' at the top of her waste-pipes, until she reached the PinnacleRock; and there they anchored and sank her. She was manned almostentirely by cadets; and as an illustration of the consummate coolnesswith which they behaved, let me tell you that when the ship 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 mastand then the other. Then they were called upon to surrender, some ofthe Russians actually launching boats to take them off the floatingwreckage; but the cadets were imbued with the true Samurai spirit, theypreferred death to surrender, and they defended themselves with theirrevolvers from all who approached them, until every Japanese was slain.
"Then came the turn of the _Totomi Maru_, we being the third ship toarrive. Well, I have not much to say about what we did, or whathappened to us; it would be merely a repetition of what I have alreadydescribed. Like our predecessors, we went in at full speed, struck somefloating object two terrific blows just as we entered the channel, swepton, amid a hurricane of shells and bullets shrieking and whining aboutour 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 reversedhis engines, swung the ship athwart the channel, with our bows as closeas we could guess to the _Mikawa's_ taffrail, let go two anchors, oneahead and one aft, and calmly sank the craft.
"The Russians kept their searchlight upon us, and peppered us well withrifle-fire, until the _Totomi_ went down; and then they had other fishto honourably fry, as you English say; for the _Aikoku Maru_ was nowracing in toward the harbour's mouth, and it was high time for them toattend to her. They turned the searchlight upon her, opened fire uponher with every weapon that would hurl a shot, and presently, when shewas within about a thousand yards of the entrance, they fired anobservation mine as she passed over it, and down she went, taking herengine-room and stoke-hold crew with her.
"Then there ensued a `spell'--as you, my dear Swinburne, honourably callit--an interlude; possibly it was the end, for there were no more shipsin sight; the firing died down, the searchlight beam stared steadily outto seaward, and we who had survived that saturnalia of slaughter had anopportunity to slip out and rejoin the torpedo-boats which were lurkingclose in under the shadow of the cliffs, waiting to pick us up.
"Honda commanded the leading boat in which our party were making theirescape, and I the other. We were both creeping along as close aspossible to the foot of the cliffs under Golden Hill, in order to eludethe notice of the Russians above; and Honda, with fourteen men, wasabout 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 eventproved, immediately beneath the fort, and I was staring contemplativelyup at the face of the cliff which towered above us, when we came abreastof a sort of cleft in the rock, at the foot of which lay several bigboulders 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 toclimb that cleft; and acting upon the impulse of the moment, I put theboat's helm hard a-starboard and, giving the word `Easy all!' headed intoward the boulders.
"A minute later, we found ourselves in a miniature harbour, just largeenough to receive the boat, the big boulders forming a sort ofbreakwater.
"`Men,' I said, `have all of you your revolvers and cutlasses with you?'
"They answered that they had. `Then,' said I, `let us give thoseRussians, up above, a little surprise. I believe we can climb thatcleft, and I, for one, am determined to try. Who goes with me?'
"As I had quite anticipated, they all agreed to join me in the attempt;so, making fast the boat's painter to a rock, and leaving her to takecare of herself, we scrambled out, and I honourably taking the lead, aswas my right, up we went. It was a very difficult climb, in thesemi-darkness, for the moon was hidden by clouds, and the way was sosteep that we were obliged to push and pull each other up; but at lengthwe reached the top, and then lay down in a little hollow to recover ourbreath.
"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 thattime came to the conclusion that only by the rear could we hope toapproach it undiscovered. Accordingly, I led my men round to the landside of the fort and, taking our time, that we might save our breath, wecrept slowly up the slope until we reached not only the summit of thehill but actually the parapet of the fort itself. Peering over this, Iwas able to see that it was armed with eight 11-inch Canet guns; andthere were, including the gun crews, at least a hundred men in theplace, all of them intently staring out to seaward, evidently inmomentary expectation of seeing more explosion ships arrive.
"Had it been possible for us to have entered that fort at that moment, Iwould have led my men in, and we would have honourably died for theglory of Nippon, destroying as many of the enemy as we could before`going out' ourselves. But entry, at least swiftly enough to take theRussians by surprise, was not possible, the parapet being protected bysubstantial _chevaux de brise_ which we could neither have surmountednor broken down without attracting attention; I was therefore obliged tocontent myself with giving them what you call a `scare.' Ranging my menin open order along the rear parapet, so that only their heads and theirlevelled revolvers could be seen, I loudly called upon the Russians tosurrender!
"My dear Swinburne, it was worth all the toil of that climb up thecliff, and up the steep slope of the hill, to behold the blank dismay ofthose Russians. It did not last long, though; to give them the creditdue to them, they were brave fellows, and the moment they realised thesituation, 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 immediatelyordered his men to cover us with their rifles, and then ordered us tosurrender.
"`How are you going to take us?' I asked.
"`Throw your revolvers over here to me,' he ordered; `and I will sendout 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 mymen, we opened fire with our revolvers at the same moment that theRussians blazed away at us with their rifles. And not until everychamber of our revolvers was empty did we turn and race down that hilltoward 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 ourears like mosquitoes in the summer-time, but not one of us was eventouched. On the other hand, I saw several Russians fall before ourfire, and I think that at least thirty of them must have gone downbefore 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 unassuming, brave as a lion, everything in short that a shipmateshould be; but it was evident that the habit of introducing thatfavourite expression "honourable" in conjunction with a bit of Britishslang, was inveterate with him, and I felt that it would be a long timebefore he would be able to recognise its incongruity.
"Well," I said. "What happened next?"
"Oh, nothing, so far as we were concerned," he replied. "We scrambleddown the cleft into our boat and
pushed off, still keeping quite closeto the foot of the cliffs, although there was a heavy sea rolling in andbreaking upon them. And indeed it was high time for us to be off, forwhen we pulled out of our little harbour at the base of the cliff, thefirst light of dawn was showing along the horizon to the eastward.
"Suddenly, the cannonading, which had completely died away, broke outfuriously again from the heights above, and from the new batteries whichhave been built on the low ground higher up the harbour. At first wethought we had been seen, and that they were firing at us; but presentlya steamer hove in sight to seaward, and we saw that the firing wasdirected at her and three others which followed her. These we presentlyrecognised as the remaining explosion steamers, which had lost their wayin the fog of the night before.
"On they came, rushing toward the harbour at top speed, with a hurricaneof shells of all sizes falling upon and about them, and the full glareof the searchlights shining full upon them.
"The first of them to come I recognised as the _Edo Maru_, under thecommand of Commander Takayagi. She looked frightfully battered as sheswept past us, yet she kept afloat and reached the spot for which shewas aiming. Her engines stopped and reversed, and she was evidentlypreparing to anchor, when a shell struck poor Takayagi, who was standingon the port extremity of the bridge, and, almost cutting him in two, hitthe funnel, and exploding blew a tremendous hole in it. Nagata--youknow Lieutenant Nagata, I think--the second in command, who was also onthe bridge, immediately took charge, anchored the ship, exploded thecharges down in her hold, and, ordering away the boats, left her, justas she was sinking, the crew bringing away poor Takayagi's body withthem. He is to be buried ashore here, this afternoon, with fullmilitary honours, of course.
"The next steamer to come was the _Otaru Maru_. I think the firedirected upon her was even hotter than that which greeted the _Edo_.Shells fell all round her, but none of them seemed to hit her; andmeanwhile she was replying briskly with her Hotchkisses. The din wasterrific, for every battery that could bring a gun to bear was blazingaway at her, while troops made their appearance on the cliffs above andrained bullets upon her deck; indeed a sort of panic seemed to haveseized the Russians, for not only were they hurling hundreds of shellsat the devoted _Otaru_, but were exploding observation mines everywhere,in the most reckless manner. But their most deadly weapon of all wastheir searchlight beam, which they directed right into the eyes of thehelmsman and the officers on the bridge. Dazzled by its blindingbrilliance, our people could not see where they were going; and insteadof reaching her appointed station in the harbour, the _Otaru_ dashed atfull speed upon the rocks. The crew, of course, took to the boats, butthey were unfortunately in the full glare of the searchlight, and theRussian troops shot every one of them.
"We were by this time about a mile out at sea, when we suddenly caughtsight of a torpedo-boat hove-to, without lights, and rolling andpitching furiously not far away. Feeling sure that she must beJapanese, I hailed her, got a reply, and five minutes later wasfollowing my crew up the side of Number 65, being warmly welcomed by myfriend, Lieutenant Taira, who was in command.
"And now came a misfortune; for as I made a spring from our boat to thedeck of the plunging Number 65, the sweeping ray of the Russiansearchlight passed over us, returned, and rested inexorably upon us.Taira instantly gave the order to the engineers to go full speed ahead;but even before the engines could be started, a number of shells camehurtling about us, and one unfortunately passed through the boat's thinside and, without exploding, cut the steam pipe of Number 3 boiler. Ofcourse the stoke-hold was instantly filled with high-pressure steam, andbefore the stokers could escape, three of them were scalded to death.It was horrible to hear their screams and at the same time to realisethe impossibility of doing anything to save them. Luckily for us,Number 75, lying at no great distance, saw that we were in difficulties,and pluckily came to our rescue, taking us in tow and, despite thetremendous fire directed upon us both, dragging us out of range.
"I was too busily engaged in helping to save Number 65 to see much ofwhat further happened in connection with the attempt to `bottle up' theRussian fleet; but I have since learned that the _Sagami Maru_, whichfollowed the _Otaru Maru_, was peculiarly unfortunate, in that shestruck a mechanical mine, just outside the harbour, and went down withall hands. The last ship, the _Asagao Maru_, was scarcely lessunfortunate; for a shell struck her rudder as she neared the harbour,and rendered her unmanageable, so that she went ashore close underGolden Hill, and her crew, refusing to surrender, were killed, to a man.
"Just after this last happening, a fog came driving in from seaward andswallowed us all up, so that the Russians lost sight of us; and then thefiring ceased. Shortly afterwards, our fast cruisers came looming upthrough the fog, to cover our retreat; and about nine o'clock in themorning Togo himself joined us with the battle squadron. He was mostanxious to know the result of the night's operations; but,unfortunately, none of us could afford him more than mere disconnectedsnatches of information. I think I possessed more information thananybody else; but of course mine was by no means complete, and theAdmiral was most anxious to know exactly how matters stood, for greatthings hinged upon the measure of our success; I therefore offered totake in a picket boat and attempt to obtain all the informationrequired, and my offer was accepted. I steamed in under cover of thefog, which was so thick that it was impossible for us to see more than afew yards in any direction; so thick, indeed, that we actually foundourselves among the masts of the sunken craft before we really knewwhere we were. There were two or three shore boats groping about thewreckage already, but they took no notice of us, imagining, perhaps,that we belonged to one of their own ships; and we were therefore ableto complete our examination and to definitely satisfy ourselves that atlast the harbour was entirely blocked. Learning this, the Admiralwirelessed a message to General Oku, informing him that he could safelymove, since the Russian ships were now effectually bottled up; and theresult of that message is the fleet of transports that you see yonder.And now, my dear chap, I must be off; the doctor told me that I must onno account weary you by talking too much; and here have I been yarningfor the last half-hour or more. Good-bye! Hope to see you about againsoon."
"Here, stop a moment, old chap," I cried. "Having told me so much, youmay as well tell me the rest. Where is Oku going?"
"Ah!" answered Ito. "That is a secret. But I think many of us couldmake a good guess, eh?"
"If I were asked to guess, I should say, Pi-tse-wo," answered I.
"And very probably, my dear Swinburne, you would be honourably correct,"answered Ito, as he waved his hand and smilingly bowed himself out.
A little later I was honoured by a visit from Togo himself, with whom Ibelieved myself to be something of a favourite, although Togo'sfavouritism never took the form of sparing the favoured one, or givinghim easy work to execute; on the contrary, the most infallible sign thata man was in the Admiral's favour was the assignment to him of someexceptionally difficult, arduous, or dangerous task. He had, of course,already heard of my adventure from Kamimura, but he wanted to hear thestory from my own lips, and he also had several questions to ask me. Heremained with me nearly an hour, and was most friendly and kind in hismanner, expressing regret at my sufferings--such as they were--and thehope that I should soon be well enough to resume duty.
To my surprise, the Admiral called again, somewhat late in theafternoon. He was very busy, he said, being engaged on the task ofarranging for the convoy of General Oku's Second Army, consisting of70,000 men, the task of whom was to assist in the reduction of PortArthur. He expected to be away a full week, at least, possibly longer,and the object of his visit was to explain to me that, aboard thetransports in harbour were all the materials for the construction of agreat "boom," eight miles long, to be carried from the island ofKwang-lung-tau, the most westerly of the Elliot group, to the mainland.Similar booms had already been run from island to island of the group,and the new, big boom would render the ren
dezvous immune to attack fromthe land to the northward. His object in looking me up, now, was inconnection with the construction of this new, big boom. It appearedthat, after leaving me that morning, he had encountered the physicianwho had charge of the hospital, and that official had expressed theopinion that, in the course of the next three or four days, I mightprobably be sufficiently recovered to be discharged from the hospital,and be employed upon light duties, such as those of superintendence, oranything which did not involve personal exertion.
That remark had suggested an idea to Togo, the result of which was hissecond call upon me, to inquire whether I knew anything about theconstruction of protective booms. As it happened, I did, having oncebeen actively employed upon the construction of an experimental boomwhich was afterward stretched across the mouth of Portsmouth harbour.When, therefore, I told the Admiral this, with his usual directness ofpurpose he at once appointed me to superintend the construction of thelong boom; his orders being that I was to remain in hospital until thedoctors should discharge me; when I was to resume the command of the_Kasanumi_, and with her as flagship, proceed to the Elliot Islands, incharge of the torpedo flotilla which he would leave behind for thatpurpose, escorting the steamers into which he would tranship all thematerials necessary for the construction of the long boom. And upon ourarrival there, I was to discharge the steamers--or, rather, supervisethe discharge of them, landing the materials at the most suitable spot Icould find; and then, still supervising only, proceed with all celerityupon the construction of the boom. He briefly gave me his own ideas asto how the boom should be constructed, but left me with an entirely freehand to introduce any improvements that might suggest themselves to me,so far as the materials at my command would permit. The task was onethat strongly appealed to me, for it gave some scope for the employmentof a certain inventive faculty which I believed I possessed; and Iundertook it with avidity.
That evening, about half an hour before sunset, the transhipment of thematerials for the boom having been effected, the transports containingOku's Second Army got their anchors and started for Pi-tse-wo, escortedby a portion of the fleet under Togo, while the remaining portion,consisting of the light, fast cruisers and a detachment of destroyers,proceeded to Port Arthur, to make assurance doubly sure by keeping aneye upon the Russian ships there. I subsequently learned that thelatter appeared to be quite inactive, although the sounds of frequentloud explosions proceeding from the harbour indicated that the Russianswere already busily engaged upon the task of attempting to blast apassage through the obstructing wrecks.