YECORITCH OF THE FIFUNSKIS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10903, 21 October 1911, Page 1 (Supplement)

YECORITCH OF THE FIFUNSKIS.

,[!i- Frederick Palmer.) .: t Dai Ichi Gun —First \-ctv Corps—to whom hnge language, need not

i' ■ .! l!i* ir dictionaries tor a « • <!e;inition or tho act of i"' f ; V.--ori'eh. There could be none. vjr.i'iy madness —the exalted, "r .. r.Ticction of madness—born torment of pianti j>- •n-.i-.-.s and speaking in tho p» ( ",f a, private of the X''ifunsky

fl:iin.-kis rejoiced in the same in-'itcitv which made the charg.L*.v';:'s Brigade glorious and has n f ,jr l° rn hope with ro- •' "■['could not remain quite so.I live up to a tradition that ftec to them by Peter the Great

crazy devils!" Peter called "jiitr a wild campaign of theirs V' l a £ e imperial 'jsd they had gone so straight object, turning out of the way r villages nor rivers, that he "j-p w ou their collars as a mark "a-cuoh from his own hand, -id a regimental song in keeph the temper of their inherit"fhe gist of such sense as it had •a kat your drums, sing, and * When in doubt, when not in merry, when sad, charge, till the_ enemy showed vv £■= —then give him a. drink. (jI the song was as ten thou-;'C,ct-hield beating time on a ti'jor. For, first and last, never been any sopranos tr'iie Fifunskis. All were big .rWctly with blue eyes and fair oi tiifir madness was of the top-.'U-w-tfvcd. fair-haired kind of the ■i'jii peoples. Throughout tho >nc:rv the Imperial bowstring had can-iens for letting the Fifunt:v here and there across the .jfcisiatt frontier, from the Black '.Jji i> the Amur's mouth. The is familiar with all manner £i.i-haired, yellow-skinned and i-;sinai:d pagans, but particularly fi-k. They liked to fight the Turk. L yes ai"'77S they went through brigade in such a fashion. v.on another bit of insignia ■Cir collars. On either side of the just back of the barb, " i 6; a section of half-moon —symci the crescent emblem of the i trckon in two. crept on. Recruits came and ;7r. a long period of peace. The Colonel, when the old century ;>_■ corner and gave a new cenr': 4 road, was Semyon Samsono1, pa?nn. who had been a major 1 *■_ of Shipka Pass in '77 and - e jisault on Plevna in '7B. He . r o:iadance of flesh unequally the bulk hanging heavily r aistband. Though his r I precepts were all of - days, who could question it reviews with a row of -his breast or in the bar- , - - tre St. George cross for in impressire isolation ou aiir:: blouse? delightful, talkative, Kus- _ ' ,ertible was Colonel Sam- . \': him about the Japanese , 11 say: "Pouff!" and flip crum off his knee, r iiiev are nothing!" It -! Andrei Yegoritch, peasant ; ■> the Colonel was a pillar r r j irage, and authority. His : 1 mrades had called him the' : - nd to win that distinction --haired Fifunskis amounted accomplishment. Contt he was the tallest of ;e Fifunskis, among whom five -as abasement and five feet a laiijcritr. "3 :r.s spring of 1904 arrived ho ks .1 year away from the colors bi ?uwa a plenteous uncontroliiad the hue of straw. Ho was iua make a home for Mashurina. ::i joies of his boots .to the top :i he loved Mashurina in a atasd unremitting earnestness, t:had Mashurina refused to :.?inre the hearthstone which oit.hbornly preparing, but she at the idea as a joke, aj-wnot 'et such a small obstacle b Lis. He insisted with arrowfectKss that Mashurina would 'oimbte. When she told him he jta !fi:le£s for consideration, ho I sis: have" some sense. Didn't I »T.:h - L he Fifunskis?'* •as?o,a!" answered Mashurina. lewd to being called Simpleton, I I/ica't care as long as I am a and love you," he returned, bu »ere of tho mother soil, born who had been serfs. Their KiTis in the sea-level steppes, two hj:: miles distant as the crow flies 1 ::o nsarest salt water. It was 0 know nothing of all that 1 «•- stirring outside world ex- : approved" by the censor of •.• racy in St. Petersburg. Yet 3in that this bother with i<- was growing to grave pjrp- ; J L ; . Finally it broke in war. v:i::uetif>n of Russian battles r ruu;rs did not disturb r jthe ? i:i . Li".t beating Russian soldiers ~ iaii: li-ating Russia on land! 'J jo piizziing. Then Andrei reY i tiiifmanie slip of paper, which

out as a first-year reservist. .Fiiniwkis are going! We'll Jkoathen a lesson!" said How well yon tliink of answered Mashurina. "Most s: r..i do until they trip over their imtouM not wait on nonsense js crisis. His big peasant's hands r er the shoulders as in a Lsr eyes flashed defiance. I come back?" he asked.

I come back?" he repeated. • it you get St. George's And now let me go, you bully!" oi' **"-3 the Fifunskis had i-o than twentj crosses of St-. '-■ J' : it thai was against the Turk, be the most they could ex»Mn righting the Japanese pig-'.■j-'wryi thought. He made up his ; . e would win one of the ten. tor a girl who was so disin his future that she was tin- group of his neighbors » him off at the railroad station. Vs' : t:,r " L - however much it hurt i 'T. A r ', o: diminish bis giant love, the .Fifunskis always fought -'''"o of women?' There was a r a ti:e regimental song about- it, r'/r"" softly as the winnowing r.rur the roar of the tlirashTJ j over. p the Simpleton—have you stopped growcomrades, when they - n; at the rendezvous of mobili-

CoDUr de Lion, favorking of the primitive i-T\ '" uv /een that regiment he "Come on! Drop i i n.rrels that ill become yon L i:.- v . our a nnour and seize your to take the Holy r c r:-,Henry VIII of England, l"v i'- France, or Charles XI : t'.'T" " r Frederick the Great 5, v ~ understood these children !'-i ur ' il sv - 10 were a little later in breaking the ' sm - Herded in troopforth, from siding fo sidiTi'l" !* lt;e ria to their awakening. m'V tal n ' e . Fiftinskis charge!" would say. Then : "This is a devil of a i train ride!"—for h v"! ' lrllK ' t 'io Japanese and for T-n J?' : ' ant that they should pay. 3 ; r " > io;, s a nd miles in the Czar's r |.,^ e Fminskis travelled before r r-*' !e Manchurian frontier. j r '; c " little Father had so much r.-C : ma ny farms yet to know '"Tow. some of the Fifunskis ! ot ti, should want more. ; rr "" e ' n ?, cv . en lost interest in the is,' °' : l • ' r 3 Fifunsky had notrw'- l to breathe gunpowder as 4tu atiles fireitti ( ?°". =a nd miles travelled these ii ea ~.yi e youngest of the new !<, (jj j, : ? er all, under their shaggy message of the itirJ , CH ui-sation which took k< in"•Vi r -"? l ' le soW' ol " 3 - poets. lawa Philosophers on the tf.« f X orranean spread. Prayer?. laughter. and xJ.." 1 '' : ~"liial pioneering. til! its ?sri<v - oi " n "He- whole coast of ;• —'i irom Cape Horn to Behring

Seven thousand miles to the country of the stay-at-home peoples, who took their inspiration from India, to the country of the old peoples, the peoples without, emotion, ivlio have never had restless Western aspirations for the unknowable and. the unattainable: to a land which iilt.s up its soul neither in cathedrals, epic poems, nor symphonies. Wo cannot deny kinship with the Fifunik;s without icelini: cold before the towers of Milan and Cologne, tinder the pulse oi tin: Ody.-=ev'.s lines or the strains of Beethoven or T.ichaikowsky. ".Straimc- heathen, these Chinese!" was Andrei's less complicated c-xpres-

siou of tli" contrast of the Fast, and the West, after the Fifunskis were detrained a- Liau-Ynng. He promptly screwed his brow into knots over a letter home to Mashurina. It- was his pride that could write; he had learned how in tile army after he had reached the age of eighteen.

"We have arrived. We go to fight. I will get the cross. I love you. I will finish the house for you when I come home,'"' was the sum of that mighty labor, all smudgy with fingermarks" of Andrei's straining over the intricate problems of literacy. Muscle-stiff from the ride, soft feet soon going sore, the Fifunskis started off to the front, the red-faced, whitehaired old Colonel leading. One of their officers, Major Boris Andrevitch, a studious man who had travelled much, even to Japan, surveyed with foreboding their cumbrous blanket coats and mess-kit, their heavy _ boots, and their bayonets set fast to rifle barrels. "Unfit for modern warfare, when soldiers must crawl to approach the trenches against long-range rifle fire," ho remarked. "Crawl! The Fifunskis do not crawl! They charge! It is the equipment that we had against the Turks!" roared thei Colonel.

And Andrei was thinking as he trudged in his place in the ranks: "I will get tne cross of St. George because—because, though I may be the stupidest. I am the biggest and I can charge the fastest." After marching many miles, the Fifunskis were sent, at dusk, scrambling up to the top of the highest ridge of a mountainous region. There they slept on their arms. At dawn they looked unt on a series of verdure-clad valleys crisscrossed by ravines. A hard country this for steppes men to charge in! But they were not expected to charge; only to stay any attack on the position they occupied. Right and left they heard the rattle of rifle fire and the pounding of artillery) while thev were not in the battle.

At length they had glimpses of moving bits of brown in openings of the high millet and among the scrub on the slope of the ridge to the right. After the little khaki figures had massed in a ravine, they sprang up in a cloud and rushed the crest above them with flashing bayonets. The Fifunskis heard a cheer —a cheer that seemed trained as a part of a calculated stage scene—and then they saw the flag of tho Rising Snn floating in place of tho flag of Russia. Another cheer, and they saw that the ridge to their left was also in the enemy's possession. The whole business had been as surreptitious as a burglar entering a house at night. It was as puzzling; and undeniable. as an incomprehensible scientific demonstration.

"This is knitting! This is not war!" stormed the old Colonel: "You will fall back immediately!" called an adjutant, riding up. "Fall back!" gasped the Colonel. "The Fifunskis faff back, without firing a shot?"

"Yes. You'll be in a trap if you don't."

"Trap the Fifunskis! God in Heaven! These littlo heathen trap the Fifunskis! We'll cut our way out!" answered the Colonel. "Orders! The orders are to retreat immediately."

And orders must be obeyed. The Fifunskis scrambled down to the road. There they formed in columns of fours, while the bullets of their pursuers began whipping the air. Looking on from a distant hill, Japanese staff and foreign attaches were thrilled at sight of such stoical defiance under fire.

In his injured dignity and contempt for the heathen, the old Colonel would not even command the double quick. A massy line of dark blue, their officers' white blouses points for the aim of Japanese skirmishers, the Fifunskis inarched away in solid formation. They were heavy-hearted with shame and the weight of this Great Discovery which they could not analyse. "Wait till the Fifunskis charge!" called the old Colonel over his shoulder, beads of perspiration trickling down his purple cheeks.

He did not have long to wait. A chance came before Liau-Yang fell, a chance when, with their band playing and singing the song of the thrashingfloor, they plunged into a sheet of flame. If you doubt the desperate courage of that charge, ask the Japanese who met it and rolled it back with overwhelming fire, as a breaker throws driftwood on the beach. If you doubt the glorious audacity of it, ask the samurai of Dai Ichi Gun.

Andrei was in the front rank, with the vision of the cross of St. George before him, and his long legs were giving him the lead when something tripped him. Ho dropped so early in the onset with a bullet in his leg that he <nd not fall into the hands of the enemy with the other wounded, but was picked up by the litter-bearers and borne to safety. As the remnants of the Fifunskis were reformed in the streets of LiauYang, the nature of the Great Discovery about the little pagans who crawled became plainer to them. It was Major Boris Andrevitch in that moment of confusion and despair—the sleeve of his blouse hanging in shreds, torn by a fragment of shell—who revived their spirits by starting the national anthem. "Russia will come back!" the old Colonel roared toward' the foe. "It may be a month; it may be a year, or ten years, or a hundred years—but Russia will com© back! Nothing can stop 'Russia !" "One defeat seven thonsand miles from Moscow," said Boris, "will mean victory if it awakes us at home " "You Nihilist!" stormed the Colonel, who wanted nothing so much as to shoot Boris for black treason. "We both love Russia, each in his own way," answered Boris, respectfully.

Spring had come again to the Mancliurian hills, where Andrei Yegoritch sat under the shade of a piece of Chinese matting doing outpost duty. In the ten months which had passed much history had been swiftly made. In another charge at the Sha-Ho the nature of the Great Discovery had become even more comprehensible to all the Fifunskis at the cost of a third of their strength. There the old Colonel, refusing to take cover in the presence of pigmies, had fallen, the arrows on his collar pointing _ straight toward the muzzle of the rifle barrel that sent its messenger mercifully "through his forehead. After the Sha-Ho came the long winter in the frozen trenches, where they kept the letter of sxaff commands bv holding back the enemy's charges for ten days in the growing confidence that the Great Discovery had become the open secret of their glad mastery. When with the flanking of th e right wins of the army the heart-breaking word that they must go was given. th:y went not in columns of fours and purposeless grand disdain, but covering their retreat-step by step and taking toii of their pursuers in skilful rearguard action.- For now Boris Andrevitch was their Colonel. In all. Andrei had received four letters from .Mnshurina. written _by the village letter-writer at her dictation. "The Fifunskis are still running away from the pigmies." she said. Her tone was taunting and it was touched with shame for Russia's name. "Do you Fifunskis still boast what grand fellows you are r' T she asked. Of the few Crosses of St. George that had been distributed, not one had gone to a Fifunsky. Ilow could you reward a man with an arrow on his collar tor retreating:' The idea was out of harmony with the Fifunsky tradition.

On this warm spring day. when ho knew that all the level fields at home lav carpeted with green, our giant simpleton was homesick —homesick as a boy in his first week away from his mother's care at a strange school. But lie would not have returned if he had been given a furlough. For one tiling, he would not face ilasliurina. For another thing, iron had entered his blood.

A thousand yards down the road was another bit of matting which shaded the Japanese outposts, who had the same orders as Andrei. An outpost's business is not to make war on his own account. but to keep a sharp lookout, lie is not to fire unless fired on. Ihus, catlike., the points of the two armies glared at each other.

Watching that pigmy squatting under his thatch set a glow of anger in Andrei's sou!. He wanted to see that pigmy taste some of the bitterness of retreat that he had tasted ; he wanted to recover all the land that Russia had lost. "Russia. will come back!" the old Colonel's defiance at Liau-Yang sounded i:i his oars. This war had become a personal matter with him. In the next battle, now that the Fifunskis knew how to charge, they would win. The next battle! 'He was dwelling on the prospect as a kind of Nirvana when Colonel Boris and one of the officers of the general staff rode tip. The Fifunskis loved Boris now. They would have gone rejoicing into hell for this quiet, self-contained leader, hoping that they would never come out. except on the" other side, with their feet on crest of a Japanese brcatsworks. Tlio crucible of war had found its merit, as it had the merit of the men who led on the march to the sea and t-o Appomattox. There was something of tho kindly dignity of a Hancock or a Gordon about Boris. He patted Andrei on tho shoulder and gavo him cigarettes; and then fell to talking with tho staff officer, while Andrei could not help listening. "You get a long view over the valley here," said Boris, as the staff officer looked through his glasses, "and no sign of supplies being brought up —110 sign of any preparations for movement. I don't believe they mean to try as again; they've had enough." "My idea, too," answered the staff officer. '""While all . the world thinks that they could beat us again because they have done it before, they mean to get peace and label it magnanimity on their part." I

Peace! Did Andrei hear aright? Jt meant going home without the St. George's Cross! Home to be laughed at as a simpleton! "Peace, without one victory for Russia!" exclaimed Boris. "No. We must have one victory, if we stay here forever. "We can win out here and still get reforms at home." "So we would if he had a strong Czar —not a Czar surrounded by crystalgazers and vacant-minded, soft-word-ed courtiers." It would have meant a world- tumijling in anarchy to Andrei if he had heard this a year before from the lips of an officer. Now he was finding, curiously, that it did Mt interfere with liis love of Russia or his respect for the Czar's office. "Peace because St. Petersburg will take Japan's word • and the world's opinion about Japanese strength," continued the staff officer, as he called to the orderly to bring the horses. "Every "discussion always returns to our incurable weakness —intelligence," said Boris. "The Japanese know all about what wo are doing and we know little of what they are doing." "Why—why is that?" Andrei asked, forgetting that privates are not supposed to bother their heads with official affairs. The old Colonel would have told him to "shut up." Boris, however, took the pains to explain, as if a private might have intellectual faculties as well as legs to carry a rifle.

"Mv Colossus"—Boris always called Andrei this, and Andrei liked it better than Simpleton —"my Colossus, it is this wav: We are fighting in a country of yellow men. The trained Japanese spies fasten a cue to their hair and put on coolie clothes and wander about in our lines at will. But n<3 white man may roam about in their lines. He is recognised and taken prisoner at once. "Yes, sir," answered Andrei, staring. "And suppose," he inquired naively, ' 'any one found out if the pi 6" mies were not ready to fight again. Would the Czar,give him the cross.-' "Depend oh it!" answered the statt officer, laughing, as he and the Colonel rode away. . n Andrei, gazing straight down tlie road toward the Japanese outpost, was thinkin"-; and he thought so hard that lie saw nothing but a precious little enamelled cross and the one way to win it. He thought himself into that capricious perfection of arrow-straight Fifunsky madness that made him overlook the penalty for desertion, as he withdrew silently from his sleeping comrades that night.

Andrei had left Iris rifle behind. He had no'weapon with him except the wit which should spring from tho touchstone of his folly; no equipment except a bundle strapped to his back- So cautiously did he proceed, keeping to the shadows of thickets or to the bottom of ravines, that he could not have made more than a mile when the break of dawn found liim in the "woods at the edge of a field of young millet. Slowly the morning mist rose from the vallev. It left a mantle on the tiles of a "village which gleamed under the slanting rays of the sun. A river with high banks ran past the village. iNear tlic military bridge which spanned it a dew-moist regimental flag flapped out limplv with the first morning breeze. Sturdy, short figures in khaki were moving about the camp and preparing for breakfast. , "I'm right among tho pigmies —clear past their outposts!" thought Andrei. He was as happy over the prospect os a shaggy bear who had just thrust lits tcngue into a store of wild honey.

Slipping off his uniform, he folded it nicely as all Fifunskis were taught to do. Opening his bundle he spread out its contents—a box of shoe-blacking a suit of Chinese coolie jeans and a cue or braided black hair which he had already sewed to the black rim of a coolie cap. There was also a small mirror. How could any actor make up without one ? There was also a pair of shears. With these he clipped his straw beard till it was a furrowed stubble showing his milk-white Caucasian skin. "That will never <lo! I must be yellow," he thought. "I have it r He. rubbed his cheeks and. chin witJi dandelion blossoms, which made a yellow a little too bright for realism. Dipping his forefinger in the blacking-box he drew oblique black lines across ms straight, fair eyebrows. Then with .1 quantity of the blacking he vigorously shampooed the edges of his hair. After he had drawn the cap with the cue attached down close to his ears and studied the effect, his face spread m a broad smile of satisfaction. * 'Mashurina. could not tell her future husband from a pagan! Ho! • ho!" be sliortled —this great fool, this maddest of mad Fifunskis, looking into his own blue eyes, when not a black-haired vel-low-skinned native of all the four hundred millions from the Amur to Canton had blue eyes. Oh, he would have news for Colonel Boris! And if they gave St. George's Cross for news, his cross was as good, as won! He was softly humming the air of the stanza of the Fifunsky song about the lov e of women, with no practical Mashuriua present to call '•Simpleton!" as he started along the path across the fields., confident that lie was only another ambling coolie on the -VLaiichurian landscape.

His initial plan of observation was made with great credit to his sagacity, he thought. ~ The path led to a clump ot hu=hos bv the river bank. Pie would hide behind these and watch the regime'ital camp, and then wander around the outskirts of the village looking ror other regiments. It all seemed as easy as charging the Japanese had to the old Colonel. . When lie came to the bushes he heard voices quite near—voices which lie knew were not Chinese. He was about- to move on. when four figures without rifles arose from the shelter of the bank, where thev had been seated chatting. Tiiov broke into a grin at sight oi the ludicrous giant: their breaths were drawn in in whistling gusts ;is t.ie.v loco 211 ised his blue eyes. Andrei had been nt close quarters vnth that grin before and lie had heard that peculiar hissing cry of the Japanese before thev sprang. He was prepared tor their onset as they came at him, on-i----two-three-four: and one-two-three, rejoicing in the strength of his arms, he threw them into the river, splash, splash, splash. But as the third went, the fourth gripped him around the ankles with a wrestler's hold. Then pigmies semed to rise from rll sides. Some who were good jumpers were able to reach high enough to get

their arms around his neck. There was the incentive of the collector in their mass play. They wanted to take this specimen alive —this very Jumbo of the clumsy, hulking giants, with hair of hemp and bared chest (to their slanteves) the color of a fish's belly. Some one hit him on the head with a bayonetscabbard and he saw stars as he sank under the weight of his captors. When consciousness returned, two pigmies were sitting 011 either leg, -while two others held his shoulders and a fifth was tviug his wrists together. Ho beheld. "in mortal humiliation, an ainphitheatric gallery of grins, while one little fellow —who had the brush, as it were —held tho coolie cap with its false cue aloft in farcical exhibition. How he wished tho pigmies had killed him outright! But he was reassured by tho thought that his agony could not last long. A soldier out of uniform and in disguise, ho would bo shot as a spy. Then the exasperating, graven grins sent him into an outburst of rage. Fie called the little men names which would not have been nice to hear had they understood Russian. But tho grins of"the soldiers of the unemotional peoples did not change. ltather they increased in number as news of the event spread. And the anger of tho son of the emotional peoples passed. Oh, it was hard, hard, hard for a fighting Fifunsky to bear! It convinced him that he was" p. buffoon, a simpleton, a renegade, who had brought shame to his regiment. When an officer came and soldiers with rifles, the captive was permitted to rise; and the spectators exclaimed "Aw!" as their glances rose with liis towering height. It gave liim some satisfaction that he was shoulders above their khaki caps anyway. Suddenly, as ho looked over their heads, he broke into a taunting, spontaneous "Ho! ho!" of his own at sight of something in the background. They turned to see the three comrades he had thrown into the river, dripping with mud, as they scrambled up the bank. The three made a picture sweet. with solace to Andrei's sore and battered soul; and the grins faded somewhere 'with the "Aw!" that followed. Andrei threw his chest out, his shoulders back, and his head up. He was not a pigmy, thank heaven. Yes, he was a Fifunsky, a soldier of the Czar. . . "Take him to headquarters!" said the officer, assigning the specimen to an armed squad.' A soldier on his right and a soldier on Eis left, two soldiers behind, and two in front —the officer was taking no risk with a mad Russian who threw infantrymen one-two-three into the river, like so many bags of rice—Andrei was started to Dai Ichi Gun. Every face he passed was smiling or grinning at him, and every face was yellow, as he saw with a flicker out of his eyes, while he looked straight ahead. He was isolated, alone among the heathen, the butt of their humor; but lie was bound that he would not perform for them like some dancing bear with a ring in his nose.

At length he saw approaching a number of men on horseback, who, though indistinct in the distance, yet had a quality in their appearance entirely out of keeping with the landscape. A tree at a bend of the road hid them, and a moment later he came abruptly face to face with tliem. He did not notice that they wore different styles of uniform; he saw only that they were not yellow. They, too, were white. "English and Americans!" he thought, for he had heard that both wore on the side of the pagans. ■ ' ... At sight of that erect figure m its ludicrous effort at make-up, the foreign ataches with the First Japanese Army Corps drew rein. Their inclination to smile was struck cold by Andrei's stare. The stare was accusing and contemptuous* It asked what excuse they had for being on the side of the pagans, while it denied any kinship with such apostates. te K splendid fellow! And the beautifill folly of him!" said tho Englishman. "It's ripping!" "Corking! said the American. "What regiment are you of?" asked the French attache, who spoke RusS "Fifunsky!" answered Andrei, as if it were a shibboleth to blast a rock wall in two. "Fifunsky!"

At this the attaches exchanged glances. AIL had heard of the Fifunskis. The Frenchman leaned over in his saddle, liis fingers working nervously on the reins. , .... "I am French —I am one of your allies —I am here to see for my Government," he explained. "Wo are all here for our governments," put in the German attache, in general exculpation for his colleagues. All felt better as Andrei's stare mellowed. With a quickness creditable to a simpleton, his mind flashed back to the object of his Odyssey. Again he had a vision of winning the cross. "What can I tell my Colonel?" he For a year the Frenchman had seen his allies driven back, beaten by their unpreparedness, clumsiness, .and bad generalship. He had gloried in the improvement they had shown at Mukden. For a vear every letter he wrote had been' censored. He was human and he was also a Gaul. He forgot the official niceties of his position in an explosion. "Tejl him they are making no preparations for another attack!" he said. "Teli him I am a soldier and I know by the signs! Tell him they have gone their limit and they want peace!" The Japanese officer who acted as I chaperon to the attaches, lest they should see too much, did not understand Russian, but lie suspected the Frenchman. A word from him ana the guards took the hint and proceeded with their prisoner.

This brought Andrei out of the dream of a cross already won. Of course he would never live to give the message to his Colonel. These pigmies had his body fast, but they had not the Fifunsky spirit of him. As he took up the march again h© broke into the stanza of the regimental song about the love of women. It was no music at all to the ears of the guards, who fought for the love of Emperor and the love of race. Their women are_ honored in putting on my -lord's slippers. Fancy Mashurina feeling that way • The stanza was sweet with the rhythm of the West to the attaches. It made them all start and turn and listen. The German had heard it before. "He explained what it was and hummed the. measure through as they rode on. The effect was infectious. All took to humming, with a sense of the national boundaries that separated them disappearing and a feeling of brotherhood for a peasant private of the steppes.

Singing did Andrei so mucli good that his impulse called him to the whole Fifunsky song. Out of his deep lungs came the roar of the boots on. the thrashing-floor. . . His thunderous voice convinced lus little guards that they had a wonderful specimen indeed; and they grinned liappilv. "If we don't have peace the Fifunskis will win next time,-'' Andrei told himself. "I shall not be with them, but tliev will win. with Colonel Boris leadino-.' He will show tlie English and the Americans that, though they side with the pigmies, they cannot beat Rus"'Our simpleton was in the. ecstacy of this thought when the squad reached the headquarters of Dai Iclu Gun, and led him to the main compound, where the staff officers of the corps were seated. . '■Tliev will say when I am to be shot," thought Andrei. ' The chair at the head or the table was vacant. At the foot sat an officer who was evidently the Chief. Through another officer who, spoke Russian he asked Andrei some questions. "I am a Fifunsky!" said Andrei, and was stubbornly silent, a towering column of unconcern. Then the chief shook his head, as it dismissing the matter. "A simple peasant! A yokel. A madman !" protested the Russian-speak-officer. He had served as a student attache with the Russian army and had learned to like his comrades. "Why not send him as prisoner back to Japan. It seems like murder." "And invite others to the same trick?" returned the Chief. "No!"

But Andrei understood nothing of what they were saying. Stiff as at review, he was staring straight ahead when he saw a slight, brown, whitehaired, little man, clad in a Japanese

kimono, come through one of the do ors. As the little man paused, relaxed at sight of this colossus before the 'staff, he made a picture to awaken, to life the etching genius of Whistler. There was something real about him ; a something which would have disappr.-a.Ted if he had x>ut oil trousers. He ,'aad the quality of super-refinement and iiuish belonging to a world new to Andrei's horizon.

By contrast the other officers in their European clothes seemed in a false make-up. Some way Andrei felt a respect for him such as he had never felt for a pigmy before. At the same time he was conscious of the awkwardness and clumsiness of his own big limbs, as the old gentleman, his beady black eyes twinkling, came sedately across the compound. At sight of His Augustness, the Field Marshal commanding the corps, the other officers sprang to their feet-, but dropped back on a nod from'him. However, he remained standing, his slim, delicate hand resting on the back of the chair.

"He would cut up into two Japanese," said the Marshal of Andrei.

"Weren't the Fifunskis the fellows who tore up our Sixth Regiment so handsomely at the Sha?" "Yes, Augustness." ' 'And turned' a trick on Yokayama at Mukden?" "Yes."

The Chief remembered 1 . the incident only too well. After his repulse Yokayama at-Mukden?" "Yes." . The Chief remembered the incident only too well. After his repulse Yokayama had wired to the staff, asking what he should do, ,-and the Marshal had answered: "What we did in the samurai wars of old—keep on attacking!"

"And though Yokayama kept on attacking, they, did not go. That took a lot of conceit out of Yokayama," mused' the Marshal. Then he turned to the interpreter: "Ask oui; giant to tell us who is in command at th front? What other regiments are there?"

"We know already," said the Chief. "Ask him!" repeated the Marshal. "I am a Fifunsky!" returned Andrei, grandly. Except for the movement of his lips, he was as still as a man of stone. "Tell him if he will not answer our questions he shall be shot," continued the Marshal. "If he will, he shall live."

"I am a. Fifunsky!" repeated Andrei. He had no other words to offer. Did they think that a Fifunsky would turn informed? Something unconquered in his personality quivered through the atmosphere of the compound. He was no longer a ludicrous, masquerading peasant private in coolie clothes, with a face a splatched yellow from dandelion flowers and' fair hair daubed with shoe-blacking. In his blue eyes were the depths of the blue sky. In his attitude was the glory of the cathedrals, the. epics, and the symphonies of .the emotional peoples speaking the defiance of the old Colonel in the streets of Liau-Yang. "Nothing can stop Russia!" To the officers this brought a wry expression of face. But a shower of' twinkles fell from the beady eyes of ■ the Marshal. He had enjoyed his samurai test highly. In the school of feudal swordsmanship to which he was bred, war had been a social amenity regularly interchanged between gentlemen of different clans, whose title to mutual respect was their courage. "There is only one thing to do —send him back to his regiment with a message to his Czar," began the Marshal • | "Your Augustness! Not after he has been in our lines!" interrupted the -Chief of Staff, who was almost emo-' tional in his vigorous protest. _ | "If this game of modern war is as complicated as you younger men who studied in foreign schools say .it is, what knowledge of it worth while can a peasant reveal?" continued the Marshal. "Since when have the Japanese learned to forget courtesy due to an enemy who prefers death to dishonor?" i "But —" the Chief began, and stopped. The word of the Marshal was j law. ... "Send him with a message felicitat- | ing the Czar on being Emperor of the : Fifunskis!" concluded the Marshal. j "A good thing that the little Czar is not worthy of his Fifunskis," thought the Chief. : A few hours later Andrei was marching grandly down the stretch of road between the Japanese and the Russian outposts, humming the stanza about; the love of women as he went. Colonel Boris hugged him and gave him whole handfuls of cigarettes, and the staff officers said that he should have the cross, which, however, became a superfluous honor in view of a letter from Mashurina which was waiting for him. It was brief. It was vivid with the impulse that characterises the emotional peoples: "We can live with my mother till your house is finished!" At least, . Andrei had won one victory worthy a Fifunsky's fighting for and crawling for in the name or the love of women. As for the message which the Irench officer had given him, by the time it reached' St. Petersburg it was only a repetition of a truth which could have no influence on a weary Czar, unwilling to believe that anything except disaster could come out of Manchuria. But the veterans who had mastered the Great Discovery do not forget. Andrei Yegoritch will pat the straw thatch of the little son.who is the likeness of hi.s'father, and say: "Some day the Fifunskis may put a broken sun in front of the broken cres- | cent on their collars!" "After all, the giant only had his little toe cut to the quick while he was suffering with colic," says Major-Gene-ral Boris Andrevitch. When our farmers have settled Siberia and more of Us Russians have a common-school education, we shall go to salt water. Isothing' can stop Russia !"