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20 THE SIEGE OF PORT ARTHUR
visible everywhere. Even where they have trenches
on the slopes or at the foot of a hill, they take no
pains to conceal them or to construct blinds to
draw the enemy’s fire. The troops have to shoot
over the top of the breastworks, and so expose
their heads and shoulders. This is why the
Japanese, time after time, were able to drive them
out of their trenches by shrapnel fire alone (e.g. at
Nanshan). As the war progressed, much of this
was altered and improved. Already during the
two months from Nanshan to Port Arthur they
had learnt much. The trenches I saw at their
last advanced positions before Port Arthur were
much better constructed and masked than those
more forward. In Manchuria, from Liaoyang, the
Russian field fortifications were, from all reports,
exceedingly well constructed.
But to resume. From July 5th to 26th
the two armies kept their relative positions,
nothing but small engagements of outposts taking
place. Towards the middle of July Talien Bay
had been completely cleared of mines, so there
was no longer any danger in making the con-
veniently situated port of Dalny the base of the
Third Army. During the latter part of the month
the whole of the 9th Army Division and two inde-
pendent infantry brigades were landed here, as
well as the 2nd independent artillery brigade and
a number of siege and naval guns. The whole
force of the Third Army thus being assembled, no
reason existed for delaying the attack on Port
Arthur.
The Russians, meanwhile, had employed the
delay in constructing strong semi-permanent for-
tifications along their whole line of defence, which
extended from coast to coast, from Shuang-tai-
kou in the north over the An-tze-ling Pass to
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