THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. 185 the evil of any delay in seizing the advantage chap. which the fortune of war was offering. ' Being in this strait, and judging also, with what Lord Ragiai . 1 „ . , , , determining we now know to have been a true loresight, that to use bis the weak chain of Eussian infantry columns which stretched towards him endwise along the line of the redoubts would prove somewhat soft to the touch, he determined to use his cavalry. He did not so determine apparently because the cavalry arm was the one which he would most willingly have selected for his purpose if he had any freedom of choice, but because his infantry reinforcements were not yet far enough in advance, and the time was too precious to be lost. Be that as it may, he despatched to Lord Lucan a written instruction which in the subsequent con- troversies was generally called ' the third order.' It ran thus : ' Cavalry to advance and take advan- ■ The third ' tage of any opportunity to recover the heights. ' They will be supported by the infantry which ' have been ordered [to] advance on two fronts.'*
- It seems that in the original order the word 'to' was
omitted — that there was what looked like a full stop after the word 'ordered' — and that the word 'advance' was written with a capital A ; but the copy which Lord Lucan afterwards furnished to Lord Raglan was as given in the text, and I there- fore imagine that, notwithstanding the clerical errors above mentioned, the order at the time must have been read aright by Lord Lucan. The question seems to be unimportant, for the order is not made at all less cogent by reading it with its clerical errors uncorrected. I should not have adverted to the matter if it were not that Lord Lucan — I do not see why — laid stress upon it in his speech addressed to the House of Lords. The copy in my possession is in the handwriting of Lord Lucan himself, and was furnished by him to Lord Raglan. Therefore, order.
