This may not mean that an assault is immediately to be made, as some short time is necessary to make arrangements and procure the stores required. An idea of the quantity of these may be formed from the fact that, on receiving this order, the chief medical officer of one ])ivision, consisting of rather more than GOOO eftective men, at once sent in a requisition for about six tons' weight of various articles. Such a mass of drugs, lint, plaster, bedding, wine, and other hospital necessaries and r.UMOURS OF AN comforts, is painfully suggestive of what may probably occur, and of how manj-- stout and brave fellows are expected to go down in the next serious operation against our tenacious foe. But at the point to which things have now come, success is not to be hoped for without heavy loss, and if the former be complete the latter may. be endured, if not cheerfully, at least without repining.
It is said that after a bombardment, very large forces will be sent in to attack. Some talk of a combination of French and English troops against the Malakhoff, and even designate our First Division (Guards and Highlanders) as the British force that is to co-operate with our allies. If the attack really is to be made, Heaven grant that this time no blunders may be committed, and that the blood of this gallant army may not again be fruitlessly poured out by mistakes and mismanagement. If we fail this time we may make up our minds, as many have already done, to remain where we are for the winter. It is the opinion of some here that Sebastopol will never be ours until we regularly invest the whole place.
There are various opinions, in both the French camp and the English, as to the impregnability of the Malakhoff. Some believe that if we succeed in storming the outer works, we shall find within them a second line of invincible strength. Others think the strength of the inner works exaggerated. Of course, in all this there is much more of conjecture than of well-founded opinion. The Generals in Chief keep theii* information and intentions to themselves. If we get the Malakhoff, little doubt is entertained that the south side will speedily be ours; whether we shall be able to remain in it under the fire from the forts on the north is another question. The Eussians driven out, however, and the fleet destroyed, we shall be at liberty to busj^ ourselves with the northern forts, or to move inland, as may be decided upon.
As for the town, which we have treated with so much iorbeai'ance, it is not to be supposed that it will be left to us in its present neat and serviceable condition. If Russia be faithful to her military traditions, we shall obtain but a heap of ruins and ashes. No snug quarters will there be in Sebastopol for the allied armies, which have been so long alternately crippled with cold, plunged to the knees in mud, or seethed in sickly Crimean vapours. A time there was, now some ten months ago, when Sebastopol might have been ours on easier terms and in better condition — a time when Russian prisoners expressed their surprise at not being sent into depot there, since they made sure the place had fallen Into ouv hands after tlie battle of the Alma.
It is bootless to recur to past blunders and omissions, or we nii<^-lit also talli of the time when the Malakholl" was but a round tower, instead of the strong fortification now the chief obstacle to the capture of the place to which it is the lie3\ However, if grievous eiTors have been connuittcd, let i;s hope that they will in future be avoided, and that tlic next attack will be very differently conducted, and have a widely dilierent result, from the last. After nearly two months' monotonous inaction, during which many thousand men of the allied army have been put hors de combat by trench duty and disease, I can hardly think that there is a man in the camp — even of the croakers, who, I regret to say, are pretty numerous — who will not joyfully hail the resumption of more active hostilities.
I must observe that there are persons, whose opinion is not without weight, who do not believe that we shall attack soon, and a similar doubt appears to exist among those French officers whose opinions I have heard expressed. These seem to think that a tremendous bombardment is contemplated, such as shall literally pulverize the defences opposed to us, and completely crush the enemy; and they add that some time must elapse before the necessary preparations are completed. Leave of absence continues to be granted to a very large extent. Taking five of the latest general orders, those of the 3rd, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th instant, we find the nauu's of no less than seventy officers who have received permission to absent themselves.