Part 9

Nevertheless, they were hemmed in fast enough. That was made plain by the fact that at least five small French cruisers had turned up at daylight a long way inshore of where I was, and had evidently been there all night keeping watch on the port. While I was weighing, these cruisers, some of which seemed much nearer to our own fleet, appeared to be coming out—I supposed in obedience to signal—and then I saw that several German ships were evidently coming out after them, and steaming at speed. I had hardly realised the state of affairs when I saw I was in for a hot skirmish, and that we should be in the middle of it ourselves. However, we put on full speed, and steamed as hard as we could, straight for the _Alexandra_. Some of the French now passed us in retreat, firing their stern guns; and presently we were passing between an advancing and retiring line, and were between two fires. My wife gripped my arm tight and stood and looked, but never a word she said. Nor I either, for I had a horror of what might happen, and was powerless.

‘What’s that?’ cried my wife presently, pointing to the sky over the German ships. What, indeed? I was only conscious that some monstrous, roaring, and very relentless thing had passed me, and made a crash somewhere, and that my steward had torn up the hatchway, crying, ‘Good God! the bottom’s out of the ship!’

Then I knew that a German projectile had passed through our deck and planking below, and that we were sinking. I holloaed down to the engineer, ‘Keep her going as long as you can!’ dashed down for my wife’s jewel-box, collared it, and was up again to find the men clearing away the boat. I knew the engine-room compartment was by way of being water-tight, and that we had a little time to spare in consequence; but I wanted to run out of the fire, which I could not do in the overcrowded boat. My engineer was as cool and white as marble. ‘She’ll go a bit yet, sir!’ he called up through the skylight; ‘the water’s leakin’ in through them sluices pretty, but there ain’t more nor six inches yet.’

The boat was down, towing alongside, and I gave the word to quit the yacht as she was sinking markedly by the stern. The engineer came regretfully last into the boat before myself. ‘Them blooming engines ’ll go a bit yet,’ he muttered as he passed me. ‘I’m glad it worn’t a Rooshian shot anyhow.’ It was no use sticking to the yacht, but she had done us the good turn of carrying us out of the line of fire, which, indeed, was slackening by reason of the approach of the French to their own fleet.

The whole thing was such a scurry that one hardly knew what had, and what had not happened, but we understood it when my poor _Elaine_, with a great snort and splash, suddenly threw her nose into the air and went down stern first, leaving us in the overcrowded boat, clear now of the cross fire which had, indeed, nearly ceased. Then I became aware of two things; one, that a heavy English cruiser, with a flag of truce flying, was steaming towards the Franco-Russian Fleet; and next, that a smaller ship was steering direct for my boat. In a very few moments we found ourselves safe on board the _Blonde_, kindly welcomed and commiserated by Commander Pretyman, who told us he had been signalled to pick us up and take us to the flagship.

ON BOARD THE FLAGSHIP.

ACCEPTANCE OF THE ENGLISH TERMS BY THE RUSSIAN AND FRENCH ADMIRALS.

The change was sudden and unexpected enough when we found ourselves greeted by the Duke the moment we put foot on board the _Alexandra_. My old friend Keppel had, we found, already turned out of his cabin to make room for my wife; and the Duke led us—still rather dazed—into his after-cabin, assuring us that we were his welcome guests till he could send us home. I could not help wondering at the moment at the quietness of his manner and his exceeding urbanity on the brink of such tremendous occurrences and with such awful responsibilities on his shoulders. I found I was by no means alone in my admiration of this amiable _aplomb_, but I soon learnt that not only the Duke, but most of the officers did not apprehend a collision.

For the situation was that war with France had not yet been formally decreed, and that the flag of truce had gone with the Duke’s Flag Captain, Brooke, to ‘invite’ the French to withdraw their forces, in which case no attack would be made, and the Russians might retire unmolested to Cronstadt. If, however, in three hours the Russian Squadron had not separated from the French, and the French had not signified their acquiescence, the united English and German Fleets together would enforce compliance. The Duke’s secretary, Mr. Rickard, showed me the copy of the message. It was exceedingly firm, but exceedingly conciliatory; praying the French Admiral Planché and the Russian Shestakov to reflect that, in presence of forces so enormously superior, their honour could in no way be touched, and that common dictates of humanity forbade the awful effusion of blood which would be so uselessly shed in the event of a refusal.

The ships were all prepared for action,—those with masts appearing to be nearly stripped,—and now I saw that the German Fleet was well out, and steaming directly for us. The officers all seemed a good deal more excited than the Admiral, but still I found that no one believed in the possibility of resistance. The latest news by a despatch vessel represented that the embarkation of troops at Cherbourg, which was closely watched by several of our cruisers, had apparently been stopped, and this, it was felt, gave additional cause to believe in a peaceable solution, as it was made clear that even if the English Fleet only stopped the transports, the whole Franco-Russian game was up. A last telegram from Paris, _viâ_ Madrid, expressed belief that the French Admiral Prémesnil had sailed with orders to return to Brest if the English appeared in observation off the Jahde in greatly superior force.

Notwithstanding, there was not a glass in the ships that was not persistently directed upon the _Immortalité_—now about ten miles off, and stopped close to the French Flagship—and her great white flag, for it had been arranged that she should hoist the Dutch ensign under it as the signal that the terms were rejected.

The hours drew on, and for perhaps two there was no sign. The distance was too great to make out ordinary flag signals, but sometimes it could be seen that such were hoisted, and one of the signal midshipmen created a fresh stir by affirming that the ships in view were ‘stoking up.’

My heart was in my mouth with the excitement of the moment, but if I was as cool and unconcerned in outward appearance as the officers and men surrounding me, I must have wonderfully belied my real feelings. Suddenly the head signalman called out in a hurried voice, not taking his eye from his glass: ‘The Russians are moving, sir!’

We could not in fact distinguish French from Russians at the distance, but I had told them that the Russians were on the right wing, and as they looked, they could see the right wing opening out from the left. A sort of disappointed sigh passed round the group, as by a single impulse they dropped their glasses and looked at one another. I am sure I saw an impatient gesture of the Duke’s right arm, and a certain setting of his lips which confirmed it. There was no Dutch ensign. Common sense had overcome the sentiment of the allies; the terms were accepted, and the Russians were off to the Gulf of Finland.

All this surmise was confirmed when Captain Brooke returned on board; but I never saw complete disappointment so unmistakably betrayed as it was on his face, that of the Admiral and the other officers who received him at the gangway.

I have little more to say. The French Fleet presently passed us, steering to the westward. The Duke detached twelve of his battle-ships under Sir Michael Seymour with seven or eight cruisers—all newest types of ships—to follow up the Russians into their own waters, while he himself followed up the French with the remainder of his fleet. My wife and I were sent on board the _Thames_ which came home full speed with the news.

I remain in a kind of mental paralysis. No one had ever suggested to me that in the presence of British power, naval war was to become but naval peace. All the naval people whom I had ever heard talk about it always seemed to have in their minds a certainty that in naval war, no two hostile fleets could ever see one another without rushing to a mutual destruction pell-mell. And yet I could get away from the fact that to every Frenchman and every Russian in the combined fleet I had seen, it must have been clear that no one but a madman could have pursued any other course than that which their Admirals followed. Of course it might have been different had war been actually declared.

PREPARATIONS FOR THE LANDING OF BRITISH TROOPS AT TREBIZONDE.

THE PROTECTION OF ERZEROUM—TURKS, LIKE THE ENGLISH, AS USUAL, TOO LATE.

(_From our Special Correspondent, Mr. Francis Scudamore._)

KARAKURGHAN, _April 29_.

I owe the opportunity afforded me for writing to you from this wretched place to an accident which has befallen my best horse, and will delay me possibly for another couple of days. The mischance is doubly unfortunate at this moment, inasmuch as reports from our front lead to the supposition that an important engagement is at hand. Any adequate analysis of the rumours that reach me constantly, contradictory as they are, continually varied, chequered with additions and omissions, and burdened with the extravagant local interest environing some wholly trivial circumstance, would be as entirely out of the question for me as for any of your readers at home. Indeed, your readers are certainly infinitely better informed than I am as to current events.

When I left Trebizonde, five days ago, the town was in a state of fevered anxiety, of enthusiastic anticipation, tempered in some sober quarters by a quiet but not ungenerous scepticism born of previous experience. The English were coming, cried the enthusiasts. Three English Army Corps (Heaven alone knows whence it was proposed to get them) were on their way to Trebizonde, to Samsoun, and to Shumla to aid their Turkish and Italian allies. The eastern division of the Mediterranean Fleet had already entered the Black Sea, as much to the surprise (and perhaps, somewhat to the chagrin) of the Turkish commanders at the Dardanelles and the Kavaks as of the generals of Russia and of France. In Trebizonde and the surrounding villages a certain basis of probability was built beneath these rumours by the fact that English agents had, for a week, been purchasing mules, sheep, and cattle, at, as is usual with British agents in times of stress, some five times their market value to any other purchaser. Nor have the native producers profited more than usual by this large-handed generosity, for some two or three Greek and Armenian traders, anticipating, as is their wont, honest English procrastination, have been beforehand with the army agents, with whom they are now dealing at altogether fancy prices. This, however, is after all but a small matter beside the great question of our intervention. That England’s action should invariably be delayed almost (but never quite) until too late—that her transports should reach their destination empty, her troops be either unprovided with cartridges, or supplied with those of some obsolete and useless pattern—that by every mistake ineptitude can secure or official ignorance produce, all arrangements connected with the disembarkation and provisioning, and general welfare of whatever forces have been tardily despatched, must inevitably break down but for the tireless energy, the unfailing resource, the unremitting good temper and never-flagging loyalty of all the officers and men thus maltreated, are matters which have long since come to be as well known abroad as they are beginning to be recognised at home. ‘The English,’ said the good people of Trebizonde, while awaiting the expected Army Corps, ‘are good but careless. They are richer than the Russians, and they are less corrupt, but they are also more stupid.’ This, as the independent criticism of allies, more than anxious to be generous, is worth at least a second thought.

I would gladly have witnessed the disembarkation of our troops (for aught I know it may have already taken place), but, after fruitlessly waiting many days in dreary Trebizonde, I no longer dared to delay. News had come that a large Russian force was advancing from Kars westward towards Erzeroum, and, although there are in and around that place some 50,000 Turkish troops, yet, save at Keupru Kui, a place about nine hours’ ride from Erzeroum on the Kars road, little or no preparation appears to have been made to resist an enemy. Erzeroum, let it be remembered, is entered by three posterns, called respectively the Stamboul, the Ardahan, and the Kars gates. The roads from them lead to Ardahan, Kars, Van, Erzinghan, and Trebizonde. On the south of Erzeroum, at a very short distance from the walls, a mountain descends steeply towards the city, which it altogether commands, and a direct road runs from Van to Moush, and from that town to the mountain, from which two water channels lead into Erzeroum. If an enemy once had possession of the eminence—and, so far as I can learn, there is little or nothing to prevent him—he would be able to turn these water-courses off from the city. There are, it is true, a few wells within the walls, but the supply from them is already insufficient for the requirements of the population, without taking into account the troops quartered in and around the town. It seems typical of Turkish apathy that so little should have been done to secure this their last great stronghold in Asia Minor from attack. I am going, of course, merely by what I hear from Turkish officers, as I have as yet been unable to see for myself; but I have hitherto had no reason to discredit their information.

It appears that from time to time, since 1878, proposals have been made for fortifying various strong natural positions, but that, with a procrastinatory belief in the protection of Providence that is wholly Turkish and almost English, these plans have been continually set aside until it is now too late to execute them. Thus on the Van Road, about five miles from Erzeroum, there is an admirable position known as the Palandukain defile. This position was protected after a fashion in 1876, when a fort was constructed capable of offering sturdy resistance. Another fort had been built also at that time at Gereguzek, eighteen miles from Erzeroum, on the Ardahan road. Another position, that of the Devé Boinou Bogaz, five miles from Erzeroum, on the Kars road, was considered at that time to be a good place for a fort, and yet further defences were then constructed at the Loghana defile, which is some twenty-four hours from Erzeroum, on the Kars road. There are, no doubt, also important positions on the Bayazid road, as, for instance, at Deli Baba—a narrow gorge through high mountains, which the Turks declare to be impregnable—at Taher Gedi, five hours’ march further on, and at Kara Kilissa, beyond which there is a level road to Bayazid. Since the war, however, it appears that little or nothing has been done to strengthen or even to maintain these positions in an adequate state of defence. There has been much talk of late in Constantinople of extensive armaments on this frontier. Krupp guns have, it has been said, been sent to supplement the bronze cannon manufactured at Tophané, with which the forts of Erzeroum were in the last war mainly armed. As to whether any such material has reached its destination I am as yet uninformed. People on this road, which it must surely have traversed, profess to know nothing of it. It is to be feared that we may expect a repetition of the famous story of the million liras expenditure said to have been incurred in the fortification of Erzeroum in the last war.

I did not journey from Trebizonde alone, but took advantage of the departure of a huge straggling convoy of mules and pack-horses laden with ammunition for Erzeroum. There were also with us half a dozen English doctors who have taken service with the Porte, and have volunteered to attend the wounded under fire. Owing to the accident to my horse, who slipped, poor brute, through a ragged hole in the wide stone bridge across the Kara Su, close to this place (a terrible pitfall for artillery), and badly scraped both his own shin and his master’s, these gentlemen have perforce abandoned me until such time as I can obtain another beast.

The traffic through this little place, which is the point of junction of the Trebizonde and Erzinghan roads to Erzeroum, and as a rule at this season is almost deserted, is in itself indicative of stirring events in our front. All through the day there has been a continuous passage of nondescript wayfarers in either direction. Turkish soldiers—stragglers or deserters may be—some sick, some slightly wounded; Koordish Bashi-bazouks, pure bandits for the most part, flashing great arsenals of gleaming weapons in their waist-belts, and armed, many of them, with Winchester rifles, remnants of the last war; slim, evil-visaged Circassians on lean, wiry horses, and gaunt Zaibeks, ferocious beneath their extravagant headgear, have tramped and clattered continuously past the miserable khan where I am established. Some of these gentry, I note, have Russian great-coats with regimental numbers on the shoulder strap, flung either across their cruppers, or around their shoulders. This is a sure indication that there has at least been some skirmish or reconnaissance in which Russian arms have suffered not a little.

REPULSE OF THE RUSSIANS.

THE TURKS PURSUE ESKI ZAGRA—THE GRIM REALITIES OF WAR.

NEAR KEUPRU KEUI, _May 2_.

I am profiting by an opportunity to send you a hurried message by a Turkish officer on his way to Erzeroum with despatches. Soon after writing last to you, I managed to pick up a horse—a poor beast enough truly, in place of my stalwart grey—and pushed on to Erzeroum. There I found all in confusion. Certain news had arrived of a Russian advance in force along the Kars road, and every available man had been thrown forward to meet it. It was but natural that the Russians should seize the earliest possible opportunity of hurling themselves against the Turkish stronghold, which they might very reasonably expect to find unprepared to receive them. More or less unprepared the Turks indeed were, but Ghazi Moukhtar Pasha—the hero of ’77—who had himself reached Erzeroum but a few days since, was fully determined not to permit his traditional enemy to win an easy triumph. As I have said, every available regiment was ordered to meet the attack, and hurried forward to Keupru Keui, where the stand was to be made. I have as yet no details—indeed, as I stayed but an hour or so in Erzeroum to feed my horses, I have hitherto been able to see no one in authority; but so far as I can gather, the Turks, though outnumbered, were not greatly inferior to their adversaries, over whom they had the additional enormous advantage of being in a position which tradition has taught them to regard as well-nigh impregnable. In any case Turkish arms seem to have gained a signal victory.

Very soon after leaving Erzeroum, which I did shortly before mid-day this morning, I began to meet with unmistakable evidences that a big battle had either been fought or was in progress. First a knot of some twenty infantrymen, weary, haggard, and ragged, met me on the steep slope of the hill some five miles beyond the town. They were all jaded beyond expression—every one was wounded more or less grievously—several were using their rifles as crutches, and some who had lost or abandoned their rifles were helping themselves along either by the aid of their comrades’ shoulders, or by stakes, or waggon-boards, or rammers, or indeed any of the miscellaneous articles of wood or metal that are to be found strewn along the line of a straggling fight. I gave them a water-skin, and offered a bottle of brandy (as _ilitch_—medicine for their wounds). The water they took, but none would touch the spirit save one gaunt, white-moustached veteran, who mumbled incoherencies about Algeria, by way seemingly of excuse. While they drank I asked them what was doing. ‘A great battle was being fought,’ they said, but their opinions were divided as to the course of the action; several men (weak from loss of blood) opined that the enemy was too strong for them. But one broad-shouldered, bright-eyed little fellow, who had had all the flesh of one cheek torn from him by a shell splinter, and had bound the wound with a strip from his rough serge jacket, was loud in his derision of this view. ‘It was Eski Zagra again,’ he said. The Moskoffs were driven back, beaten hopelessly, and pursued by agile Bashi-bazouks through the slippery passes, the precipitous fastnesses, the treacherous paths of the rugged route, a pursuit without cess or quarter—where every enemy, whether wounded or not, was exultingly slaughtered as soon as caught. The little veteran illustrated with horribly realistic gestures his own views as to the treatment of Russian wounded. With a foul gusto that raised wild enthusiasm in his weary comrades, he demonstrated how he would hew off the noses and lips of his enemy; how he would gouge out their eyes with his bayonet before he plunged it into their throats and twisted it till the victims died suffocated with their own blood. He outlined other horrors, but I had had enough, and left him posing in anticipation as a hero among his fellows, while I rode on towards this place.

That this fierce implacable Moslem had been right in his conjecture I soon had ample—ay, terrible—proof. In every mile, even on the rugged track itself, as I neared the spot from which I write, the horrible evidences of deadly carnage multiplied and repeated themselves. Disembowelled horses, broken limbers, little mounds of dead, fallen one on another, their still, calm, white faces in cruel contrast to the extravagant distortion of their scattered and twisted limbs; and everywhere traces of that ruthless hatred vowed by the Turk to his hereditary enemy. Hideous featureless corpses stared at me out of eyeless sockets from the roadside, their hands uplifted and bloody, showing that wounded, not dead Russians, had been thus maltreated; occasionally a movement, slight though perceptible, caused me to dismount, eager to aid some mutilated sufferer, but all to no purpose—the Turks had done their work too well. As I advanced, the spectacle of these recurrent horrors increased in its revelations of barbarism and malignant cruelty. The number of Turkish dead diminished step by step, as that of the Russians augmented, and by the time I reached this place I had had such a surfeit of ghoul-feasting (for the eye) as I envy no man.