This description of the picture under our consideration refers, of course, only to the French left attack, as distinguished from their works on the extreme right at Inkermann. Running the eye along the horizon, commencing on the left will be seen the Flagstaff Battery, or, as our Allies term it, the " Bastion du Mat "; next to this the Garden-wall Battery; then a portion of the town of Sebastopol, and the Dockyard Creek, at the entrance to which, on a tongue of land, stands Fort Saint Paul. Proceeding again to the right, on the high ground are the spacious and beautiful barracks, the battery in front of which is called the " Barrack Battery "; further on, the Redan, and, terminating the line, the Round Tower, or, as it is now generally designated, the "Malakoif" and its batteries. Several of the ships of the Russian Fleet, every one of which has since been burnt, sunk, or destroyed, are to be distinguished in the creek or in the main harbour beyond. Below the barracks is the suburb of the town, in which General Eyre so gallantly and successfully established himself during the unfortunate attack of the 18th June. The valley on the right of the picture, and which divided the English and French attacks, is still studded with a few trees, whose tops and branches, like every other feature of the landscape, are covered deep with snow. A working party is busily employed in labours which soon render those engaged in them insensible to cold, while the guard of the trenches, with their muskets piled against the parapet, are condemned to a state of inaction which demands, evidently not in vain, a recourse to artificial means of promoting that genial circulation of the blood without which the hardships of so severe a service are liable to be terminated by a "relief" sometimes deemed even more welcome than the arrival of comrades in the regular course of duty.
One characteristic group, a little to the right of the others, must not be
HEAD OF THE HAKBOUB, SEBASTOPOL. 145
passed over unnoticed. Three French riflemen, under the shelter of a projection of the rock, are eagerly on the watch for the chance of a shot at the enemy; and woe to the unwary Eussian who, looking over a parapet, or peeping through an embrasure, shall bring himself within range of those ready rifles, for they are wielded by hands which never tremble, and directed by eyes which never err; and the bullet which speeds from their deadly grooves is urged on its flight by the breath of the destroying angel.
PLATE XX.
HEAD OF THE HAEBOUR, SEBASTOPOL.
This is a scene of tranquil beauty and repose, heightened rather than diminished by the evidences everywhere pi'esented to the eye that here, as all around, War claims the landscape as his own. The lazy stream of the Tchernaya creeping into the blue, placid waters of the bay; the rounded outlines of the hills, stretching away in gentle undulations to the horizon; the passing shower over Inkermann East Lighthouse, and which, with a few fleecy clouds, breaks up and relieves the monotony of the azure vault; — all these are contrasted, and yet blended, with the harder forms of batteries and earthworks, and with the picturesque yet significant puffs of whitest smoke which issue here and there from their guns. The most important of these works, at the time of the execution of the drawing, was the New Mortar Battery, on the extreme right, which it was supposed would destroy not only the Lighthouse Batteries, but the shipping in the harbour. The latter portion of the task has been fully accomplished, though by other means; and perhaps the principal interest of the picture now attaches to the rapproclicmi'nt of the English works of attack and the Eussian batteries on the north side of the harbour, which have afforded a temporary and precarious shelter to the vanquished defenders of the town. Three of these are here shown — namely, two on the left, close to Inkermann West Lighthouse, and a third on the hill in the centre; but the chain of defences is prolonged westward till they terminate at Fort Constantine.