“And by Jove! sir, you shall not be disappointed if I can help it,” I exclaimed, springing to my feet in a paroxysm of delight and grasping the hand which the Admiral kindly extended to me. “I don’t know how to find words in which to express my profound gratitude to you, sir, for all your kindness to me, from the moment when I presented myself before you, an utter stranger,” I continued huskily; but Togo interrupted me, reaching up and patting my shoulder in a very kind, fatherly way.
“There, there,” he murmured, soothingly, “say no more about it, my dear boy; say no more about it. I want no wordy expressions of gratitude; you should know that by this time. And if you really feel grateful to me for anything I have done for you, you shall show your gratitude in deeds, rather than words, when the strenuous times arrive which I already see looming in the distance.”
And therewith, affording me no opportunity to reply, the fine little fellow, well named “the Nelson of Japan,” hastily shook me by the hand and effected his escape, while I sank into a chair, almost overwhelmed at the extent of my good fortune.
Captain of the Yakumo! I could scarcely credit it. As the Admiral had said, the Yakumo was a very fine ship; she was indeed one of the finest armoured cruisers which Japan at that time possessed. Her waterline was protected by a belt of Krupp steel seven inches thick amidships, tapering off to five inches thickness at bow and stern; she mounted four 8-inch quick-fire guns in her two turrets, and fourteen 6-inch guns on her broadsides; she could steam twenty-one knots, when clean; and she carried a crew of five hundred officers and men! A rather different craft from the little Kasanumi, with her single 12-pounder and five 6-pounders, eh? I felt that, in command of such a ship as that, I could dare and do almost anything. My delight must have proved an important factor in aiding my recovery, for from the moment when I received my appointment, my strength came back to me so rapidly that, instead of the fortnight which I had allowed myself in my conversation with the Admiral, I took only nine days to qualify for my discharge from the hospital, and to report for duty.
It was a proud moment for me when I stood on the spacious quarter-deck of my new command and, in the presence of all hands, mustered for the occasion, read my commission appointing me to the command of the ship. The vacancy had occurred in consequence of the death of her previous captain, and when I boarded the craft, I did so fully prepared for a certain coldness of reception on the part of the officers, for naturally, in the ordinary course of events, the command ought to have gone to the senior officer, one Commander Arisaka. But not so; on the contrary, as I finished reading my commission, folded it up, and put it in my pocket, the Commander approached, shook hands in the most friendly way, expressed the extreme gratification felt by himself and the rest of the officers of the ship at finding themselves under the leadership of one who—as they were kind enough to put it—“had so brilliantly distinguished himself”; and then proceeded to present to me the rest of the officers in rotation, in strict accordance with their rank, all of whom found something pleasant and complimentary to say. By way of response, I made a little speech to all hands, crew as well as officers, in which I expressed my gratification at finding myself in command of so fine a ship, manned by so fine a crew, and voiced the hope that, not only should we be able to all work comfortably and harmoniously together, but also that the Admiral would speedily afford us an opportunity to add fresh laurels to the Yakumo’s fame; a speech which elicited a quite enthusiastic storm of “Banzais.”
Agreeable relations with my officers and crew being thus satisfactorily established, I took up my quarters onboard, and forthwith proceeded to “learn” the ship—that is to say, I made myself intimately acquainted with the localities and purposes of the numerous engines and pieces of machinery with which she was fitted, the number and positions of her magazines, and their contents, the number and situations of her torpedo tubes, the uses of the many fitments to be found in her conning tower, and in fact everything connected with her working, so that in the hour of action I might have every detail firmly fixed in my memory, ready for use at a moment’s notice. And wherever I found anything capable of improvement, I unhesitatingly had that improvement carried out, although I feel bound to say that I found very little anywhere needing modification. In this way, and by continually exercising the crew at such evolutions as could be carried out with the ship at anchor, I very soon became perfectly familiar with my new command and, as my strength steadily returned, began to long for the opportunity to test myself as well as my ship and crew. For during the whole of this time the Yakumo, with several other cruisers, and our four battleships, had been lying at anchor at our rendezvous at the Elliot Islands, not idle by any means, but, like the Yakumo, “tuning up” for a certain eventuality, the approach of which we all seemed to sense in some mysterious way.
And yet, after all, I do not know that there was very much mystery about it, for our Secret Service agents—of whom there were several in Port Arthur—informed us that, from the moment when, on that memorable Sunday, 7th August, one of the first twenty shells fired at the stronghold by the investing Japanese, fell aboard the battleship Retvisan, lying at anchor in the harbour, and seriously damaged her, there had been a general outcry that the Russian fleet ought to go to sea and fight, rather than remain in harbour and be ignominiously destroyed without striking a blow in self-defence.
It was known that Admiral Vitgeft, and Prince Ukhtomsky, his second in command, were utterly opposed to such a course, their freely expressed opinion being that the Russian ships, already more or less seriously damaged by the attacks to which they had been subjected from time to time during the progress of the war, were totally unfit to meet and engage the Japanese fleet, which, they had every reason to believe, was in first-class fighting trim. There were certain officers, however, whose mortification at their enforced inactivity blinded them to the soundness of this judgment. “If the ships must be destroyed, let them be destroyed at sea in the act of inflicting as much injury as possible upon the enemy,” was their contention; and it was certainly a reasonable one. It was broadly hinted that the leader of this faction found means to convey his contention to the ear of Admiral Alexieff; for, strange to say, the following day brought a wireless message from the Commander-in-Chief to Vitgeft, ordering the latter to take his whole fleet to sea and proceed to Vladivostock, fighting his way thither, if necessary. Every effort was of course made by Vitgeft to keep this order a profound secret; but it was necessary to communicate it to the captains of the several ships and other officers whose duties required that they should possess such knowledge, and the delight of some of them at learning that their long-cherished desire was about to be granted was not conducive to secrecy. Moreover, the sudden, feverish hurry and bustle of preparation was a sufficient advertisement of what was impending; and that very night the news was signalled to the blockading squadron in the offing, from which it was as promptly transmitted by wireless to Togo, among the Elliots. The news was confirmed on the following morning by our patrol vessels off the port, from which came the information that a tremendous state of activity was discernible among the Russian ships, and that all indications pointed toward an almost immediate sortie.