Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/218

 174 THE BA.TTLE OF INKERMAN. CHAP, twenty Russian battalions engaged in the earlier ^^' onslaughts were altogether withdrawn from the 2d Period jjgj(j^ ^j^(j l,]-,aJ3 Dannenberg chose only fresh entire "^ " troops for the succeeding attacks ; but it must hi^giuing not bc supposcd that the English could detect not per- such a chaugc at the time. The increasing roar tbe English of a heavily strengthened artillery intercepted or at the time. . i i n • i i. weakened attention to the lull in the musketry- fire ; and the defeated soldiery, when they van- ished — dropping down out of sight by the steeps — were so promptly replaced by fresh troops, that our people marked no distinct break in the tenor of the fight, except such as might naturally occur between the repulse and the renewal of any infantry attack. They indeed saw columns upon columns brought up, as it seemed, in support, but did not either know or imagine that the enemy, when he once more confronted them, had changed all his fiohting battalions. The error which began to entangle our troops on wrong ground. III. Imagining, probably (as almost all the infantry men did), that the parapet of the Sandbag Bat- tery marked a part of the Inkerman defences, General Adams prepared to resist the attack now directed against it ; and from this time, accord- ingly, the error which ascribed a great value to the position of the Kitspur began to work mis- chief. We shall have to see our people entang ling themselves more and more heavily in obstin- ate, bloody fights, for a worthless spur of ground