knocking all my plans to bits. It was a cipher message from Captain
von Tappken, and shortly I was again on the high sea, bound not for
home, but for Port Arthur. My orders were to ascertain how far the
Port Arthur fortifications were completed and to report on the general
conditions as I found them. I wondered not a little at this mission,
as I could not then see what close interest Germany could have in a
possible war between Russia and Japan. Also, I by no means relished
the assignment, for it was a perilous business and I judged the
Russians to be extremely suspicious--which I afterwards learned they
were not.

I decided to travel under the cloak of a doctor of natural history and
botany, my medical training giving me the necessary knowledge to
impersonate the character. The reader will understand that if Doctor
Franz von Cannitz is subsequently mentioned, it refers to me. Almost
everybody, especially my government, knew that war between Russia and
Japan was inevitable. I say, all, except Russia.

To make this situation clear, let me hark back a little. Japan,
beating China in the war of 1895, took and occupied Port Arthur.
Japan later, compelled by hostile demonstrations on the part of Russia
backed up by France and Germany, restored Port Arthur to China. Note
the holding aloof of England here. The actual text of the ultimatum
delivered was that the possession of ceded territory by Japan would be
detrimental to the lasting peace of the Orient. Japan was bitterly
humiliated and an Asiatic never forgets or forgives. Japan bided her
time. Russia's duplicity in the Boxer Campaign, and her seizure of
Port Arthur, gave Japan the needed _casus belli_. Result, the
Russian-Japanese War.