Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/129

 ARMY FROM SEBASTOPOL. 99 ' reconnaissance. . At a later hour, Prince Mentschikoff learnt how the rear of his army had been suddenly attacked hy English horsemen at jIackenzie's Farm ; hut even when he knew this had happened, he still kept himself Mind to the truth which the incident seemed fitted to teach him ; for he ascribed the collision to 'a patrol,' and remained unacquainted with the fact that, all day, the whole Allied army had been defiling, and was still continuing to defile, at a distance of but three or four miles from his quarters.* If Prince INTentschikoff had been surrounded by a force like the Cossacks of 1812, it would have been hardly possible for hira to have remained unacquainted with the movements of a hostile army which bivouacked on ground six miles from his quarters, and had since been marching towards him ; but although there were abimdance of horse- men still called by the name of Cossacks, the spirit of military organisation had changed all these into bodies having no more spontaneous energy than the rest of the liussian cavalry. Tn the course of the 25th, Prince Mentschikoff, completion 1 ,,,.,. p 1 •, • .of his flauk With the whole ot his lorce, took up a position in march; kenzie's Farm to 'amounted patrol and two guns.' — Second note from the Prince to Korniloff, dated '13th [25t]i] Sep- tember.' What the Prince imagined to be ' a mounted patrol ' was, as we saw, nothing less than Lord Raglan in person fol- lowed by his staff. Ant^, chap. ii.
 * vanced posts will meet to-morrow for tlio fust ciiAP.
 * He ascribes the capture effected by the English at Mac-