Copper boiler, for steaming plank........ 336
Pair of 220-horse power marine engines, unfit for use, original value.. 12,000
Eight copper boilers for ditto, repairable, 50 tons..... 5,600
Patent ship cradle dredging machine, &c....... 3,100
Copper, pumps, forges, hydraulic pump 32,146
Cranes, Lc 13,280
Total £45,426
This, taken with the French return, gives the total in the list; but there were an immense number of small articles which would swell this inventory to a formidable extent. The Karabelnaia, or English side, it will be observed, contained the largest and most valuable portion of the articles captured. The fourteen bells were divided thus — one of 2500*00 kilos. French Pare de Siege, one 21 cwt. ditto, onel6cwt. ditto, one 533*00 kilos, at Right Siege Train, another of 146*00 kilos, at ditto, one 8800 kilos, at French Pare de Siege, one 76*00 kilos, at Right Siege Train, one of 1 cwt. at Pare de Siege, one of 3 qrs. 221b. at ditto, ditto; one of 3qrs. 171b. at Pare du Moulin; one of 36*00 kilos, at Right Siege Train; one of 26*45Ib. at French Pare de Siege; one of 9 00 kilos, at General Mazare's office.
The nixed Commission combined the functions of the three
ANQEr DOCTOES. 385
infernal judges with great skill, and was by turns Minos, iEacus, and Rhadainanthus — for, although it condemned no one to death, it consigned many worthless bodies of materiel to destruction. Its deliberations were perturbed, if not suspended, by the attentions of the enemy's cannoneers, for the street in which the house of the commissioners was situate was selected with a view to remind them of the value of guns, balls, and gunpowder, as it was completely enfiladed by the fire of one of the batteries. Sometimes a shot bumped against the walls of the mansion, and shook the bodies corporate, though it did not disturb the nerves of the members. Sometimes a shell blurted into the rooms, and routed outlying artists as they sketched the ruins of Sebastopol. But the commissioners pursued and terminated their labours.
It is generally known that Englishmen like to grumble. Is it true that England gives them reason for indulging in their notorious tendencies? Now, for instance, the doctors (in common with nearly every class of officers) were highly indignant at the alleged neglect and indifference of the authorities to their claims. Is it to be understood that English military surgeons are not entitled to any honorary reward? Lord Panmure did not say so, but he let Lord Raglan's shade stand betwixt him and the angry doctors. The case stood thus: — After the publication of the lists of brevets, promotions, and decorations of the Bath, &c, Dr. Hall, urged thereunto by sundry weighty considerations, addressed an energetic and reasonable letter to Dr. Andrew Smith, animadverting upon, or at least pointing distinctly to, the exclusion of the surgeons of the army from the rewards bestowed with no niggard hand upon their comrades of the Staff and of the regiments. Dr. Smith sent that letter to Lord Panmure, and his Lordship, who has not studied polemical divinity for nothing, and is, moreover, a capital hand at finding out a good official excuse, replied to it, and met the case by a plea of confession and avoidance. Nothing would his Lordship be more ready, nothing was he more anxious to do, than to recommend deserving medical officers for promotion, but the fact was, that he wa3 in utter ignorance of the deserts of the gentlemen in question; for, on looking to Lord Raglan's despatches, he found that the Field-Marshal had never said a good word for any of that genus or species of man-militant. They could not even boast of the official damnation of a faint applause from head-quarters, nor was there much solid pudding to compensate for the want of empty praise from which they suffered. Although these officers did not wish to be placed under a system of supervision like that of the French in tendance, they felt that such a course would at least relieve them from much responsibility and consequent blame, and that it would secure to them special mention and official recognition of meritorious services or of extraordinary exertion.
In one case, at least, I know for a fact that a General of Division, with many of the oaths which he lavished in enforcing professions of earnestness and sincerity, declared to the principal
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386 THE BEITISH EXPEDITION TO TIIE CRIMEA.