Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 7.djvu/143

 WAY OF MINISTERING TO THE ARMIES. 99 passing up across those very ridges on the chap. Chersonese Heights which were to be occupied !__, by our divisional camps. Thus, supposing Lord Raglan assured that Science would make good her promise, he had at command all the road- way he could well have deemed needful ; for whilst rightly entitled to trust that the road by the Col would not be broken up by great rains before the October day when already (if Science spoke true) his troops were to be in Sebastopol, he had also good ground for believing that he could keep as a second resource his control of the Woronzoff Eoad. Under such conditions, would it have been warrantable for Lord Rag- lan to insist that he needs must construct a ' metalled ' road leading all the way up from Balaclava to the ridges in front of Sebastopol ? He had no supply of the tools indispensable for such a purpose ; (}^) and unless — drawing back from the combative work undertaken — he were to employ a large proportion of his troops in breaking and laying the stones required for some eight miles of carriage-way, he could not iind ' hands ' in his army for the compassing of any such task.(^^) Nor again did it lie in his power to obtain Imman labour by hire ; (^^) and, upon the whole, it is plain that, to insist on making the road in derogation of a military project then supposed to re([uire but three weeks for its thorough maturity, would have been to secede from the enterprise. Far from taking any such course, Lord Raglan not only entered upon the business of tliis quasi-