JAPANESE HEADQUARTERS, Shantung, Nov. 2.—­I have seen war from a grand stand seat.  I never before heard of the possibility of witnessing a modern battle—­the attack of warships, the fire of infantry and artillery, the manoeuvring of airships over the enemy’s lines, the rolling up from the rear of reinforcements and supplies—­all at one sweep of the eye; yet, after watching [Transcriber:  original ‘watchnig’] for three days the siege of Tsing-tau from a position on Prinz Heinrich Berg, 1,000 feet above the sea level and but three miles from the beleaguered city, I am sure that there is actually such a thing as a theatre of war.

On Oct. 31, the date of the anniversary of the birth of the Emperor of Japan, the actual bombardment of Tsing-tau began.  All the residents of the little Chinese village of Tschang-tsun, where was fixed on that day the acting staff headquarters of the Japanese troops, had been awakened early in the morning by the roar of a German aeroplane over the village.  Every one quickly dressed and, after a hasty breakfast, went out to the southern edge of the village to gaze toward Tsing-tau.

A great black column of smoke was arising from the city and hung like a pall over the besieged.  At first glance it seemed that one of the neighboring hills had turned into an active volcano and was emitting this column of smoke, but it was soon learned that the oil tanks in Tsing-tau were on fire.

As the bombardment was scheduled to start late in the morning, we were invited to accompany members of the staff of the Japanese and British expeditionary forces on a trip to Prinz Heinrich Berg, there to watch the investment of the city.  It was about a three-mile journey to this mountain, which had been the scene of some severe fighting between the German and Japanese troops earlier in the month.

When we arrived at the summit there was the theatre of war laid out before us like a map.  To the left were the Japanese and British cruisers in the Yellow Sea, preparing for the bombardment.  Below was the Japanese battery, stationed near the Meeker House, which the Germans had burned in their retreat from the mountains.  Directly ahead was the City of Tsing-tau, with the Austrian cruiser Kaiserin Elisabeth steaming about in the harbor, while to the right one could see the Kiao-Chau coast and central forts and redoubts and the intrenched Japanese and British camps.

We had just couched ourselves comfortably between some large, jagged rocks, where we felt sure we were not in a direct line with the enemy’s guns, when suddenly there was a flash as if some one had turned a large golden mirror in the field down beyond to the right.  A little column of black smoke drifted away from one of the Japanese trenches, and a minute later those of us on the peak of Prinz Heinrich heard the sharp report of a field gun.