'A besieged fortress can be compared to a man suffering from gangrene. In the same way that he must sooner or later succumb, so, too, must a fortress fall. The doctor and the commandant should realize this fact from the very first day that the former is summoned to the bedside of the patient, and the latter placed in command of the fortress. This, however, does not prevent the former believing in miracles, or the latter hoping for a happy issue by external relief. And this belief is more necessary for the latter than the former, provided it is not so great as to make him careless. Gangrene attacks a man in his extremities—i.e., in the toes—and it is the doctor's duty to separate the part affected. His task consists in prolonging the patient's life, and the commandant's in postponing the date of the fortress's fall. The doctor must not allow the patient suddenly to die, any more than the commandant must allow the fortress to fall suddenly through some unforeseen circumstance. The patient should succumb gradually, beginning with the extremities, and so should the fall of the fortress be gradual, beginning with its outworks. Successes with the first, as with the second, will depend upon the extent to which the infected member is in time removed, or the attacked position is abandoned. This task is no easy one; the doctor must be a skilled professional to be able to fix the moment when the diseased organ is more harmful than useful; but this alone is insufficient, for the patient must first be persuaded to agree to amputation, as without his consent the operation will be impossible. Who cares to lose a leg or an eye? Some would prefer to die, and the doctor must be able to persuade the invalid that it is possible to get about without a leg, that an American artificial leg will enable him to dance. Nor is it easy for the commandant, who must have a thorough grasp of the situation, to be able to know when an attacked position has inflicted all the loss that it can inflict on the attacker, and to recognize the moment when the balance of superiority passes to the enemy. The skill consists in being able to abandon a position before the final blow is delivered, and at the same time to sell the enemy his success dearly. It must be borne in mind that fortress warfare resembles rear-guard fighting, a fact which does not seem to be appreciated by everyone. But besides eyes the commandant must have character, for commonsense and conscience will call out "Retire!" while sentiment and anger will cry "Hold on!" He does not know what he can get—like the artificial leg—in place of what he loses. With the doctor it is different, because his medical store contains false limbs, the commandant's does not. The doctor amputates the infected organs so as not unnecessarily to waste the life's blood, keeping it for the heart. The commandant abandons by degrees the enceinte of the fortress so as to preserve strength for the keep. The length of a defensive line should correspond to the strength of the garrison. No doctor would torture a patient by attempting to reunite the amputated organs, even though it be a tooth taken out by mistake. And, similarly, no commandant should waste his men in an attempt to recapture a position once yielded to the enemy, even though it were abandoned through carelessness. At Sevastopol we held firmly on to what we had, but we did not once attempt to retake a position; the redoubts Komchatsky, Selenginsky and Volinsky are good examples. Osman Pasha, the celebrated defender of Plevna, never attempted to retake a position; on losing one he hastened to hold out another to our blows. Thus, when we seized Grivitsa Redoubt, he got ready another for us which he named Grivitsa Redoubt No. 2, with which he checked our onslaughts. Would he have held out long if he had attempted with his army of 40,000 to retake the redoubts from us? He was careful of his men, and they served him with their spades. A doctor to perform his task successfully must have more than a true hand and eye; he must make his assistants conform strictly to his requirements, and must also know in detail all their work, and be able to direct them while doing that work. Who could perform a good operation if his assistants did not know how to help him, or through stupidity were to pull the thread or the wool out of a wound? To that there would usually be but one end—death. And so for a commandant, it is not sufficient for him merely to select the site of positions and indicate the style of fortification. What use is a fortified position if its loop-holes are unsuitable for firing, or, instead of giving the firer cover, expose him? The Germans assert that with modern rifles a flying sap cannot approach closer than to within 800 metres, etc., etc.'
This is a sufficiently long quotation to show in which direction Fock's mind was working, and how he took Smirnoff's disinclination to surrender anything. It was poison—slow—but certain poison, which even in October had begun to demoralize the garrison, which was beginning to suffer from scurvy, induced by bad food. The Commandant knew that this memorandum was known to the whole garrison, for copies had been lithographed and freely distributed. But how could he deal with this enemy of the Fortress? He had done everything that was in his power; he had already removed him from duty, and could do no more. The reader must not forget that General Fock had great influence over Stössel, that what he said at this time he said 'by order.' There was only one thing to do, namely, to arrest both of them. Why did Smirnoff not do this? may be asked. Because the garrison was already demoralized. It was tired, it was morally and physically worn out; and if he had arrested Stössel—the Tsar's Ambassador,' as Fock called him—he would not have had the full sympathy of the garrison, but would only have created more dissension and scandal. For what would these partisans of Stössel—the all-powerful—have said in Arthur, if they had found out that he had been arrested by the hated Smirnoff? For he was then literally omnipotent, and the future hopes of many depended on him. When he arrived in Russia, instead of going into confinement as a prisoner of war, hundreds of his friends thought that he was the hero and Smirnoff the intriguer. Read their evidence before the Committee of Inquiry, and you will be amazed to see to what extent men can lie to save their own worthless skins. Therefore, keenly as Smirnoff felt the baneful influence of this effusion of Fock's, he was powerless. To have such a spirit fostered in the Fortress was truly an alarming symptom.
On November 3 there was a heavy bombardment, which resulted in a tremendous fire in the oil stores, covering the surrounding country in dense black smoke.
The following are some entries in Raschevsky's diary:
November 9.—'To-day the Japanese succeeded in blowing up the magazine on Zaredoubt Battery with their 11-inch shells. The explosion was awful, but luckily our shells were not damaged. On B Battery two casemates have again been penetrated by an 11-inch shell which burst in the lower floor.'
November 10.—'To-day we fired from Fortification No. 3, with the mortar improvised by Lieutenant Podgursky, a pyroxyline bomb weighing about 40 pounds. This mortar is very convenient: it makes hardly any noise in firing, but it is difficult to regulate. In any case the effect of the bomb is very great, and with luck should cause the enemy much damage. They have for quite a long time fired at us in the forts from similar guns, and this is the first time that we have retaliated in kind.'
November 12.—'The Japanese seem to be doing nothing. In places where formerly we could not show ourselves without being fired on we can now pass with impunity. This gives rise to the hope that they are in a bad way, and will leave Arthur.'
It was not only Colonel Raschevsky who thought this. Many buoyed themselves up with a firm belief in a speedy relief. Unfortunately these hopes were not destined to be fulfilled.
November 14.—'Chi-kuan-shan Fort, Kuropatkin Lunette, and B Battery are in a most critical state. The latter has been broken down and so battered by 11-inch shells as to be useless. The masonry of the casemates is all crumbling away, and the commandant of the battery is asking that it may be tied together by a wire hawser! I daily get similar original suggestions.'