it did. Such almost
incombustible materials as hammocks and rows of boxes, drenched with water,
flared up in a moment. At times it was almost impossible to see anything
with glasses, owing to everything being so distorted with the quivering,
heated air. No! It was different to the 10th of August!"

In this storm of fire there was heavy loss of life. A shell-burst killed
and wounded most of the signallers as they stood together at their station.
An explosion against the opening of the conning-tower killed two officers
beside Rojdestvensky, and slightly wounded the admiral. The fight had not
lasted more than twenty minutes, and the "Suvaroff," the "Alexander," and
"Borodino," the three leading Russian ships, were all wrapped in black
smoke from the fires lighted on board of them by the Chimose shells.

How was the Japanese line faring? I talked over his battle experiences with
a Japanese officer not long after the day of Tsu-shima. He told me his
impression was that at first the Russians shot fairly well, causing some
loss of life at the more exposed stations on board the leading Japanese
ships. "But," he added, "after the first twenty minutes they seemed
suddenly to go all to pieces, and their shooting became wild and almost
harmless." No wonder that under such a tornado of explosions, death and
destruction, and with their ships ablaze, and range-finding and
fire-controlling stations wrecked, the gunnery of the Russians broke down.
One of the pithy sayings of the American Admiral Farragut was: "The best
protection against the enemy's fire is the steady fire of your own guns."
Tsu-shima gave startling proof of it.

Semenoff hoped that the Japanese were also suffering from the stress of
battle. From the fore-bridge of the "Suvaroff" he scanned their line with
his glasses. In the sea-fights of other wars both fleets were wrapped in a
dense fog of powder smoke, but now with the new powder there was no smoke
except that of bursting shells and burning material. So he could
distinguish everything plainly.

"The enemy had finished turning. His twelve ships were in
perfect order at close intervals, steaming parallel to us, but
gradually forging ahead. No disorder was noticeable. It seemed
to me that with my Zeiss glasses (the distance was a little more
than two miles) I could distinguish the mantlets of hammocks on
the bridges and the groups of men. But with us? I looked round.
What havoc! Burning