then cantering off to join the Guards just ere they made their charge, and finding it all over while he was in a hollow of the ground.”  Lord Raglan, let it be remembered, was the Commander-in-Chief of the English forces.  And again:—­“The Light Division was strangely handled.  Sir George Brown, whose sight was so indifferent that he had to get one of his officers to lead his horse across the river, seemed not to know where his division was....  If the conduct of a campaign be a succession of errors, the Crimean expedition was certainly carried on secundum artem.”  Once more, on the same point, and quoting from the same authority:—­“All the Russian officers with whom I have conversed, all the testimony I have heard or read, coincide on these two points:  first, that, if, on the 25th, we had moved to Bakschiserai in pursuit of the Russians, we should have found their army in a state of the most complete demoralization, and might have forced the great majority of them to surrender as prisoners of war, in a sort of cul-de-sac, from which but few could have escaped; secondly, that, had we advanced directly against Sebastopol, the town would have surrendered, after some slight show of resistance to save the honor of the officers.”  Certainly, such generalship as this did not promise very well for the results of the campaign.

Let us follow the movements of the Allies a little farther.  On the morning of September 25th, the combined forces took up their line of march southward.  On the 26th, they reached and occupied the town of Balaklava, about six miles distant from Sebastopol.  On the 28th of the same month, Lord Raglan wrote to the Duke of Newcastle, then Secretary of War, “We are busily engaged in disembarking our siege-train and provisions, and we are most desirous of undertaking the attack of Sebastopol without the loss of a day.”  And yet it is not until October 10th that the Allies commence digging their trenches before the town.  Meanwhile the allied army was anxious and impatient. “’When will the siege commence?’ was the constant inquiry of the wearied and expectant troops.  ‘To-morrow,’ was the usual response, ‘most probably to-morrow.’  But day after day came and went, and the Allies still rusted in inaction, while the Russians worked day and night at strengthening their defences.”  “The time dragged heavily on; still the Russians worked with incredible industry, and still the cannon of the Allies had not yet opened their thunders upon Sebastopol.”  On the 17th of October, twenty-one days after the occupation of Balaklava, the allied forces commenced fire by land and sea on the stronghold of the enemy.  The bombardment continued from half-past six, A.M., until nightfall, but is conceded to have been a complete and mortifying failure.  From this time until the 5th of November, it will not be contended that any substantial advantage was gained by the invading forces, or that material progress was made towards the reduction of the Russian Gibraltar.