Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 8.djvu/54

 22 RECONSIDERATION OF PLANS. CHAP. I. Burgoyne's insistence upon the expediency fit' assailing Die Mala- kofc dured to make such a change in their policy as would seem to admit that for months their en- ergies had been wrongly applied, and their sacri- fices made all in vain. Burgoyne all this while had not ceased to in- sist that the Malakoff front was the one more than all others meet for attack — had not ceased to be counselling plans put forward day after day which, whether directly or not, were aimed with commanding ability at the object kept always in sight ; ( 7 ) and apparently, it was almost a torture to him to find that, the French being deaf to his counsels, and the English having no men to spare, he could not induce the Allies to press the left flank of the Work from the side of Mount Inker- man — could not even make them determine that their defence of that part of the Mount which they knew they must hold should at least be that kind of defence which, far from being inert, is active, bristling, elastic, and always in its spirit aggressive.* In the face of our dread ' Morning States,' and the only too well foreknown scantiness of any English succours approaching, he long clung fast to a hope that the honour of attacking that Work which he held to be the one all-mastering key of the position might accrue to his own fellow-coun- trymen ; and even when forced to see that there could not be laid on our people any heavier share of siege-duty than the one they already were bearing, he still tried to find a way to the object
 * Journal Royal Engiueera, p. 72.