Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/535

 SEQUEL TO INKEllMAN NAKKATIVE. 491 day's losses, and the matiiiitude of the nuiuLors CHAP. . . VJII. which the enemy had disphayed.* If accordingly no grand act of vigour could be attempted with a chance of success, Canrcjbert submitted that the alternative was to temporise, and wait for rein- forcements.i* To such representations — which and even ' ^ allowing Lord Eaglan, it seems, did not combat — there themselves ° ' ' to be succeeded in natural sequence a council of war, ^J^'g^^jfttie^' a unanimous determination that the assault of Sebastopol must not then be attempted, and fin- ally, a decisive resolve on the part of the French that for the present they would abandon all idea of seizing the Flagstaff Bastion.t Thus, notwith- one of the . enemy's standing their overthrow, the Russians were al- objects " attained. lowed, after all, to attain one, at least, of the t He described this course of action (or inaction) as an ' ater- ' raoiement '— a word which the Dictionary defines as — ' com- ' position, compounding with creditors, delay.' See in Ap- pendix, Note XV., a cop}' of the note which Canrobert read. Considering, no doubt, the extreme importance of maintaining for the time as much secrecy as was possible in respect to such a resolution, Lord Raglan seems to have kept the note apart from other ' private ' papers. I find it endorsed by his own hand in these words : ' Private note of General Canrobert read at a ' meeting on the 7th November 1854.' t The seizure of the FlagstafiF Bastion was a measure which might have been adopted tvithout undertaking a general assault on Sebastopol ; and, unless General de Todleben errs, that is precisely the course which the Allies should have taken. He says : ' Once entrenched in the No. 4 [the Flagstaff] Bastion, ' the enemy would not have been under the slightest necessity ' of assaulting Sebastopol — an attempt in which he must cer- ' tainly have been defeated with great loss — but our line of ' defence would have been forced, divided, maimed, and the ' ulterior defence of Sebastopol must have become all but im- • possible.' — Todleben, p. 433.
 * Lord Raglan to Duke of Newcastle, Novemljer 8th, 1854.