This is a brief—over-brief—account of what was really a series
of battles contested with singular courage on both sides, and marked by a slaughter unparalleled since Napoleon retreated from Russia. It is impossible as yet to obtain an accurate account of the casualties ; but the rule on both sides was never to retreat, whole regiments were swept away, the Japanese on one day counted nine thousand Russian bodies, and there is grave reason to believe that the killed and wounded exceeded—perhaps even much exceeded—eighty thousand men. The battle disproves, in fact, the general im- pression that modern weapons have superseded hand-to-hand encounters, and are consequently less murderous than the older modes of fighting. There is no difference when the numbers on both sides are on the same scale, and the men equally disciplined and determined. It is said that in both countries the slaughter is making a deep impression, theRussian Reservists regarding the summons to join as a death-warrant, while in Tokio the news of victory is received with none of the old joyousness. The fact that the numbers of the wounded cannot be grappled with, either by the Red Cross Societies or the doctors, adds greatly to the horror created by the official reports of the number slain.
