Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 5.djvu/360

 338 THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. chap, the sheer sake of duty, could go down that fatal " north valley as the English Light Cavalry did. This feeling on the part of others Lord liaglau might be willing to repress, but he could not help sharing it himself ; and despite all his anger and grief, despite the kind of protestation he judged it wholesome to utter for the discouragement of rash actions on the part of his officers, I still find him writing in private of the Light Cavalry charge that it ' was perhaps the finest thing ever attempted.' * General The well-known criticism delivered by General Bosquet's criticism 01 the charge. criticism on Bosquet was sound and generous. He said of the charge, ' It is splendid ; but it is not war.' *f- He spoke with a most exact justice ; but already the progress of time has been changing the relative significance of that glory and that fault which his terse comment threw into contrast. What were once the impassioned desires of the great nations of the West for the humbling of the Czar are now as cold as the ashes which remind men of flames extinguished ; and our people can cease from deploring the errors which marred a battle, yet refuse to forget an achievement which those very errors provoked. Therefore the perversity which sent our squadrons to their doom is only after all the mortal part of the story. Half- forgotten already, the origin of the ' Light Cavalry t ' C'est magnifique ; mais ce n'est pas la guerre.' This was said by Genera] Bosquet to Mr Layard in the Meld, and ar. the time of the charge.
 * Oct. 30, 1854.