Crossword-Solution: IWON 4 letters, 119 clues 🏆 scrabble score: 7

The two honourable gentlemen who have just visited me--the Commandant of Gensan and our Japanese consul stationed here--inform me that rumours have reached their ears of certain suspicious occurrences at Iwon which seem to point to the possibility that the Russian Government may be contemplating the dispatch of a large body of troops to Vladivostock by rail, their embarkation there for Iwon, at which spot they may land, march across Korea, and take our troops at Port Arthur in the rear.

But in view of the information which I have just received, it is my bounden duty to investigate the matter; and I therefore propose to dispatch the _Kinshiu Maru_ on a reconnoitring expedition to Iwon, to ascertain what foundation, if any, there may be for the suspicion.

The _Kinshiu Maru_ had in tow a small junk, or lighter, which we had used to facilitate the landing of the soldiers at Iwon.

All I knew was that I was some fifty miles, or thereabout, to the southward and eastward of Iwon; but I might as well have been five hundred miles from the place, for all the means I had of returning to it, or even of making a shot at Gensan.

From these conversations I gathered that after the squadron and the _Kinshiu_ parted company off Gensan, while we in the transport headed for Iwon, the squadron proceeded toward Vladivostock, being much delayed by a dense fog, through which it steamed at half-speed, each ship towing a fog buoy as a guide to the ship immediately following, though, even with this assistance, keeping touch was only accomplished with extreme difficulty.