Nothing of interest occurred during the day and a half that elapsed
before the departure of the despatch-boat. Punctual enough as to time
she steamed out of the harbour under cover of night, with the Chinese
agent and myself on board. Misfortunes are well known never to come
singly, and so it was in my case. The morning after our departure was
very foggy, and towards noon we had to slow down to less than half
speed. Suddenly, without a moment's warning, a Japanese gunboat loomed
through the dun vapour close on the port bow. With their ridiculous
fondness for showing it on all occasions, in season and out, the
Celestials had their flag flaunting on a staff in the stern. The
Japanese on the gunboat perceived it, for without troubling to hail
she opened on us with the machine-guns in her tops. A storm of balls
swept the deck, and half of those upon it fell dead or wounded. One of
the bullets cut off the peak of my cap with mechanical neatness,
leaving the rest of the article on my head, though turned quite
round, back to front. Before anything could be done to increase our
speed, a quick-firing gun plumped several heavy shot through us. The
machinery was damaged, we swung round helplessly, and were evidently
fast sinking. We had two boats of no great size; one of them was
knocked to splinters by the shot; the other we lowered as fast as we
could. As many as it would hold got into it, the others jumped into
the water, and within half a minute afterwards our vessel went down,
and the woe-begone survivors of the sudden catastrophe found
themselves prisoners on the deck of her destroyer.
She was the _Itsuku_ gunboat of about five hundred tons, on a cruise
of observation in the Gulf, along with two or three consorts, whom she
had lost in the fog. There was not a soul on board who could speak a
word of English, but by a few Chinese was sufficiently understood, and
a gunnery officer could speak tolerable French, a knowledge of which
tongue I shall probably be recollected to have mentioned as being the
major portion of the inadequate exchange for my eighty thousand
pounds. They informed us that they had taken us for a torpedo boat,
and seeing the Chinese flag had no hesitation in opening fire on so
dangerous a neighbour, as they deemed us. They seemed very scantily
pleased when told our real character, and learnt that their
precipitancy had perhaps lost them a little promotion, or at least
honourable mention, as capturers of important despatches, as I
understand them to have been.
I remained on board this vessel for more than a month. The Chinese, of
course, were prisoners of war, but there was no ground for detaining
me as such. I related how I had been left behind by the _Columbia_ at
Port Arthur, without, of course, giving any hint that she had been
engaged in supplying China with war material. I thought this would
satisfy my captors, but I was not long in finding out that they
entertained their own ideas as to my character, for one day I was
plainly asked whether I was not a military or naval instructor of the
Chinese. I was able to conscientiously deny that I was any such thing,
but the query took me very much aback, as the naturalness of the
suspicion was obvious, and I foresaw no end of trouble in clearing
myself of it. The commander of the gunboat, a consequential and rather
surly personage, shook his head, and said he would have to take time
to consider the matter.
Time he certainly did take, and plenty of it. We were, however, well
treated, chiefly through the kindness of the French-speaking officer,
Lieutenant Hishidi, with whom I struck up an acquaintance, he being
in fact the only one of the gunboat's crew with whom I could converse.
He caused a small separate cabin to be extemporized for myself and Lin
Wong, and looked to our comfort in other ways. My friend Lin, I should
say, had received a nasty graze on the ribs of the right side from one
of the machine-gun bullets, but otherwise was all right, though in a
very chop-fallen condition at being made prisoner. He and I were
allowed more liberty than the other captives, and apart from the
detention had little to complain of.
I was naturally much interested at first in looking round me and
taking stock of the Japanese sailors and their vessel. She was in
superb fighting trim, beautifully clean and well found in every part,
and the duty was carried on with thorough man-of-war smartness. It was
impossible to watch these little active, clever, determined sailors
without feeling that the men of the finest navy in the world, which I
take to be that of her Britannic Majesty, would find in them foemen
worthy of their steel. I remember that they were daily exercised at
the guns, and the promptitude and precision with which they sank the
_Kowtung_--such was the unlucky despatch-boat's name--was a handsome
testimonial to the accuracy of their aim.
Lieutenant Hishidi and I had many conversations, chiefly during his
watches, and our talk generally turned on the war and nautical
matters. Of the Chinese he spoke with unmeasured contempt, certainly
not undeserved, and said that the Japanese fleets and armies had no
misgiving as to the result of the struggle; they felt able, against
such opponents, to do anything and go anywhere--"aussi loin que mer et
terre puissent nous mener," was his emphatic expression.
"We have been making this war for a long time," said he, "and we feel
sure of what we can do."
I remarked on the extraordinary rapidity with which a nation, closed
like the Japanese, up to within thirty years since, to European trade
and European ideas, had adopted and assimilated the system of Western
civilization.
"Yes," he replied, "we can learn, and we have learnt, because we saw
that the knowledge would give us a great advantage in our own part of
the world."
He had been in France, and expressed great admiration of French
ship-building and French seamanship, and seemed doubtful when I
maintained that British seamen would in case of war assert their
superiority over the French ones just as decisively now as they ever
had done in the past--and of naval history in general Hishidi had a
good idea.
"You might," he said, "as your navy is so much larger than theirs."
But I pointed out that our naval triumphs had seldom been gained by
superior force--"although," I admitted, "we certainly have now double
the force of any other European power, on which account none of them
dare attack us singly, as they know that if they did, the majority of
their knocked-out tubs would be towing up the Downs in a very brief
space of time. But numbers apart, the British sailor of to-day can
still do more with a ship than a Frenchman. The conditions are
certainly completely changed, but the best seaman will make the most
of the new order."
He shook his head dubiously, and said he should like to see a war
between England and France.
"Well," said I, "you may live to see that and not be an old man. You
may live to see a war between England and half the rest of the world,
and see England get the best of it. It has happened once or twice
before."
On another occasion we were talking about Russia, when Hishidi
remarked--
"Russia wants China."
"Russia wants everything," said I.
"Ah, that is what they say of you," replied he.
I once asked him what he thought of the torpedo.
"Well," said he, "the torpedo is as yet far from being thoroughly
understood. It is very uncertain in use, though when it takes effect
invariably deadly. Gun-fire should be able to neutralize it, that is,
to keep it at a distance, for once struck, no sort of construction
could resist the explosion of two hundred pounds of gun-cotton against
the hull under the water line; water-tight compartments would be of no
avail against such devastation. Vessels of the cruiser type, fast, and
with a heavy quick-firing armament, are best suited to cope with
torpedo-boats, which would find it difficult to get to close quarters
with such craft. Warships have lately been built with a considerable
increase of length, which of course increases a torpedo's chance of
striking by giving it a larger target. Moderate size, no overloading
with armour, speed, good coal supply, and as many quick-firing guns as
can be mounted--that is my idea of the best type of warship at
present. The policy of building monstrous ships is doubtful, when they
can be sunk by a torpedo-boat. Under such conditions, it seems to me
that ease and rapidity of manoeuvring is of more advantage than
gigantic weight of ordnance and armour, because after all the
torpedo's attack is directed against a part which nothing can render
invulnerable."
Such is the substance of my conversation with the lieutenant, but
despite the charms of intellectual intercourse, I soon began to get
desperately weary of my detention. Day after day the _Itsuku_ cruised
about, sometimes in company with other craft, sometimes alone. The
enemy kept well out of sight, and few events occurred to chequer the
monotony. Once we sighted two Chinese gunboats not far from Chefoo,
and the Japanese varied the day's drill and gun exercise by shelling
them into Wei-hai-wei. They ran ignominiously and never made the least
show of fight. Had the _Itsuku_ been a faster vessel, she would
undoubtedly have captured or destroyed one of them. Her maximum speed
was under sixteen knots. On another occasion, off the western coast of
the Liaotung, we came upon a fleet of junks, craft engaged in coast
trade, I presume. Their crews ran them ashore and escaped, whilst the
Japanese fired the stranded junks with shells, the officers amusing
themselves by sighting the guns and betting on the shots. When a
satisfactory bonfire had been created we steamed away.
This sort of thing, I have said, went on for more than a month. The
gunboat's cruising-ground was chiefly about the mouth of the Pechili
Gulf, now under the frowning forts of Wei-hai-wei, and now opposite
Port Arthur on the other side. There did not seem to be any regular
blockade of the Gulf, though Japanese warships were constantly
hovering about. The Chinese fleet, I believe, confined itself to the
modest seclusion of Wei-hai-wei harbour, and was not to be tempted
outside. Once I asked Hishidi when they meant to assail Wei-hai-wei
and Port Arthur?
"Oh," said he, "we are waiting our time; it has not come yet."
British war-vessels were frequently in sight, but to my requests to be
put on board one of them, or at least to be brought before a Japanese
admiral, the commander of the _Itsuku_--I have completely forgotten
his name--turned a deaf ear. October wore away, and any termination of
my captivity seemed as distant as ever. I was obliged to put an end to
it on my own initiative. One evening--the fourth or fifth of November
it would be--we were outside Port Arthur. At dusk the gunboat
anchored, and a boat was despatched on some errand of reconnaissance.
A point of the coast was less than a mile distant, and as I leant over
the bulwark in the fore-part of the vessel, it struck me that I might
easily swim off to it, if I could get into the water unobserved. Under
Webster's tuition I had become an excellent swimmer. I looked round; I
was apparently not under notice, and there was no light near where I
was. My mind was made up at once. I stole as far forward as I could,
and watching my opportunity, and steadying myself by the cathead, I
made a leap for the cable, intending to climb down it to the water. A
leap in the dark is proverbially a dangerous thing; the vessel
perversely veered away as I sprang, and instead of catching the cable
I soused into the water with a loud splash. The sentry on the gangway
heard it, ran forward, and emptied the magazine of his rifle at me as
I swam away, but by diving and swimming under water out of the direct
line of advance, I managed to evade the bullets. A boat was soon down
and in hot pursuit, but I had had a good start, and they were at a
loss for my true direction at first. I struck out vigorously and made
good headway, but had the disadvantage of swimming in my clothes;
moreover, the water was frightfully cold, and began to chill me to the
bone. I could tell, however, that the tide was strongly in my favour,
and I believe I should have escaped the boat's notice, but that the
people on shore, hearing, I suppose, the rifle-shots, turned on an
electric search-light to see what was going forward. I was still a
good quarter of a mile from the shore, and the boat was nearly as
close in--almost parallel with me, though several hundred yards away.
There was no fort near, but I could see the dark mass of one on a
towering height far to the left. The bright glare soon showed me to my
pursuers, who turned the boat's head towards me and gave way with
might and main. They closed fast, and I gave myself up for lost. A
heavy rifle-fire began crackling along the shore, and the balls
frequently skimmed along the water disagreeably near me. I struggled
on, but would inevitably have been retaken if the event had depended
on my own efforts. There was a small coast battery near containing two
or three mortars, and a shell was thrown at the boat as it held its
daring course for the shore. It was not a hundred yards from me at the
moment. I heard the scream of the projectile, saw it describing its
flaring parabola in my direction, and with my last energies dived to
avoid it. The sound of its explosion rang in my ears as I went under.
When I came up again, the boat was putting back in a hurry with three
or four oars disabled. How near to them the bomb had pitched I cannot
say, but they had evidently got a good allowance of the splinters,
though chance probably had more to do with the matter than
marksmanship. The gunboat was under steam and standing in, returning
the fire. I strained every nerve, and struggled ashore at last in such
a numbed and exhausted state that I could not stand upright without
assistance. I found myself surrounded by Chinese soldiers, who plied
me with questions, which I could not have answered even if I had
understood Chinese. Perceiving my condition, they took me off to a
small building like a guard-house, some way to the rear of a line of
trenches. They made a blazing wood fire in the middle of the stone
floor, and when I had stripped off my wet clothes and was partially
thawed, they renewed their interrogatories. I absolutely knew not a
word of Chinese, and could only endeavour by gestures to give them an
idea of what had happened. This was not very satisfactory, but they at
least could make out that I was no friend to the Japanese. They
jabbered away for a while amongst themselves, apparently discussing
me. At length one of them brought me some food in a large wooden
bowl--a strange mess of I know not what mysterious compounds, amongst
which, however, I could distinguish rice. It was palatable and I ate
it gladly, and asked, too, for a supplementary supply, which was not
denied. Overcome by exhaustion and the fierce heat of the fire, a
drowsy stupor came upon me, and I made signs that I wished to sleep.
They did not seem to have any clothing to offer me for my own which
was drying in the blaze, but they brought in several long, coarse
cloaks or mantles, and one of them enveloping himself in these,
stretched himself before the fire on the ground, to intimate to me
that in such a manner I must pass the night. Another offered me a pipe
of opium, which I knew it would be a great discourtesy, according to
their ideas, to decline, although I was quite unaccustomed to the
drug. I therefore took it and affected to smoke, and as I lay down,
they left the little room in which they had placed me, and I heard
them barricade the door outside.
I immediately fell into a profound slumber. The few whiffs of opium
which, despite of myself, I had inhaled, had their effect, and
produced a series of those magical dreams with which the drug tempts
and deceives the novice. Through all of them the idea of flight and
pursuit ran bewilderingly. I will give one as a specimen. I dreamt
that I was on the shore of the sea; the waters suddenly began to rise,
and threatened to overwhelm me. I turned and ran, but nearer and
nearer the flood came after. Then there yawned across my path a
precipice of which I could not see the bottom. Down I plunged. I
seemed to fly like a bird, and once more stood on firm ground. The
precipice seemed to reach to the sky behind me. I resumed my flight,
and looking back, beheld the flood leaping down the gulf in a mighty
volume, with the sun rising above it, and bathing the illimitable
cataract with golden light. It would be impossible to describe or
imagine the gorgeousness of the spectacle. With such visions as these
does the treacherous narcotic lure its victims. I believe its use is
forbidden by the Chinese military authorities, but the undisciplined
soldiers seemed to use it extensively when they could get it, like
tobacco.