was formally introduced to the officers and men under my command. Later
he informed me that he did not consider the movement sufficiently
important to make any change in our dispositions necessary. Towards dusk
Captain Stephan, accompanied by his adjutant, rode up and reported an
important movement of enemy forces towards Runovka, our solitary
remaining position on the opposite side of the river, which formed the
natural defence and limit of our right flank. Again I was asked to move
forward to render such assistance as might be necessary in case our
right were forced to retire across the river. We marched forward in the
darkness with the flash of the Bolshevik guns lighting up the way, but
as their attention was entirely directed to our outpost at Runovka, we
were as safe as if we had been in Hyde Park. The Czechs have a fatal
preference for woods as a site for defensive works, and they selected a
wood on the left flank of the road for my position. I rejected their
plan, and chose a position about two hundred yards in front of the wood
at a point where the roads cross, and a fold in the ground, aided by the
tall marsh grass, almost entirely hid us from the observation-post of
the enemy. Millions of mosquitoes, against which we had no protection
whatever, attacked us as we began to entrench, but officers and men all
worked with a will, and by dawn we had almost completed what was
probably the best system of field-works so far constructed on this
front. How we wished we might see the enemy advance over the river and
attempt to deploy within range of our rifles! He had by vigorous
artillery fire driven our remaining Czech company across the river, and
so had become complete master of the other side.

It was here that a second chance came to deal effectively with this
attempt to outflank our entire position. A sudden dash across the bend
of the river in the north-eastern corner at Khamerovka on to the
unprotected line of enemy communications would have resulted in a