Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century

by James Richard Joy

V

Then on another wild morning, another wild earthquake out-tore,
Clean from our lines of defense ten or twelve good paces or more.
Rifleman high on the roof, hidden there from the light of the
sun—
One has leapt upon the breach crying out, "Follow me, follow me!"
Mark him-he falls! then another, and down goes he.
Had they been bold enough then, who can tell but the traitors had
won?
Boardings and rafters and doors! an embrasure! make way for the
gun!
Now double-charge it with grape! it is charged and we fire and
they run.
Praise to our Indian brothers, and let the dark face have his
due!
Thanks to the kindly dark faces who fought with us, faithful and
few,
Fought with the bravest among us, and drove them, and smote them
and slew,
That ever upon our topmost roof our banner in India blew.

VI

Men will forget what we suffer, and not what we do; we can fight!
But to be soldier all day, and be sentinel all thro' the night—
Ever the mine and assault, our sallies, their lying alarms,
Bugles and drums in the darkness, and shoutings and soundings to
arms;
Ever the labor of fifty that had to be done by five;
Ever the marvel among us that one should be left alive;
Ever the day with its traitorous death from the loopholes around;
Ever the night with its coffinless corpse to be laid in the
ground;
Heat like the mouth of a hell, or a deluge of cataract skies,
Stench of old offal decaying, and infinite torment of flies,
Thoughts of the breezes of May blowing over an English field,
Cholera, scurvy, and fever, the wound that would not be healed;
Lopping away of the limb by the pitiful, pitiless knife—
Torture and trouble in vain-for it never could save us a life.
Valor of delicate women who tended the hospital bed;
Horror of women in travail among the dying and dead;
Grief for our perishing children, and never a moment for grief,
Toil and ineffable weariness, faltering hopes of relief;
Havelock baffled, or beaten, or butchered for all that we knew—
Then day and night, day and night coming down on the still
shatter'd walls
Millions of musket-bullets and thousands of cannon-balls;
But ever upon the topmost roof our banner of England blew.

VII

Hark, cannonade, fusillade! Is it true what was told by the
scout,
Outram and Havelock breaking their way thro' the fell mutineers?
Surely the pibroch of Europe is ringing again in our ears!
All on a sudden the garrison utter a jubilant shout,
Havelock's glorious Highlanders answer with conquering cheers,
Sick from the hospital echo them, women and children come out,
Blessing the wholesome white faces of Havelock's good fusileers,
Kissing the war-hardened hand of the Highlander, wet with their
tears!
Dance to the pibroch! Saved! We are saved! Is it you? Is it you?
Saved by the valor of Havelock; saved by the blessing of heaven!
"Hold it for fifteen days!" We have held it for eighty-seven!
And ever aloft on the palace roof the old banner of England blew.

THE LIGHT BRIGADE AT BALAKLAVA

[In a letter to the London Times Mr. W. H. Russell, the war correspondent, described the charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava, one of the most notable incidents of the Crimean War.]

Supposing the spectator, then, to take his stand on one of the heights forming the rear of our camp before Sebastopol, he would have seen the town of Balaklava, with its scanty shipping, its narrow strip of water, and its old forts, on his right hand; immediately below he would have beheld the valley and plain of coarse meadowland, occupied by our cavalry tents, and stretching from the base of the ridge on which he stood to the foot of the formidable heights at the other side; he would have seen the French trenches lined with zouaves a few feet beneath, and distant from him, on the slope of the hill; a Turkish redoubt lower down, then another in the valley, then, in a line with it, some angular earthworks; then, in succession, the other two redoubts up to Canrobert's Hill.

At the distance of two and a half miles across the valley is an abrupt rocky mountain range of most irregular and picturesque formation, covered with scanty brushwood here and there, or rising into barren pinnacles and plateaux of rock. In outline and appearance this portion of the landscape was wonderfully like the Trosachs. A patch of blue sea was caught in between the overhanging cliffs of Balaklava as they closed in the entrance to the harbor on the right. The camp of the marines, pitched on the hillsides more than ten hundred feet above the level of the sea, was opposite to the spectator as his back was turned to Sebastopol and his right side towards Balaklava…..