Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 5.djvu/225

 THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. 203 Lucan says confidently was towards the left-front chap corner of the valley, the aide-de-camp replied, L_ 1 There, my lord, is your enemy ; there are your 1 sruns.' * Lord Lucan declares that these words were addressed to him in a ' most disrespectful ' but significant manner ; ' f and, even without too much relying upon gesture or cadence of voice, it is easy to see that the apostrophe thus uttered by Nolan was almost in the nature of an indignant rebuke — an indignant rebuke inflicted by a cap- tain upon a lieutenant - general in front of his troops. Just men will therefore acknowledge that this outbreak of Nolan's was only too well fitted to enrage a general officer, and, by enraging him, to disturb his judgment ; but, apart from the effect they might produce upon the temper of Lord Lucan, the gestures and the words of the aide-de- camp cannot fairly be wrought into the kind of importance which was afterwards assigned to them in controversy. The tenor of the apos- trophe as recorded by Lord Lucan himself shows plainly enough that, by pointing generally to the direction in which the enemy might be found, Nolan's gestures and words were meant to convey a taunt, not to give topographical guidance ; and this is made the more evident by taking care to remember that, when the words passed between answer of Nolan's both those accounts agree ; but the speech, in saying how Nolan pointed, says, 'to the further end of the ' valley.' t Ibid.
 * Lord Lucan's written narrative and speech. As to this