Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/225

 THE COUNSELS OF THE ALLIES. 195 there on the bleak downs at the mercy of the CHAP. rain, the snow, the biting frost. If, therefore,. the respite you are giving to the Russians should carry you into a siege not destined to end ill two months, your decision will put the winter upon the side of the enemy. 'You will remember. Sir John Ijurgoync, that one of your reasons for advising the flank march was founded upon the hope that by this unex- pected movement to the South Side we might surprise the garrison.* Well, the hope, we now know, has been realised. By our sudden march round to this side of the place the garrison has been clearly surprised. But how will this avail us if we leave; to a garrison, surprised for the moment, an immunity of two or three weeks? ' Your objections, for the most part, seem based upon apprehensions of what might befall your troops whilst forcing their way through the heart — the very heart — of Sebastopol, to encounter there obstinate battalions, street defences, and fire from the ships ; but the danger you rightly perceive in any such enterprise would not only not be incurred but would be definitively avoided by adopting the plan Avhich Sir Edmund Lyons now recommends. "f To overmaster the strong- hold, it is not at all essential for you to storm either the town or the suburb.;]: "When you re- dum of 21st September, vol. iii. p. 395, Cabinet Edition, t Sir Edmnnd's second suggestion, see a7ite. t All the views put forward in tliis and the subsequent Sf^n-
 * See the pai-agraph No. 2 in Sir John Burgoyne's Jlcmoran-