“You have seen Port Arthur. You may think it easy to take,” he went on through Gotoh. I protested.
“It is not easy,” he continued. “It is quite difficult to take.”
“Of course—of course—thirty forts—ten years of engineering—impregnable natural defenses—a stubborn army of great fighters—clever officers to face——”
“But——” he reached halfway across the table, not waiting for Gotoh to tell him what I said, and I had no need of an interpreter to know the five words he uttered:
“I hold Port Arthur there!” I looked into the hollow of his hand, twitching nervously, and saw the palm that is without bones, the palm all nerves and sinew.
“But where will the army winter? You are not building barracks. You have only shelter tents, flimsy as paper, which the Manchurian winds would laugh at.”
“Do not worry. You shall winter inside. We will take it soon. I hesitate to use the big guns for fear of hurting noncombatants.”
Then the tea came, via a soldier whose shoulder straps bearing the figure 9 showed him to be one of the few survivors of the famous 9th regiment, which lost 94 per cent. of its men in repeated unsuccessful assaults on the Cock’s Comb forts during the three days battle from August 21st to 23d, and I saw that Kodama, like Nogi, rewards the heroism of private soldiers by relieving them from duty on the firing line and giving them honorable work as body servants.
The General fondled his tea, delicious in a lacquered cup; Giokuro it was, the best Japan grows, and bits of the leaf glittered in the bottom like particles of steel. The steam curled about his face. He lit a cigar, puffed vigorously, and smoke wreathed with steam. Through the haze his whiskers, twisted in a loose wisp, bobbed spasmodically as his pointed chin spat out the sentences. He pulled himself further together, tying his legs acrobatically, and made room in the great chair for still another general. I wondered if he would disappear entirely, wizard-like, in a cloud of smoke. Then I thought of that criminal condemned to capital punishment, executed in experiment by the tea expert, who drank and drank until he shriveled and shrunk to powdery fiber. Plainly Giokuro, Havana and hot baths had helped hard work in drying up this tiny great man.