Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/519

 SEQUEL TO INKEKMAN NAKllATIVE. 475 of llieir scanty resources, upon the business of de- chap. fending the Chersonese against field operations ; * and although long accustomed to expect an attack on Mount Inkerman, they had certainly failed to imagine that any force approaching in its num- bers to a strength of 40,000 would ever be brought to assail them on that one corner of ground. So, when called upon to encounter what they did — and that, too, whilst baffled by a densely en- shrouding mist — they acted by common consent as men who had been brought under the pressure of unforeseen emergencies. Again, and again, and again, after the close of the First Period, some general or other officer might be seen over- stepping, without any scruple, the usual bounds of authority, and governing the destination of troops, which — except on that ground of emer- gency — would not have been under his orders. No such licence could well have obtained, if the course of military business had not been rudely disturbed ; and in the absence of all col- lected knowledge about the early part of the battle, it was natural that those who observed all this evident dislocation of formal authority should ascribe it at first to what soldiers call a ' surprise,' though, in truth, it was only after the close of the First Period that the laxity in question be- gan. Wliat our people really wanted was — not directed to the position at Inkerman ; but it was for the sake of aggressive purposes against Sebastopol that he so yearned to have it hehl in force.
 * The mind of Sir John Burgoyne had long been eagerly