Page:The invasion of the Crimea vol. 2.djvu/223

PKKCEDING THE LNVASION. 193 The iuterview lasted till an hour after mid- chap. XII night, and Colonel Trochu's request was followed ' up on the ensuing day by written communicatious from the French jMarshal. But the importance of these discussions was superseded by a further and more perilous change in the French counsels. At seven o'clock in the morning of Sunday the stAmaud-s 4th of June, Marshal St Arnaud called upon Lord termination Iiaglan, and announced that he had determined defensive npon an entirely new ])lan of operations for his rear of the T IP ■ I ■ n -^r Balkan. array. Instead oi moving his force to Varna, as had been agreed, he had resolved, he said, to send there only one division, and to place all the rest of his army in position — not in advance, but in rear of the Balkan range. He was to have his right resting on the sea at Bourgas ; his head- quarters were to be at Aidos ; and he hoped, he said, to be able to establish himself there by the third week of June. He invited Lord Baglan to conform to this plan, and to take up a position at Bournabat, a part of the proposed position which was the most remote from the sea. Thus, at a time when the eyes of all Europe were upon Silistria and the campaign on the Danube, it was proposed that the armies of the Western Powers should take up a mere defensive — a timidly defensive — position, placing all Bul- garia, a part of Boumelia, and the whole range of the Balkan, between them and the scene of con- flict ! What made the matter still more grave was this, that Marshal St Arnaud did not come to consult. He had already adopted this almost VOL. II. N