The news from the Far East is still to the
advantage of the Japanese. They are delaying, for reasons of their own, the final assault on Port Arthur, the capture of which becomes daily more important from a political point of view ; but they have compelled the Russians, by a series of attacks on their position at Ta-shih-chao, the junction of the railway leading to Newchwang with the main Siberian line to Port Arthur, to evacuate that important point. This victory, which has been secured with casualties on both sides estimated at five thousand, supplies the Japanese with a new port, Yinkow, at which they can safely land masses of troops, and a large fleet of transports is already engaged in that work. General Kuropatkin is evidently retreating, or trying to retreat, on Liaoyang ; but the exact position of the Japanese between him and that great depot of stores is still obscure. The Japanese do not move fast, for they make their roads as they go ; but they are advancing steadily, and the Russian General must either defeat them, or retreat at dangerous speed on Mukden, or surrender. The Russians still talk of his enormous reinforcements ; but it is nearly impossible, as the troops must be fed, that they can amount to more than a thousand a day, and General Kuropatkin in every despatch complains of his inferiority in strength. The masters of the sea move much more easily.
