From an authentic portrait, painted in 1852, by CAPTAIN GOODRICH. of the Cape Mounted Rifles

INKERMANN

NOVEMBER 5, 1854

"Scarce could they hear or see their foes,`
Until at weapon point they close-
They close in clouds of smoke and dust,
With sword-sway and with lance's thrust;
And such a yell was there

Of sudden and portentous birth,
As if men fought upon the earth
And fiends in upper air."

-SCOTT.

NKERMANN is emphatically "a soldier's battle."

The bayonet of the private counted for everything in it, the brains of the general for almost nothing. It is simply one of the most distracted, planless, muddleheaded, yet magnificent battles in British history; and as an illustration of the chivalrous daring of the British officer, and the dogged, unconquerable fighting quality of the British private, Inkermann has scarcely a rival in the long roll of famous battles. There are some scenes in the military history of our race the recollection of which always stirs the blood-the steadfast, long-enduring patience of the infantry squares at Waterloo; the stern valour of the Fusiliers at Albuera; the wild daring of the stormers of Badajoz. But none of these surpasses, as an example of the fighting quality of the British soldier, the strife that, for nine hours on

that November Sunday in 1854, raged amidst fog and rain on the rugged slopes of Inkermann. It was on the British side, at least, in the truest sense of the word, an Homeric fight-a long succession of single combats; of desperate charges undertaken by tiny clusters of men, with leaders evolved by mere supremacy of fighting power at the moment. Generalship was non-existent; tactics were forgotten; regiments were broken up into unrelated fragments, and fought like Hal o' the Wynd for their own hand.

The general physiognomy of the battle may be described in a dozen sentences. The scene of the fight was a long and narrow spine, rising from steep and wooded ravines. Some 40,000 grey-coated Russians, with more than 100 guns, were being thrust into the flank of the British camp. They formed a river of dingy-grey overcoats, closely-cropped bullet heads, broad, high-boned, pasty-looking faces. Across the ridge was drawn a knotted, irregular line of British soldiery-for the first three hours of the fight not exceeding 3000 in number-men of all regiments, mixed together, many of them pickets who had been on duty for twenty-four hours, and without food for twelve. The ground was heavy with rain, thick with scrub, broken with rocks, a mist lay heavy on it, and the red flash of the guns had the strangest effect as it flamed and vanished through the eddying masses of vapour. The steadfast red wall, edged with fire, and fretted with the gleaming bayonets, which we expect in a British line of battle, had no existence here. But that knotted, irregular, and swaying line of British soldiery which kept back the huge Russian masses was

unpierceable. To quote Hamley, it was made up of "scanty numbers, but impenetrable ranks." "Colonels of regiments," he adds, “led on small parties and fought like subalterns, captains like privates. Every man was his own general." Nobody could see many yards from the point where he stood and fought or died. When at any given point the huge grey mass of the Russians swayed upwards, a cluster of British-sometimes a single officer leading, sometimes a sergeant, a corporal, or a private soldier of exceptional daring-would run forward fiercely with bayonets at the charge; and always the few thrust back the many. About the combatants eddied the thick, white fog. Above them rolled incessantly the sullen thunder of the Russian guns, and over the crest to which the swaying line of the British clung so stubbornly rushed incessantly the tempest of Russian shot.

No one can adequately tell the story of Inkermann. If translated into the language of tactics, it is the coldest and shortest of tales. If written as a pure chapter of adventure, it overwhelms both writer and reader by its wealth of detail. Kinglake devotes an entire volume to Inkermann; and, in patches, his story is of amazing brilliancy. It is, in fact, a sort of dithyrambic hymn of praise in honour of the British private. But no one will form any clear mental picture of the great fight from Kinglake. His landscape is too wide and crowded. You cannot see the forest for the trees!

Inkermann represents on the part of the Russians an effort of daring generalship. The allied forces, numbering 65,000 men-not including Turkish auxiliaries -were besieging a great stronghold, fortified by the