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148 been burdened by the company of the slow Rurik, and the loss by grounding of the fast Bogatyr it might have accomplished more. Yet Russia never attempted a properly thought out guerre de course. Her Port Arthur fleet acted with the grand battle in view, and the Vladivostok cruisers at the time of their defeat by Kamimura were apparently engaged, not on a guerre de course, but in trying to join the Port Arthur ships for a grand battle. Moreover, when upon guerre de course cruises, fishing boats seem to have been as acceptable to them as Japanese transports: there was little design in their operations and still less intelligence.

The guerre de course, as a danger to the stronger Sea Power, cannot be gauged from the Russian travesty of it. Let us, however, consider what Russia might have done, had she frankly recognised inferiority after the first torpedo attack. She had at Port Arthur the Bayan, Askold, Diana, Pallada, and Novik—all ships not easily caught and the Bayan at least moderately powerful, and efficiently handled. What might not have been accomplished by these vessels? Sooner or later, each would have been destroyed; but certainly they would have done considerable mischief, which as certainly is what they never accomplished in the war as it was actually conducted. There was always the chance at least that depredations upon the Japanese communications might have seriously impeded Oyama's armies and perhaps raised