Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/315

AND PREPARING. 285 but when moriiin" dawned it disclosed the mark CIIAP. . XJI. of a seam, stretching on with many a hend, along ' the crest of Mount Eodolph. This M'as the work which the French had thrown up in the night. Then quickly Scbastopol learnt that the Allies had made their election, and were really uuder- takinsT a sietre. It was with unspeakable ioy that thejoythia 1 1 • 1 , ■ -1111 occasioned the garrison and the inhabitants received the glad inSebas- tidings; for the step the Allies had taken was to Sebastopol a respite from assault — a respite of at least several days ; and in the mean time, though great things had already been done in the way of preparing defences, much more might yet be achieved. 'If only,' so Todleben writes ' — if only men chance to know what siege war- ' fare is, they can imagine the joyful impression ' which we must have experienced at the sight of ' those works. . . . Every one in Sebastopol ' rejoiced at this happy event. People congrat- ' ulated each other upon it ; for each man saw in • it a guarantee of success, and the hope that the ' town would be saved.' On the two following mornings the sight of the works thrown up in the night by the English con- firmed the glad inference which had been drawn from the discovery of the gabionade on Mount liodolph, and proved that the whole Allied army M'as content to resort to siege labours. If the joy of the many was that of men all at once freed from the stress of a desperate conjunc- ture, the chiefs who perceived the full import of the change had a rarer and finer delight. They