Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 7.djvu/380

 33G THE WINTEU TliOURLES. CHAP, become nearly merged in what was a vastly 1 greater, and almost indeed a new army.(-^) II. The Eng- lish: their long- continued want of tlio hands re- quired for making a roart. Road made at last by our men from Bala- clava to Kadikoi ; and by Bos- quet's troops bo the Col. The rail- way. The English, otherwise circumstanced, had no such easy way out of trouble as that of con- stantly changing their thousands of invalided men for more and more thousands of troops newly landed in perfect health ; and they long had to struggle, as best they could, against the ills they endured from want of numerical strength. The problem of ' making a road ' between camp and port long continued to resist all solu- tion, and this, as we saw, because labour in the requisite quantity could neither be got by hiring it, nor wrung from an overtasked army, which — engaged day and night with the enemy, and already doing three times the work that could well be called moderate — was unable to furnish ' hands ' for the execution of any such task. There at length came a time when our people found means to lay down and to ' metal ' a bit of road one mile long from Balaclava to Kadi- koi ; and Bosquet's troops carried it on to the head of the Pass, by the Col : (2) but the newly split stones — sharply cutting, of course, for some time to the feet of our horses — had scarce been yet worn down to smoothness wlien already the stride of a railway liegan to cover the ground.(^) The idea of constructing this railway had been long ago seized and propelled by the Duke of