A stroll about the environs of Sebastopol, and tlie sight of the enormous cannon-balls and fragments of monster shells that strew the ground in all directions, impress one with a respectful idea of the power of powder; but the respect is vastly increased by a view of the havoc it has played in such stupendous works as the docks — structures formed to last for ages, and to the duration of which no limit could be assigned. The ditBculty of destruction was enhanced in the case of the docks allotted to the English by the fact that these were in part hewn out of solid rock. The basin thus formed was lined with huge masses of stone, and between rock and stone earth was filled in.
The engineers availed themselves of the soft interval for their mines, and blew the walls and counterforts inwards, but the rock remains, marking in places the outline of the docks. The counterforts were of prodigious strength and thickness. Then there was a deep covered drain outside the docks, for the purpose of emptying them when desired, of which the engineers, of course, made use. Greatly incommoded at first by the water that flowed down the ravine in their rear, they overcame this difficulty at no small expense of labour. Their mode of operating against the docks ■varied according to circumstances, but seems to have consisted in a great measure of regular mines, with shaft and gallery. Two of these shafts, down which I looked yesterday, are about thirty feet deep.
They are situated one on each side of the western dock, and in one of them, which is at about fifty feet from its entrance (between it and the centre dock), an unfortunate accident occurred on Saturday last. The engineers had blown up the eastern pier, or extremity of that side of the dock, to which a gate is attached — one of the jaws of the dock, as I may say, which are closed by the gates; and this explosion seems to have been as complete in its effect as any that have taken place. The huge mass was lifted up and dislocated, and the enormous transverse beams, masses of black timber of incalculable strength. were torn from their fastenings, snapped in twain, and remained with their splintered ends resting against each other, in the shape of a house-roof.
Below the pointed arch thus formed is a black chasm, and heaped around are piles of displaced stone and dusty ruins. Everything is removed and riven without being scattered; and this is the object at which our engineers have constantly aimed. They have sought all along, and generally with much success, so to proportion the charges of their mines that, while everything should be ovei'turned, rooted out, and VOL. II. D D ttrown into the ntmost coufusion (literally topsyturvy), as little as possible should be thrown out of the crater. And accordingly most of their explosions have not had the appearance which wovild popularly be anticipated from the letting olf of two, three, or more tliousand pounds of powder. There Vv^as no diverging gush of stones, but a sort of rumbling convulsion of the ground; a few blocks and fragments were cast up to a moderate height, but the effect upon the spectator was that of some gigantic subteiTanean hand just pushing the masses a short distance out of theii' places, tiu'ning them upside down, and rolling them over each other in a cloud of smoke and dust.
There were probably two reasons for the care with which the engineers measured their charges. One may be that by leaving the docks encumbered and filled up with their own ruins they bequeath a harder task to any future rebuilder than if they scattered the stone linings far and wide, and left the chasms comparatively clear. The second reason may be that by more violent explosions they would probably have shaken down buildings, overthrown the dockyard wall (which already totters and loses stones from its summit when a mine is let off), and perhaps have caused accidents. As it is, these operations have been the occasion of extremely little loss of life or injury to limb. The Russians have fired a great deal at times, but their shots have not told, and, although their fii-e has been occasionally accurate enough, shell after shell falling into the docks, at others they have made very bad practice, shells intended for the inner docks falling near the shears, or in other directions wide of the mark.