Читать книгу China's Revolution, 1911-1912: A Historical and Political Record of the Civil War онлайн

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Chang Piao made no reference to his adversary, General Li Yuan Hung, and did not seem inclined to encourage talk about the opposing side. Later, however, in the midst of the small talk, he referred very sympathetically to the Revolutionists, and was confident that they would rue the day when they broke out into rebellion. He continued: "It will not be long before we shall be able to win. There will, at any rate, not be any serious fighting for four days, but when Sah has his big guns' ammunition sent to him, and we have ours and our twenty thousand drilled troops, the position will change speedily."

Imperial troops now began to pour down from the north. Their headquarters were made at a place called Niekow, a small village, situated at the end of a big S bend in the railway leading out from Kilometre Ten, and about six miles away. Their first attack was made on the morning of October 25th, the Revolutionists taking up their position at the Government Paper Mill, situated below the Kilometre Ten Station, and near the Seven Mile Creek. People would point away in a northerly direction and tell you that over there were the Loyalists—twelve thousand, fifteen thousand, seventeen thousand, twenty thousand of them, mobilised for action. But no one actually knew; every one merely guessed. True it was that on the previous day several hair-brained adventurers went so far forward as to tempt the Loyalist outposts into shooting at them, and then set the Concessions talking about their internationality and how the Loyalists were bent on shooting every foreigner they could catch.