Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 8.djvu/314

 282 RECALL OF THE KEKTCH EXPEDITION. chap, whiijh to escape great disasters. Next — as though at the time in a frenzy of prophetic assurance — he complacently took it for granted that a tele- graphed message from him would not only drive General Canrobert, but even Lord Kaglan him- self and all the gathered Allies, to clutch at ' sal- ' vation ' by the ' only ' way open, and enter at once on his travesty of the famous Marengo cam- paign. Thence it was that he had sent the hys- terical telegrams which broke the rest of the Generals on the night of the 3d of May, and stopped short in mid-course a flotilla already in sight of the enemy.