Union Jack, while some of the armed forces came to the present and others saluted.  It made quite a pretty, interesting and immensely impressive scene.  The battalion at once disembarked, and led by the Czech band and our splendid sailors from the Suffolk, and accompanied by a tremendous crowd of people, marched through the town to a saluting point opposite the Czech Headquarters, where parties of Czech, Cossack and Russian troops, Japanese, American and Russian sailors were drawn up, all of whom (except the Japanese) came to the present as we passed, while Commodore Payne took the salute for the Allied commanders, who were all present.

Our barracks were outside the town at Niloy-ugol; they were very dirty, with sanitary arrangements of the most primitive character, though I believe the local British authorities had spent both time and money in trying to make them habitable.  The officers’ accommodation was no better, I and my Staff having to sleep on very dirty and smelly floors.  A little later, however, even this would have been a treat to a weary old soldier.

On August 5 I attended the Allied commanders’ council.  There were many matters of high policy discussed at this meeting, but one subject was of intense interest.  General Detriks, the G.O.C. of the Czech troops, gave in reports as to the military situation on the Manchurian and Ussurie fronts.  The conditions on the Manchurian front were none too good, but those on the Ussurie front could only be described as critical, and unless immediate help could be given a further retirement would be forced upon the commander, who had great difficulty with his small forces in holding any position.  The Ussurie force had recently consisted of some 3,000 indifferently armed Czechs and Cossacks.  The day I landed a battle had been fought, which had proved disastrous, and resulted in a hurried retirement to twelve versts to the rear of Kraevesk.  The Allied force, now reduced to about 2,000 men, could not hope to hold up for long a combined Bolshevik, German and Magyar force of from 18,000 to 20,000 men.  The Bolshevik method of military organisation,—­namely, of “Battle Committees,” which decided what superior commands should be carried out or rejected—­had been swept away and replaced by the disciplined methods of the German and Austrian officers, who had now assumed command.  Should another retirement be forced upon the Ussurie forces, it could be carried out only with great loss, both of men and material.  The next position would be behind Spascoe, with Lake Hanka as a protection on the left flank and the forest on the right.  If this could not be held, then the railway junction at Nikolsk would be endangered, with the possibility of the communications being cut with other forces operating along the Transbaikal Railway and at Irkutsk.  Under these circumstances the council decided that there was nothing left but to ask for authority from the War Office to send my battalion