was owing to Saint-Arnaud, who felt it was necessary to embark the wounded on the ships before encountering new dangers.  This refusal of the French commander to advance directly to the attack of the forts on the north of Sebastopol was unfortunate, for there would have been but slight resistance, the main body of the Russians having withdrawn to the south of the city.  All this necessitated a flank movement of the allies, which was long and tedious, eastward, across the north side of Sebastopol to the south of it, where the Russians were intrenched.  They crossed the Belbec (a small river) without serious obstruction, and arrived in sight of Sebastopol, which they were not to enter that autumn as they had confidently expected.  The Russian to whom the stubborn defence of Sebastopol was indebted more than to any other man,—­Lieut.-Colonel Todleben,—­had thoroughly and rapidly fortified the city on the north after the battle of the Alma.

It was the opinion of Todleben himself, afterward expressed,—­which was that of Lord Raglan, and also of Sir Edmund Lyons, commanding the fleet,—­that the Star Fort which defended Sebastopol on the north, however strong, was indefensible before the forces that the allies could have brought to bear against it.  Had the Star Fort been taken, the whole harbor of Sebastopol would have been open to the fire of the allies, and the city—­needed for refuge as well as for glory—­would have fallen into their hands.

The condition of the allied armies was now critical, since they had no accurate knowledge of the country over which they were to march on the east of Sebastopol, nor of the strength of the enemy, who controlled the sea-shore.  On the morning of the 25th of September the flank march began, through tangled forests, by the aid of the compass.  It was a laborious task for the troops, especially since they had not regained their health from the ravages of the cholera in Bulgaria.  Two days’ march, however, brought the English army to the little port of Balaklava, on the south of Sebastopol, where the land and sea forces met.

Soon after the allied armies had arrived at Balaklava, Saint-Arnaud was obliged by his fatal illness to yield up his command to Marshal Canrobert, and a few days later he died,—­an unprincipled, but a brave and able man.

The Russian forces meanwhile, after the battle of the Alma, had retreated to Sebastopol in order to defend the city, which the allies were preparing to attack.  Prince Mentchikof then resolved upon a bold measure for the defence of the city, and this was to sink his ships at the mouth of the harbor, by which he prevented the English and French fleets from entering it, and gained an additional force of eighteen thousand seamen to his army.  Loath was the Russian admiral to make this sacrifice, and he expostulated with the general-in-chief, but was obliged to obey.  This sinking of their fleet by the Russians reminds one of the conflagration of Moscow,—­both desperate and sacrificial acts.