Never did any infantry scatter and retreat in greater confusion than the Russians at the Alma. The ground was covered for miles with their arms, coats, and knapsacks, and we found traces of their flight at the Katcha and the Belbek. At Inkermann they fled down the steep from our fire like a disorderly mob for twenty minutes, and it was only when they get within the cover of their guns, and found they were not pursued, that they formed and began to march like soldiers. Who that saw Balaklava can forget the miraculous flight of their mounted cavalry after their first two minutes' interview with the scanty squadrons of the EnniskiUens and Scots Greys? No, no, Doctor; you may be a Yankee Muscovite of the genuine free despot type, but you really cannot tell these little fibs about yom* dear comrades and expect Europe to believe them.
The Russians fight well behind rampart;?, and possess a good deal of stolid braveiy, but they never have stood, and never will stand, against an equal nmnber of French or English troops, and there is no general here who would not wish to get them out, three to two, and try them on the open. At Alma, we attacked them in a formidable inVOL, II. B B trenched position, and carried it. At Inkermann, they attacked us, without a gun, without a ditch to defend our flank, and beat down part of our camp with their guns before our men were well awake. They certainly ascended a very steep ravine side, but we were not there to defend the crest of it; and then see what account our 7500 men made of assaulting columns which certainly exceeded 20,000 men, without including the reserves!
In the trenches they never stood against our soldiers for an instant; they never won an inch of ground back from us, and their sorties were uniformly repulsed, although made in force, under the most favourable circumstances, against weak parties in weak trenches. As to their equipments, they may be good enough for a Russian soldier, but our men would be greatly disgusted if they had to put on such clothes; and as to their arms, they are certainly inferior to the arms of the allies. For their discipline, I can only speak from this fact — that they have never yet attempted to attack but in masses of columns, as at Inkermann, Eupatoria, and Kars; and have never succeeded in deploying them, nor have they ever ventured on any flank movement in the presence of an enemy; but I hear from their deserters that it is pretty severe, and that a liberal amount of baton and fustigation is administered to keep the men, especially the militia, in order.
Where was Dr. Davega when the battle of the Tchernaya took place, or did he hear of it at all in Sebastopol? He would have seen some very pretty running in boots, and very ill-disciplined movements from the Fedukhine heights, about nine o'clock, on the 16th of last August, I can assure him. His countrymen who are here, and who receive rations and quarters from the allies, can perhaps enlighten him a little on the subject of desertions, and a look at the Provost's book will enable them to form some idea as to the exact number who have come over to us and the Sardinians, not to speak of the French, since we sat down behind Sebastopol. It may be quite true that the Russians would show no quarter to the Mahommedan if they could catch any, but as yet they have had little chance of exhibiting either clemency or cruelty towards the infidel since the flight of the poor fellows from the wretched redoubts in Balaklava, which have brought disgrace upon one engineer officer, at all events.
The " jnill" has been as yet certainly in favouiof the Turk on that score. I can scarcely believe that the Russians entertain the feelings towards the English which the Doctor attributes to them, for our officers and men who have been in their hands state that they were treated and spoken of with the greatest respect. They must know that the English army occupied the whole of the phiteau from thf end of the Dockyard Creek, on which the extreme right of the French lay, to Inkermann, from the beginning of the siege till some time after the battle of Inkermann— that our artillerj% on the 17th of October, 1854, smashed the Malakhoff and swept the whole face of the enemy's batteries, so that scarce a gun was left to reply to us, and we could have stonned the place that night but for the misfortunes of the French, whose magazines were blown up, and whose batteries were silenced by the enemy, so that the City so called, the proper right of Sebastopol, was as strong and unassailable as ever.