BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCH. xxxix 



gang to sleep ] " " Aye that I do ! But it's jist hard that a man mayn't gang to sleep when 

 he's tired." 



There is a hiatus in the letters here, and there are no full accounts of the final assault on 

 Sebastopol and the evacuation of the south side by the Russians on the Stli of September, which 

 maybe accounted for by the interest which attached to them, so that they were passed from hand 

 to hand, and were never returned. " I do not believe," he writes at the end of September, " that 

 in the whole annals of the English army there was more disgraceful conduct shown than by the 

 Light and 2nd Division on the 8th of September. The French attacked the Malakoff with the 

 same regiments and brigades that captured the Mamelon, that had already repulsed the Russians, 

 and consequently thought no Russian could stand against them. Pelissier sent his next best troops 

 against the other works ; and though they did not succeed their behaviour was splendid. Men 

 cannot do more than die, and the French died by the thousand at these other points of attack. 

 I cannot put the French loss at less than 12,000 men. The Redan on the 8th of September and 

 on the 18th June was not the same. On the 18th the enemy was prepared, he had not suffered 

 the immense losses by bombardments he did before the 8th September. Our power of fire had 

 been daily increasing. When once the Malakoff fell there was no fire supporting the flank 

 of the Redan nearest to the Malakoff. Many of the Redan guns had been silenced by the 

 previous bombardment ; its parapets were very much shaken and broken down by our fire ; we 

 were miich nearer to it, and had plenty of trench to put troops into. I had observed that 

 for some weeks previous to our assault the enemy did not show the same vigour and energy in 

 repairs that formerly characterized them. Notwithstanding all this I do not think that we should 

 have succeeded if the French had not surprised the Malakoff. The Russian general in it said 

 that the engineer had reported to him that morning that there were no unusual movements in 

 the French trenches. The skill Avith which they disguised their intentions and massed the 

 number of men they did was very great; 25,000 were told off for the Malakoff works to its 

 right. The gallantry shown by the French general and his officers was quite refreshing in these 

 matter-of-fact and unchivalrous days. At half-past four p.m., when the enemy made their final 

 attempt to recover the Malakoff, Vinoy went to the gorge of the work and called out, ' En avant 

 Messieurs de I'etat-major, epee nue ! ' I cannot help admiring the French troops — they are 

 heart and soul soldiers." "The simple fact is, the French are soldiers, and we are not; 

 their generals would not tolerate the humbug that is practised in our army. If we were going 

 to build a town we could not require a greater amount of superfluities than our army has served 

 out to it ; the result is, that we are incapable of moving, and we sink into a very indifferent 

 contingent to the French." 



The next communication is dated from the 1st Division Camp, October 2, 1855, more 



^2 



