or three
even killed during the past week. It is an extraordinary state of
affairs, but better than a general attack all along the line. We have
no right to complain. The day before yesterday several Russians were
badly wounded; yesterday a Frenchman was killed outright and a couple
of other men wounded; to-day three more have been hit. In spite of the
discharges from the hospitals, the numbers _hors de combat_ remain the
same.

To-day, too, trumpets are again blaring fiercely, and more and more
troops can be seen moving if one looks down from the Tartar Wall. Up
on the wall itself, however, all is dead quiet. It has been like that
for weeks. No men have been lost there.

Neither is there any news of the thick relief columns which should be
advancing from Tientsin. In spite of the shoals of letters I have duly
recorded, assuring us of their immediate departure, the majority of us
have again become rather incredulous about our approaching relief. It
has become such a regular thing, this siege life, and all other kinds
of life are somehow so far away and so impossible after what we have
gone through, that we look upon the outer world as something
mythical.... Some men have their minds a little unhinged; two are
absolutely mad. One, a poor devil of a Norwegian missionary, who has
been living in misery for years in a vain effort to make converts,
became so dangerous long ago that he had to be locked up, and even
bound. But one night he managed to escape, climb our defences and
deliver himself up to the Chinese soldiery. They led him also to the
Manchu Generalissimo, Jung Lu, half suspecting that he was crazy. Jung
Lu questioned him closely as to our condition, and the Norwegian
divulged everything he knew. He said the Chinese fire had been too
high to do us very much harm; that they should drive low at us, and
remember the flat trajectory of modern weapons. After keeping him for
some hours and learning all he could, Jung Lu sent him back. The poor
devil, when he lurched in again, vacantly told the people in the
British Legation what he had said, and a number demanded that he be
shot for treason. If they once began doing that an end would never be
reached....

Some go mad, too, during the fighting. It is always those who have too
much imagination. Thus, during a lull in the attacks against the
French lines, a Russian volunteer, with rifle and bandolier across his
back and a bottle of spirits in his hand, charged furiousl