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108 THE SIEGE OF PORT ARTHUR
When the Japanese had brought their sap-
heads some little distance away from their base,
the Russians nightly commenced to make attacks
on the men working in the trenches. A small
party of soldiers would steal down under cover of
darkness, and, dashing suddenly upon the sappers,
kill them with bullets or bayonets or dynamite
bombs, destroying in a few minutes a whole day’s
laborious work.
After August 23rd the Russians only made one
sortie on a bigger scale. It was during the night of
the 27th. Ever since the beginning of the general
attack on the 19th the weather had been perfect,
though very hot. But in the evening of the 27th
a heavy thunderstorm passed over the peninsula,
and, taking advantage of this, the Russians made
an advance along their whole front. The rain
came down in sheets, and we had long ago been
compelled to retreat to our tents at the foot of
Fenghoangshan and were soundly asleep, when,
about two o’clock in the morning, we were
awakened by the rattling of rifles and machine
guns, which opened up in a way that left no doubt
in our minds that something serious was on foot.
Hastily donning our waterproofs, we scrambled
up the steep, slippery sides of our hill, hot and
wet and sleep-drunk. Once up there, all our
grievances were forgotten in the sight that lay
before us.
The night, black as the eternal darkness,
formed a fitting background for the unique
spectacle, the wonderful play of light and flame
which fairly dazzled us when we reached the hill-
top. With pauses of but a few seconds the
darkness was rent by blinding blueish-white rays
of the lightning which came shooting across the
whole horizon from every side, now crossing their
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