" Lord Raglan at once despatched Lieutenant Curzon, Aide-de-Camp, to convey his congratulations to Brigadier-General Scarlett, and to say ' Well done! ' The gallant old officer's face beamed with pleasure when he received the message. 'I beg to thank his Lordship very sincerely,' was his reply. The Cavalry did not long pursue their enemy. Their loss was very slight, about thirty-five killed and wounded in both affairs. There were not more than four or five men killed outright, and our most material loss was from the cannon playing on our Heavy Dragoons afterwards, when covering the retreat of our Light Cavalry."
PLATE VII.
SECOND CHARGE OF THE GUARDS AT THE BATTLE OF INKERMANN.
The Battle of Inkermann has already been described at length in another part of this work. Mr. Simpson has chosen for delineation in this view the moment when the Guards, reinforced after their first check, are making their second successful charge into the well-known Sandbag Battery, from which they had been driven at an earlier period of the day by overwhelming numbers.
The rear and flanks of the battery as well as the sides of the steep ridge above the Tchernaya are crowded with the innumerable hosts of the Russian infantry, whose closely-packed columns in vain struggle to keep at bay the thin but undaunted line of their resolute assailants. Already the contest is becoming hand-to-hand, and the foreground is filled with a melee of Russians
I'd'I THE SEAT OF WAlt and Grenadiers, clubbing their muskets, and interchanging bayonet thrusts, as they near each other in the deadly strife. The sides, the front, and the interior of the battery are thickly strewn with the dead and the dying of either side, and grey great-coats, flat caps, and bearskins, muskets and accoutrements, lie all around in inextricable confusion. Clouds of smoke in the centre of the picture indicate the fierce and continuous musketry fire which is rolling along the hostile Imes, till it dies away in the far distance at the base of the hill, where the Eussians have posted their artillery, dragged up to its top during the favouring obscurity of the preceding night. A shell from one of these guns is bursting in the very midst of our Grenadiers, close to the spot where four soldiers are earring off to the rear on a stretcher an officer, evidently severely wounded. On the right the picturesque ruins of Inkermann, and the placid waters of the Tchernaya, bordered with a fringe of overshadowing trees, present a scene of i:)eaceful repose, which contrasts strangely and mournfully with the fearful spectacle of havoc and desolation, and with the fierce raging of the storm of human passion, on the field of battle.
Such a scene, so vividly portrayed, cannot fail to awaken in every heart, not dead to the kindly influences of Christian charity and love to his fellowmen, the most earnest longing for the consummation purchased at so dear a price,^ — purchased with the life-blood freely poured from thousands of noble hearts, and with the agonised tears of those to whom the loved and lost were dearer than life itself, — a longing for peace, honourable, just, and enduring, — not an insult to the dead, but a pledge of happiness and security to the living, and to the unborn generations who shall bless and cherish the memory of the heroes who perished to obtain it.
' ' Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals
The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies, But, beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of Love arise."
* PLATE VIII.
LOED EAGLAN'S HEAD-QUAETEES AT KHUTOE KAEAGATCH.
A group of unpretending farm buildings, with a few stunted trees in front of them, and a sentry pacing up and down his monotonous beat, mark the head-quarters of the British Army in the Crimea. The winter's sun throws the faint shadows of the trees on the white walls of the building, and enlivens the general aspect of the scene.