Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/353

 THE 17TII OF OCTOBER. 323 the Admiral "vvas now able to impart tidings, chap. XIII ■svliich went to show that, for the moment at ;_ all events, the balance of the artillery conflict was inclining against the French ; for although Korniloff had not yet apparently heard of the great explosion in the French lines, he already knew something of the consequences resulting from the disaster, and was able to assure his chief that the fire from ^Nlount Kodolph had slackened. That it had quite ceased he could not yet say ; for the time when the two chiefs thus rode to the Catherine landing-place was about ten o'clock, and a little anterior to the moment when the French gave up their attack. I liave heard no account of the reasons by which Prince Mentschikoff may have thought himself compelled to depart from the beleaguered town, and to depart, too, at such a time. It is true that, in moving to the region on the north of the roadstead, Prince Mentschikoff would be rejoining his field army ; but, since that was a force secure itself from attack, and not then about to be used by him as a means of striking any instant blow at the besiegers, the necessity for his personal presence in the country towards which he was going is not at once made apparent by showing that he there had an army. It may be that, entertaining faint hopes of a successful resistance on the South Side, he judged it a duty to bend all his energies to the defence of the Severnaya ; and, indeed, if he really held fast to the theory by which his former withdrawal from