36 THE FLANK MARCH. CHAT, from keeping the command. This dormant com- ^ mission was to be kept hidden, it seems, from the Marshal.* jSIonsieur St Arnaud seems to have liad an instinctive suspicion that something of the kind had been planned, but ho was not made acquainted with the truth until the 13th of Sep- tember, the day next before the landing. The Marshal had sent for General jNIorris, the ofticcr next in seniority, and General Canrobert then thought it was time to disclose the existence of the commLssiou. St Arnaud had already re- quested the Government to appoint his .successor as soon as Sebastopol should fall ; but it would seem that his discovery of the dormant commis- sion tended rather to increase than to lessen the singular tenacity with which — struggling always against mortal sickness — he still clung to the Marsiiai _ commaud. However, on the 26th — the night the St AriKlUrt'S -r-, , 1 1 rn 1 11 weak Slate. Freucli lay on the Ichernaya — he became so weak that the attending physician thought fit to make his patient's state know^n to Colonel Trochu, the officer understood to be entrusted by the P2mperor with the function of advising at the
- It will l)c oLservt'd that in .spciikiiig of this dormant com-
mission, anil of the iHnesse.s, resignation, and death of Marshal St Arnand, I avoid the language of positive statement ; and I may say that for the means of making the statements I do on this particular subject I am mainly indebted to the work of M. Bazancourt. Through General Yusuf and M. Henry, who were constantly at the side of the Marshal in his last days, M. Bazan- court had peculiarly good means of knowing what passed, and his account bears internal evidence of being accurate. What I say, however, of Lord Ilaglan's last visit to the Marshal, is drawn from Lord Itaglau's private correspondence.
