After 17. Nxf7, Burn might have played 17.... Qd7 or Qb6. Let's take 17... Qb6 for example.

The game then might plausibly continue: 18. Qxe6 Qxe6 19. Rxe6 Kxf7 20. Bxd5 Rcd8 21. Bb3 Rxd4.

This is a huge improvement over the game, where Burn just takes the knight sacrificed without thinking, and resigns a few moves later as white is piling up on black's rook.

White might instead play 18. Ne5, just relying on being a pawn up. Black plays 18... Nf4 19. Qe4 Bxe5 20. Qxe5 Kh8 here. Yes: black is a pawn down, probably objectively lost. Yet his knight is on a beautiful square, and he's still fighting.

Ostende 1906 was a tournament with a weird structure to accomodate all 36 players. The basic structure was that of a bunch of 'Sheveningens' with the lowest point getters of each group eliminated after each round, and then a final. But it was more complicated still.

In the first round, Burn started realy strong (+6 -1 =2) with wins over Maroczy, Johner, Fahrni, Forgacz, E.Cohn, Saburov; draws with John, Marco; and a loss to Rubinstein. In the second round Burn slowed down a bit (+2 -1 =3), with wins over Perlis and Spielmann; draws with Teichmann, Mieses, Suechting; and a loss to Marshall. In the third round, Burn scored 3.5/7 (I do not have x-table for that round). After also a one round of play in the final, results (counted cummulatively from all rounds) settled at:

1. Schlechter (21/30, 70%), 2. Maroczy (20), 3. Rubinstein (19), 4-6. <Burn>-Bernstein-Teichmann (18, 60%), 7. Marshall (16.5), 8. Janowski (16), 9. Perlis (14)

The group of masters eliminated in the earlier rounds included well known players such as Blackburne, Spielmann, Duras, Leonhardt, Marco, Forgacz, ...

After 17. Nxf7, Burn might have played 17.... Qd7 or Qb6. Let's take 17... Qb6 for example. ...
...
White might instead play 18. Ne5, just relying on being a pawn up. Black plays 18... Nf4 19. Qe4 Bxe5 20. Qxe5 Kh8 here. Yes: black is a pawn down, probably objectively lost. Yet his knight is on a beautiful square, and he's still fighting. >

I don't know about all that. For instance, 17...Qb6 18.Ne5 Nf4 19.Qd2 Bxe5 20.Rxe5 Rd8 21.Rd1 ... looks like an easy win for Rubinstein.

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In the 3rd stage, Burn scored (+1 -2 =1). He scored a win against Swiderski, a draw with Salwe and losses to Schlechter and Znosko-Borovsky.

In the 4th stage, Burn scored (+1 =2). He scored a win against Leonhardt and draws with Bernstein and Janowski.

In the 5th and final stage, Burn scored (+2 -2 =4). Burn scored wins against Bernstein and Perlis. He had draws with Schlechter, Maroczy, Rubinstein and Marshall. He lost to Teichmann and Janowski.

Ostend 1906 was one of the largest tournaments of all time; 36 competitors and a total of 326 games.

A competitor would play a total of 30 games if they qualified for all 5 stages of the tournament. Only 9 players qualified for the 5th and final stage. The final 9 and their tournament point total: Schlechter - 21; Maroczy - 20; Rubinstein - 19; Bernstein, Burn & Teichmann - 18; Marshall 16.5; Janowski - 16 and Perlis - 14.

In the final round of the tournament, Schlechter had a bye and Maroczy had Black against Bernstein. In this crucial last round game, Maroczy twice obtained a winning position, only to blunder each time, losing the game and his chance to tie Schlechter for 1st place.

The unusual structure of dividing the competitors in 4 groups of 9 and then eliminating the lowest scorers after the 1st, 2nd and 4th stage of the tournament resulted in some uneven and in my opinion, unfair results.

After the first 2 stages, 16 players advanced with scores ranging from 10.5 out of 15 (Schlechter & Burn) down to 7.5 out of 15 (Swiderski) and 7 out of 15 (Fahrni).

Mieses & Duras, who had each scored 8 out of 15 were in the group that was eliminated after the 2nd stage.

<...Under the circumstances, the tournament resolved itself into a contest of endurance. The older players suffered most from the ordeal. One by one they sank by the wayside. The longer they held out the more pitiable was their breakdown. Maroczy, after a bad start, swept magnificently to victory, but suddenly collapsed, put a Rook 'en prise' in one game, overlooked an easy win in another, and had to be satisfied with second place. Janowsky made a briliant start and then broke down. ... Blackburne, Marco, and Chigorin were soon hopelessly floundering in the dust after the first and second stage had been reached ...

...The young masters were given their chance to show what they had learnt and the examination was most satisfactory. In fact they came dangerously near annexing the position of examinators themselves. And of their ranks, Rubinstein, proved himself what his name implies, a veritable gem. Mr. Gunsberg [tournament organizer] may thank his stars that the twenty-three-year-old Russian happens to have the cut of a genius. This fact redeems the tournament. If Mr. Rubinstein keeps what his courage, prudence and imagination promise, the tournament at Ostende will long be remembered as his debut on the stage of international chess. ...

You propose for white instead 17...Qb6 18. Ne5 Nf4 19. Qd2 Bxe5 20. Rxe5 Rcd8 21. Rd1 and think this
is an easy win for white.

A couple of points:

1) I prefer the immediate 20.... Kh8
for black in this line.

2) It's not clear how your alternative is better for white than the first line I proposed.

3) The same comment would probably apply to what you did: "Yes, black is a pawn down, probably objectivity lost. Yet his knight is on a beautiful square, and he's still fighting."

4) Black was already in trouble for allowing 17. Nxf7. Nobody is making a claim that there is some line where black can equalize. The point is: how to defend tenaciously, how to extend resistance, far beyond the exactly 6 moves black put up before he RESIGNED.

5) Although black is in a grim situation, he can still fight. He's down a pawn, but conversion of such in a major piece ending can be a problematic process, due to the need of the side with the advantage to shelter the king to avoid perpetual check.

6) If black can ever achieve a trade of white's d pawn for his e pawn, his drawing chances probably at least double. This is because the side where white has a pawn advantage is his king side - conversion of the pawn requires pushing those kingside pawns, which opens up opportunitys for black to infiltrate and look for that perpetual attack on white's king.

With just one error, black is back in the ballgame. After my proposed 20..... Kh8, white might continue 21. Rae1 Rf6, and now make the mistake 22. g3? allowing 22.... Nh3+ 23. Kh1 Nxf2.

Two previous books were published on this tournament in 1906/07. One book, by von Bardeleben contained only a few games. Marco's book contained the first 4 rounds (72 games) and 4 additional games from the 5th round. Marco's book was published as Vol. 1 for this tournament. Marco appealed for subscribers, but appartently was unable to raise adequate funding to publish the remaining games. Marco died in 1923 and no game notes or manuscript materials for Ostend 1906 have ever been located.

The current book does include all of the contents of Marco's original book.

After many years of research about 230 of the 326 games have been located and are included in the current tournament book. Many of the missing games were played in the later stages of the tournament. In the 5th and final stage, only 20 of the 36 games are available.

The current book includes annotations by many of the leading players of the era. Most games are annotated, but several only have light notes.

The current book includes a tournament review and a biographical sketch for each of the competitors. Also included are pictures of the tournament venue and a small picture of all but one of the competitors. A picture of a postcard with signatures of all of the competitors was also included.