divisions
independently yet in coordination with the general plan. Constant
training and target practice had brought his crews to a high degree
of skill. The Japanese shells were also superior, with fuses that
detonated their charges on the slightest contact with an explosive
force like that of mines. Between the enemy and their base, the
Japanese could wait quietly in home waters, while the Russian fleet
was worn out by its eight months' cruise. At best, the latter was
a heterogeneous assemblage of new ships hastily completed and old
ships indifferently put in repair, which since Nebogatoff joined
had had but one opportunity for maneuvers and had operated as a
unit for only 13 days.

On the night of May 26-27, as the Russian ships approached Tsushima
through mist and darkness, half the officers and men were at their
posts, while the rest slept beside the guns. Fragments of wireless
messages--"Last night" ... "nothing" ... "eleven lights" ... "but
not in line"--revealed enemy patrols in the waters beyond. Semenoff
on the _Suvaroff_ describes vividly "the tall, somewhat bent figure
of the Admiral on the side of the bridge, the wrinkled face of
the man at the wheel stooping over the compass, the guns' crews
chilled at their posts." In the brightly lighted engine-rooms,
"life and movement was visible on all sides; men were nimbly running
up and down ladders; there was a tinkling of bells and buzzing
of voices; orders were being transmitted loudly; but, on looking
more intently, the tension and anxiety--that same peculiar frame
of mind so noticeable on deck--could also be observed."[1]

[Footnote 1: THE BATTLE OF TSUSHIMA, p. 28.]

_The Battle of Tsushima_

At dawn (4.45) the Japanese scout _Sinano Maru_, which for an hour
or more had been following in the darkness, made them out clearly
and communicated the intelligence at once to Togo in his base at
Masampho Bay, on the Korean side of the straits, and to the cruiser
divisions off the Tsushima Islands. This was apparently the first
definite news that Togo had received for several days, and the fact
suggests that his scouting arrangements were not above criticism,
for it took fast steaming to get to the straits by noon. Cruiser
divisions were soon circling towards the Russians through the mist
and darting as swiftly away, first the 5th and 6th under Takeomi
and Togo (son of the admiral), then the 3d under Dewa, all reporting
the movements of the enemy fleet and sheph