A Secret Agent in Port Arthur by Wirt Gerrare

Just before sundown on Saturday, February 5, I entered Mukden by the south gate, in a covered Peking cart drawn by three tired mules. That day I had travelled over forty miles across country, arriving by way of Ma-tsian-tsia, and it was my intention to remain in the city over Sunday and continue my journey towards Kirin as early in the week as circumstances allowed. I put up at the Russian guest-house -- a dreary, dirty building. That same evening, tired though I was by the constant jolting of the springless vehicles in which I had been lying, sitting, squatting and tumbling -- mostly tumbling -- for fourteen consecutive hours, I started out to make inquiries as to the Russian troops quartered there and their exact location. I learned also that Mr. Bennet Burleigh and other war correspondents had been in the town very recently.

I noticed that the Sikh watchmen -- and there were many of them in Mukden -- invariably saluted me, although they never acknowledged any of the Russian civilians. As I was wearing Russian clothes, from fur cap to high boots and overshoes, and had on me enough Russian leather to proclaim my presence for half a _li_ around, the Englishman must have been sticking out of me very prominently somewhere, or the Sikhs have a special faculty for recognizing people of the only race for which they have any regard.