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As soon as his officers and men saw that there was nothing for it

but to conquer or die, their spirits rose to an extraordinary

pitch of exaltation, and they charged with such desperate

ferocity that the opposing ranks broke and crumbled under their

onslaught.]

On desperate ground, I would proclaim to my soldiers the

hopelessness of saving their lives.

Tu Yu says: "Burn your baggage and impedimenta, throw away your

stores and provisions, choke up the wells, destroy your

cooking-stoves, and make it plain to your men that they cannot

survive, but must fight to the death." Mei Yao-ch'en says: "The

only chance of life lies in giving up all hope of it." This

concludes what Sun Tzŭ has to say about "grounds" and the

"variations" corresponding to them. Reviewing the passages which

bear on this important subject, we cannot fail to be struck by

the desultory and unmethodical fashion in which it is treated.

Sun Tzŭ begins abruptly in VIII. § 2 to enumerate "variations"

before touching on "grounds" at all, but only mentions five,

namely nos. 7, 5, 8 and 9 of the subsequent list, and one that is

not included in it. A few varieties of ground are dealt with in

the earlier portion of chap. IX, and then chap. X sets forth six

new grounds, with six variations of plan to match.