enerals on duty, etc.
They did not use the sapper armor. The use of the sap-roller was
often attempted, but it could be employed only during the latter part of
the attack upon the Malakoff, when the fire of the Russian artillery was
nearly extinguished by the mortars; before that, as soon as a sap-roller
was placed in position--some thirty guns would be brought to bear
upon it, the result being its immediate destruction. It may justly be
said of the French approaches, that they admirably carried into practice
their system of sapping. The technical skill and patient courage
evinced by their officers and men in pushing forward such excellent
approaches, under a most deadly fire, is worthy of all commendation, and
is such as might have been expected from the antecedents of their
corps of engineers."

"With regard to the English, the case was different; it seemed as
if they systematically abandoned the excellent system taught and
perfected with so much care at Chatham. Whenever the ground was
difficult, their trenches generally ceased to afford shelter; a
shallow excavation in the rock, and a few stones thrown up in front,
appeared to be all that was considered necessary in such cases. They
were often faulty in direction as well as in profile, being not
unfrequently badly defiladed, or not gaining ground enough and
entirely too cramped; nor were they pushed as close to the Redan as
they ought to have been before giving the assault. In too many
cases the expression '_tatonnement_ of the French would seem
to convey the best idea of their operations. Their batteries, however,
were very well constructed. The magazines, platforms, etc., were
usually similar to those adopted at Chatham, although
unnecessary deviations were sometimes complained of. They
employed neither armor nor the full sap, sometimes the half-full, but
generally the flying-sap were employed."

It may also be added, that, at the time of the assault, the French
approaches had been pushed to the distance of thirty-two paces of the
counterscarp of the Malakoff, while the English had scarcely reached
within two hundred and twenty-five yards of the ditch of the Redan.

This description of the operations of the English at the siege of
Sebastopol carries the professional reader directly back to their sieges
in the Spanish Peninsula. It certainly is very strange that a great
natio