FOOTNOTES:
[4] The Central Wall.
DEVELOPMENTS
At 1 a.m. on February 25 some destroyers, which were covering the advance of a blocker[5] towards the narrows into the harbour, attempted to torpedo the Retvisan. The battleship sank one destroyer, while the blocker was set on fire, and ran on the rocks of Tiger Peninsula. Here she lay blazing close to the Retvisan, a source of extreme danger, as she might at any moment blow up. Later on the enemy's fleet appeared on the horizon. The Bayan, Novik, and Askold, lying in the outer Roads, at once moved out and engaged it. From the hill I was on, I watched that rare picture, a fight at sea; but it did not last long. In face of a force four times their own strength, our ships were finally forced to seek shelter under the guns of the Fortress. Just at the end of this fight one of two of our destroyers, returning from night reconnaissance, was forced by the enemy's cruisers to beach herself. This was entirely due to the unfortified state of Liao-tieh-shan.
On February 28 a remarkable order by Stössel was published in the Novy Kry. It was also telegraphed all over the whole world, and presumably redounded to the credit of its author:
'The troops know well, and I now make known to the civilians, that there will be no retirement; in the first place, the Fortress must fight to the last, and I, as its Commandant, will never give the order to retreat; in the second, there is no place to which to retreat....'