There are few amongst the British public who have not visited Chobham or Aldershot, and who are not, therefore, familiar with the picturesque appearance presented by a " canvas town " on a fine day, and beneath a summer sky. A smaller number, perhaps, are acquainted with the peculiarly unreal and phantasmagoric aspect of tents at night before the lights are extinguished; but only those who have witnessed it can form an idea of the dreary and desolatelooking objects they become with a leaden sky above them, and the snow
THE RUINS OF INKERMANN, AND CITY OF CAVERNS. 151
lying thickly around. In recalling the misery of which this gloomy exterior was but the type, we may well congratulate ourselves on the fair prospect of winter quarters this year for our gallant Army in the Crimea.
PLATE XXVI.
THE RUINS OF INKEEMANN, AND CITY OF CAVERNS.
Inkermann, or, as its name imports, the City of Caverns, has long furnished material for antiquarian discussions, the merits of which are not even in the present day decided.
" At the distance of a quarter of a mile across the valley," says Mr. Russell, " the sides of the mountains, opposite to the ridge of the plateau on which our camp stands, rise abruptly in sheer walls of rock, slab after slab, to the height of 1,200 or 1,500 feet. A road winds among those massive precipices up to the ruins of Inkermann — a city of the dead, and gone, and unknown — where houses, and pillared mansions, and temples have been hewn out of the face of the solid rock by a generation whose very name the most daring antiquaries have not guessed at."
The general opinion, however, among modern travellers appears to be, that these singular excavations were the work of monks or persecuted Christians, Arians probably, under the Byzantine Empire. The caves consist of chambers with Gothic windows cut out of the solid stone, of churches, chapels, monasteries, and sepulchres, all executed with the most elaborate care and skill. In these strange and inaccessible retreats it is conjectured that the schismatic inhabitants of the Chersonese sought and obtained refuge from the persecutions of the dominant and intolerant Greek Church. The largest chapel, the front of which is seen in the drawing immediately under the ruins, presents all the features of Byzantine architecture, and is about twenty-four feet long by twelve broad. Sarcophagi, usually quite empty, have been found in many of the cells; these latter are often connected with each other, and are approached by stairs cut in the living rock. Such are the caves of Inkermann; the origin of the ruined fortress, which crowns the cliff out of which they are hewn, is buried in obscurer doubt and in a remoter antiquity. By some it is believed to have been raised by the Greeks, others assert that it was a Genoese stronghold; while Dr. Grant assumes with confidence that it was the work of Diophantes, the General of Mithridates, and called by him Ctenos, or Eupatoria. However this may be, the absence of any reliable tradition as to its date seems to favour the hypothesis which throws that date the farthest back. On the opposite side of the valley is a portion of the aqueduct, which fills the docks of Sebastopol with the waters of the Tchernaya. This aqueduct or canal is twelve miles long, and pierces the cliff at the point where it is lost to sight by a magnificently constructed tunnel, three hundred yards in length. At the back of the arches is a deep ravine or quarry, from whence the
THE EAST.
materials for building the City of Sebastopol were drawn, with the advantage of water-carriage for them the whole way. Skirting the quarry, the Inkermann road traverses the foreground; here our outlying pickets are posted, the smoke from their fires curling round the cliff on the right. Above them is the advanced French picket of Zouaves. On the high cliff above the picket is a four-gun battery, from which the Russians fire into the camp of the Second Division, and annoy our outlying pickets. The foregrounds of this view, of that representing the head of the harbour, and of the view of Sebastopol from the East, are in each case at the rear of the Eussian position at the battle of Inkermann.
PLATE XXVII.
HIGHLAND BRIGADE CAMP,
Looking South.