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RETROSPECT 95
had the battalion which the Japanese had pushed
forwards to the foot of Wantai hill, at his mercy.
He w’ould begin his attack here. His men would
be able to beat them, perhaps annihilate them,
and this first success would, he knew, react on
his men, and—impressionable and easily in-
fluenced as they were—change a half fatalistic
acceptance of inevitable disaster into a glad
belief in their ability to beat the Japanese after
all. As I have pointed out before, events proved
how correctly he had gauged his own men.
His good generalship showed itself also in
taking every advantage of the excellent means of
defence at his disposal, both passive and active,
and I think it might be of interest at the present
juncture to examine a little closer those means of
defence with which the Japanese at this first
attack became acquainted. Those that de-
veloped as the siege progressed and as new
surprises were sprung upon them, I shall take up
for similar treatment.
The forts against which the Japanese made
their attack were all, with the exception of North
Kikuan, of a semi-permanent nature. They were
earthworks, with bomb-proofs constructed of
timber and sandbags. The Lungyen redoubt
had a fairly large and deep moat in front, and the
Shuishi lunette had a smaller one, but neither the
escarps nor the counter-escarps were built in
stone or concrete, and the moats were undefended
by any kind of caponiers.
The strongest passive means of defence of
these forts were the single or double rows of wire
entanglements by which they were surrounded.
The width of an entanglement was generally
some seven or eight feet ;
the wire was fixed to
poles, placed at intervals of about three feet,
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