were plentiful, whether Russians or British held the village. I carried a small black one, which one of our people picked up on the bank of the river, on my holsters for some time, feeding him with biscuit; but during my absence from the saddle he made off. Many ownerless dogs made friends with the army here, and, no doubt, will long be found in the ranks, all answering, of course, to the name of Katcha. At this place the Scots Grays and the 57th Regiment joined the army.

Between this river and the Balbek the allied armies marched so close to each other, on the 24th, that the red coats almost intermingled with the blue; and the officers of the two nations. rode together, Prince Napoleon conversing with the Duke of Cambridge. The Guards and Highlanders were on the right, and were much admired by the French officers, who called them แ superb" and "magnificent." They also praised highly our artillery, the horses and equipment of which were certainly not to be surpassed.

A yawning rift, half a mile wide, separates the heights on the opposite sides of the Balbek. Beyond the stream, the aspect of the country changes from grassy plains to hills, divided by deep ravines, and covered with low oak-coppice. A steep road, which the English and French artillery descended together, led us to the river. Down the hill we found two wagons, painted green, abandoned by the Russians; they contained a great number of copper pans and dishes, and about twenty thousand rounds of rifle ammunition, the balls pointed, and fitting a two-grooved rifle. The Russian method of folding a cartridge is particularly neat and convenient; the end can be twisted off and the powder exposed in a moment.

Passing up the valley to the river, we came to a small villa, which had been plundered by the retreating Russians. I rode up the road leading to the courtyard, and, tying my horse to

the garden railing, entered the house. On the steps of the porch were some broken arm-chairs, covered with yellow damask. In a room on the right were broken sofas, chairs, and card-tables heaped together, and a piano, still tuneable, with the front board torn off, exposing the keys. Up stairs was a small library, where a good many French books lay scattered on the floor. Portraits of a lady and gentleman, of a very low signboard-kind-of-order of art, had been torn from their frames ; and two fine mirrors, quite uninjured, in gilt frames, leant against the wall amid a heap of other furniture. In front of the house was a garden, laid out in flower-beds, with fruit-trees in the midst of them. I climbed into a tree bearing still some large, yellow plums, and found them delicious, though rather over-ripe. On the right of the garden was a vineyard, with plenty of grapes. On the left a fence, lined with dahlias in full bloom, gay in color, though not of high floricultural rank, separated the garden from a kind of orchard of apples, pears, and peach-trees. Under the latter the fruit lay thick on the ground, and before riding off I filled my haversack to furnish a dessert.

Passing the river, we ascended a narrow, strong, winding road, leading up a steep ravine; and, emerging into plainer ground at the top, pitched our tents amid the coppice, in the pleasantest camping-ground we had yet found in the Crimea. While dinner was getting ready, the allurements of which were heightened by the presence of a fine cabbage and a pumpkin from the garden of the villa, I took off my haversack to display the dessert it contained. But the transformation of the money, in the Eastern tale, into dry leaves, was not more disappointing to the owner than the spectacle now revealed. The ripeness of the fruit had unfitted it to bear the jolting of my horse. Plums and peaches were squeezed into a shapeless compound, and

mixed with crumbs of ration-biscuit; while in the center of the mass lay imbedded a piece of dried tongue, escaped from its envelop; and the expressed juice of the fruit, partly running down the leg of my trowsers, partly absorbed by my forage-cap, which was in my haversack, had turned the color of those articles of dress from their original blue to a dirty, olive green. However, the pumpkin, mashed in the Yankee fashion, and the boiled cabbage, turned out so good, that no vain regrets were expended on my unfortunate contribution to the feast.

We were now so close to the great object of the expedition, that, by going up the road about a mile and a half, the towers and fortifications of Sebastopol were seen, at no great distance, in the basin below. This was the north front of the place, to strengthen which all the efforts of the Russian engineers had been directed since the expedition had been first talked off. The whole of the ground there was supposed to be rendered deadly by batteries and mines, and the next move in the game was anxiously awaited. We had halted two nights on this ground, during which the cavalry and horse-artillery, who were on outpost duty, led a hard life. The horses had neither forage nor water for forty-eight hours, all which time they remained accoutered and harnessed; and the men and officers did not, for these and two other days, taste meat.

CHAPTER VII

THE FLANK MARCH.

MARCH RESUMED-LORD RAGLAN-NARROW ESCAPE-MACKENZIE'S FARM -PURSUIT OF THE ENEMY-SPOILS TAKEN-RUSSIAN PRISONERSMARCH TO TCHERNAYA-ENCAMPMENT-ALL 'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.

TOWARD noon, on the 26th, the artillery of the first division received orders to march immediately, without waiting for the infantry, up the road near which we were encamped. Proceeding about a mile, we came to a white house on the roadside, in front of which Lord Raglan and General Airey were seated, looking at a map. His lordship motioned us to take a by-road into the woods on our left, and called out to us to go southeast. Accordingly, we went on, steering by the sun, and following the main path, which was overhung with bushes. After proceeding in this way for an hour, our progress was stopped by a troop of our horse artillery, halted in the road in front. Finding themselves unsupported by cavalry, they had naturally become alarmed for the safety of their right flank and front, in a spot where artillery would be taken at a great disadvantage if attacked by skirmishers, who might pick off the men and horses, and capture the guns, without risk.

Presently Lord Raglan came riding up, followed by his staff, and demanded sharply why we had halted; and, going to the troop in front, ordered them immediately to proceed, himself leading the way. Accordingly, we advanced through the wood

for about three miles further, when Lord Raglan and his staff came back in haste, inquiring for the cavalry. In an open space in front of us, they had come suddenly on a Russian force, marching at right angles to our own.

Had the enemy, whose numbers were variously estimated at from ten to fifteen thousand men, known our order of march, they might, by throwing a sufficient force of infantry into the wood, have captured, or, at any rate, disabled, about twenty of our guns. The cavalry, some squadrons of which presently trotted past us to the front, could not have acted efficiently against musketry in a thick wood; the artillery themselves. could not have acted at all; and our own infantry, with the exception of a small body of the rifles, which presently followed the hussars to the front, was still some miles in rear. Luckily, the enemy, far from adopting any such bold measure, at once took to flight, the meeting being no more expected, and much less desired, by him than by us; and our horse-artillery, debouching into the open space, opened at once on the rear of the fugitives, who, in their haste, left some carriages with baggage and ammunition on the plain.

On this small plain, which is surrounded by trees, stands a large white house, known as Mackenzie's Farm. From Sebastopol a road crosses it at right angles to the one we had come by, ascending very steeply from the plains below, on the side of the city, and descending again on the left after passing the farm. Down the road to the left the troop of horse-artillery (Maude's) pressed in pursuit, and came up with some infantry, who, turning on the skirts of the wood, fired a volley, which did no damage, and ran into the bushes, when the artillery, unlimbering, opened with case shot, and killed several. Some of the Scots Grays, dismounting, went skirmishing through the wood, and about a dozen Russians, throwing themselves down and pretend