Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/76

 32 J'ilH BATTLK OF INKKRMAN. CHAi'. of November, the dutiful jIuscovite soldier was ' enraptured with the tidings that two of the Imperial Princes had resolved to come and share with him in the peril and the glory of the ap- proaching fight. On the eve of the appointed Sunday, the Graud-Duke Nicholas and the Grand- Duke Michael were already in camp, and their presence raised an outburst of that significant kind of loyalty which promises a warlike devo- tion — devotion to be tried on the morrow.* But Eeligion too called men to battle. The vast empire of the Czar, as we have before seen, was so circumstanced in regard to creed, that commensurate with its sense of being a nation was its sense of being also a Church ; and sacred, most sacred was the task which, on this chosen Sunday, the Czar would be entrusting to his soldiery ; for he had launched them in a war to the knife against the invaders of his empire, the enemies of the Orthodox Faith, the despoilers of churches, the disciples, the abettors of Islam, and therefore (in the apprehension of simple men) the open foes of the Cross. Now at last — lioly Saint Vladimir ! — that appalling sacrilege which horrorstruck men on the ramparts had seen with their own eyes would be surely avenged, f ing an army against the Sultan. We sliall see how Prince Mcntsoliikoff disposed of them on the day of tlic battli-, and how they were saved from ridicule by Colonel Collingwood Uickson. t Near Quarantine iky there stood an ancient and much venerated church dedicated to St Vladimir, which some French
 * Each of those two Graiul-Dukes is now, in 1877, command-