492

MARSHAL PELISSIER, DUKE OF MALAKHOFF.

ANY sketch of the French army would be incomplete without a description of the true type of a French soldier. Him we find essentially in Marshal Pelissier, probably the only general of that army who is a soldier and nothing else. His life is a romance if you will, but we can trace one great ruling principle throughout it: in everything he has done he has only obeyed the voice of duty. Pelissier may have had his personal sympathies-there may be some pardonable preference concealed behind all the stars upon his breast; the hardened warrior has more than once proved that he possesses a heart, and is able to show it without thinking of the order of the day, or even recognising a master above him. But Pelissier has never employed in his soldier's life aught but soldierly qualities; his promotion owes nothing to the ready smile and supple back; he never entered the Tuileries, save by order, the Elysée not once. He did not invoke the Presidency and the Empire; on the contrary, the Empire needed him. He was the same upright man when captain in Africa as he was when ambassador in England.

The imperialistic press, as it had no occasion to glorify Pelissier, for he became great without their aid, has exaggerated his qualities. We, while allowing his value, propose to take his correct measure, and, in the name of justice, defend him against his panegyrists. Though he is not a Kléber, a Moreau, a Ney, a Masséna, or a Soult, not even a Bugeaud, he and Bosquet were the only men fitted by their capacity to take the supreme command of a French army. Had the choice been greater, Pelissier would probably have remained in Algeria as a general of division, not risen above the command of a Crimean corps.

JEAN JACQUES AIMABLE PELISSIER came into the world on the 6th of November, 1794, at Maromme, in the department of the Lower Seine. With the exception of the Dahara episode in 1846, Europe did not know him till 1855, when the marshal had passed his sixtieth year. Still, that is the fate of the soldier in unmartial times. It has been told as a remarkable circumstance that the child was born opposite a powder magazine. We will go further, and say he was born upon one, for what else was France in 1794? Unfortunately for the warlike mission of the little one, during the next twenty years everything blew up, even the great Napoleon himself. When Jean Jacques quitted the Lyceum of Brussels at the age of twenty, on the 14th of June, 1814, Napoleon had been a month at Elba; and when, on March 18, 1815, he issued from the war academy at La Flèche to enter the army as second lieutenant, Napoleon was once more in Paris, to be removed three months later for ever. We may remark here, that no premature precocity was noticed in young Pelissier.

He was attached to the peaceful artillery of the "Royal House;" he had no traditions, no hatred, and no love. When the diplomatic war of 1823 was decided on, he went to Spain as lieutenant and adjutant to General Grandier, to suppress the liberals. It was probably in this capacity that he gained the Ferdinand Order, as well as the Cross of the

Legion of Honour. Three years later, as adjutant of General Durieux, he helped the Greeks to throw off the Turkish yoke; for his distinguished bravery at the storming of the Castle of Morea, he obtained the Greek order of the Saviour and the French order of St. Louis; he was also promoted to a captaincy.

He joined the Algerian army immediately on its formation, served under Bourmont, became chef de bataillon, and, in 1830, officer of the Legion of Honour. He was six-and-thirty years of age, and, for a man not of noble birth, had advanced satisfactorily enough. We may feel sure, though, that he had aroused no political scruples.

From 1831 to 1839 Pelissier served in the interior of France as adjutant of several military inspectors, and studied the organisation of the entire army in the ministry of war. On the 2nd of November, 1839, he returned as a lieutenant-colonel to Algeria, and remained there till 1855. His military career began at that date. Naturally cold-blooded, decided, smart, and quick judging; acquainted through experience with the administration and wants of a large army; easily arranging all the tactical combinations, he took as his model one of the first soldiers France ever possessed, Marshal Bugeaud. Bugeaud, through his gaolership at Blaye, had gained the hatred of the Legitimists and the romantic school; the Republicans accused him of the "massacre of the Rue Transnonain” (1832), though he was innocent. He has passed away with the reputation of a time-server, though he was anything rather than servile. In 1848, when government wished to attack an entire nation under arms, Bugeaud refused, and, in 1849, he was the only man on the right of the Legislative Assembly who tried to form an arrangement with Ledru Rollin by which the republic should be preserved. Bugeaud was a thorough general, both as administrator and strategist; his soldiers loved to call him their "father." He was only enabled to display his qualities on the ungrateful Algerian soil; a European war would have raised him above all living heroes, perhaps over many who have passed away. Bugeaud's positive element, the careful administration of the conquered land-the ploughshare he ever held in the left hand, while the right wielded the sword-passed Pelissier by and left no sign; but the quick decision, the bold attack, the "never retire"-these he learned from him.

Lieutenant-Colonel Pelissier was engaged in 1841 in the expedition against the Tagdempt, and the action in the Oued-Melah; in 1842 he was at the Sheliff; in 1843 in the action with the Flitahs. Then he was promoted to a colonelcy. On June 15, 1840, he received a bullet in his shoulder at the Bois des Oliviers; in 1842, another in the right arm on the march to Maskara. So early as 1843 he led a column against the tribes of the Dahara, and received the Commander's cross of the Legion of Honour on his return with his brigade. In 1844 he was engaged as souschef of the staff of the African army in the battle of Isly, where Marshal Bugeaud punished the treacherous arrogance of the Moroccans.

The celebrated "smoking of the caves" of Dahara happened in 1846. The French had been pursuing for a lengthened period the Ouled-Fellaha and Ouled-Baaskouna clans. The rocky ravines of the Dahara served as a regular hiding-place for the wildest and most dangerous tribes. The French army must have assumed it impossible to pursue the enemy into

these caves: numerous victims had already fallen in these ravines. An inevitable tribute of corpses was annually paid here by the conquerors, and a stop must be put to this: the right man for the task was sought and very soon found. When reckless daring was required, Pelissier's name rose to every lip. Pelissier himself describes the occurrence in the following fashion, in his almost elegant sabre-style:

"As I informed you in my last letter, I left Mostaganem on April 27 to press forward into the Dahara. The first night I encamped at Mechera, and the next morning I led my column to Selfoura, where the Khalifa Sidi-Laribi proposed to join me. The population of this territory certainly did not expect me. When I arrived at Selfoura, the horsemen of the goum saw the people flying to the well-known caves. They were pursued, in the hope of catching them and their flocks before they reached the entrance of the caves. We had a chasseur killed there, another wounded. The fusillade continued till all the fugitives had entered the caves and the herds were out of fire. Fifteen hundred head of cattle were brought into camp, and several of the enemy were killed by our fire. In the Native Battalion we had one tirailleur killed and five wounded, one of whom afterwards died. From this moment the Beni-Zerouel offered their submission, but under conditions which I could not accept. I had them, therefore, completely invested. The next day, May 1, they surrendered, accepted all the conditions imposed upon them, as well as the evacuation and delivery of their grottos. On the same day we forced our way into their hiding-places, and I ordered up powder and the requisite implements from Mostaganem in order to destroy them entirely. I had no hesitation about remaining here a few days longer in order to complete the operation." All depends on the meaning of the hieroglyphics "completely invested." The colonel did not besiege the Beni-Zerouel, for a siege does not compel a surrender between night and morning. The enemy could have presupposed the investment on April 30, when they offered to surrender. All the inhabitants of the caves were not dead on May 1, for Pelissier's conditions were accepted probably by somebody. Lastly, the survivors could have had no choice left them, for with the grottos the tribe surrendered its liberty. There must, therefore, have been a prospect of something terrible occurring. Last of all, we must know that Pelissier, when before the caves of the Dahara, had not his rear open: the armistice had been broken by the Arabs at three different points. Two hundred prisoners had been murdered in Abd-el-Kader's deira, another band of captives was murdered near Batna, while between Bugia and Delly's the Kabyles were murdering and plundering the crew of a stranded French vessel. Hence Pelissier resolved on instituting a fearful example. He had damp wood kindled at the entrance of the caves, and treated the enemy like wild beasts. In the presence of such decision obstinacy availed nothing: Pelissier regarded it as coming within the rules of warfare. "But the women and children!" some one will exclaim. Pelissier might have replied, " And what do shells effect when thrown into a blockaded town? What does hunger produce in an invested fort?" He forced the suffocating smoke into the natural fortress of the Beni-Zerouel, and the Dahara ceased to exist!

The doctrinaire republicans, who converted everything into darts to hurl at Louis Philippe and Guizot, fell on this fact, and twisted it into an accusation against the monarchy of July. What had not Guizot endured

because he liberated Morocco from the war contribution with the words, "France is rich enough to pay for her own glory?" Pelissier was a follower of Bugeaud, consequently an instrument of the palace-a monster, and deserving to run the gauntlet of public opinion. Pelissier did not trouble himself about the outcry of the papers; he wrapped himself up in his duty. The government appointed him maréchal de camp, and he was justified. Just as Bugeaud never wasted a word to prove that he had not been at the "Rue Transnonain," so Pelissier allowed himself most calmly to be called a "smoker-out."

1848 made no change in the attitude of this bronze soldier. While other African officers stepped into the political arena, he patiently abided in the military colony, became general of division in 1850, commanded the Oran division, and advanced to be inspector-general of infantry. In France the coup d'état came off; the second empire was hatched. Pelissier lived for his duty. The sherif Muhammad-ben-Abdallah caused an insurrection among the southern tribes; he was defeated, and fled to Lagouhat, where a general revolt broke out. General Yussuf could not master the rebels, so Pelissier started. On November 26, 1853, he left El Biod, and marched fifty leagues in six days, through a revolted country. On December 2 (the celebrated Napoleon day), he joined Yussuf; on the 3rd, Lagouhat was reconnoitred; in the night the breaching battery was formed; at seven o'clock on the morning of the 4th the firing commenced; by ten o'clock there was a practicable breach, and the eagle of the 2nd Zouave regiment fluttered from the ruins of Lagouhat.

The newly-hatched empire naturally saw with delight a baptism of fire which sprinkled others besides Frenchmen; its attention was necessarily directed to the unpolitical soldier of Lagouhat, who possessed more strategic talent and a sweeter-sounding name than the band of Coup d'Etat generals, who, besides, might become troublesome at the given moment. Here, then, was a military celebrity-a trouvaille for France. Fatalism, too, naturally demanded that the affair of Lagouhat, as a December victory, should be vaunted far beyond its merits. Pelissier was, therefore, held in reserve.

The Eastern war began. We are not going to write its history, but if ever it be truthfully written, we shall have to read the most fabulous and incredible things that have ever happened since the first wholesale murder of humanity. Two fleets set out against the Russian fleet; the latter, in the mean while, very coolly destroys the Turkish fleet off Sinope, the relics of Navarino. Two armies set sail; no one knows whither. Omar Pacha thrashes the Russians on the Danube, and is forbidden to exploiter his victory. The Russians, at a sign, give up the siege of Silistria; the Turks are obliged to evacuate the Principalities; the neutral Austrians march in. A campaign is concocted to employ the English and French armies, and remove the war from Turkey. This remote campaign proves to be no campaign, but a siege; yet again, it is not a siege, such as they have been known since Vauban, Coehoorn, Cormontaigne, and Montalembert, but a perfectly impossible siege: the siege of half a town, while the other half remains quite open, and is covered by a free army. Then it is a half town whose defenders entrench themselves more quickly and better than the besiegers are able to advance; for a long while the allies are themselves blockaded, and forced to. assume a very doubtful

defensive. On the other side, there is not only a fortified camp, which can at will send fresh troops in the leaguered half, not only can select its battle-ground, but remain in uninterrupted connexion with the greatest empire of Europe. In front of the leaguered half, lastly, stand three, four different armies, with so many different commanders; the English will not do what the French wish, and vice versa. And even if English and French wished to be united, another "higher will" interferes, who dietates mighty combinations from his cabinet, and who knows everything better, though he has never smelt powder.

A few rays of light have been thrown on this labyrinth by General Niel's "Siege of Sebastopol : Journal of the Operations of the Engineer Department." We confess that these rays only serve to illumine the labyrinthine passage, and to convince us of the utter confusion. In St. Arnaud's instructions, he was told to keep his eye on Kaffa as the landingplace, move north from there, and besiege Sebastopol last of all. The idea of operating from south to north seems to have hung in the air like an infectious fever: the commanders of the allies are somehow magnetically attracted from the Alma to Balaklava, and appear to have noticed nothing, not even when Menschikoff crept out of the trap and passed them. Or was the armed might of Western Europe purposely placed on a barren plateau in order to localise the war? General Niel, of the Engineers, arriving before Sebastopol in January, 1855, sees the absurdities that are being committed, invents another plan for the campaign, which contradicts all the given conditions, and which no one will execute, and even after the unsuccessful attack of the 18th June, reminds us, with all seriousness, that this was "no ordinary siege." The leaders of the army decide on a chimerical investment, the engineer dreams of an impossible campaign, everything seems turned topsy-turvy.

Up to the arrival of the imperial adjutant, all the strength of the allies had been directed on the town, on the Central and Mast bastions; the English alone were acting against the Great Redan. It was now seen that the capture of the town would do no good, for it was commanded by the works of the Karabelnaya suburb; that all efforts must be concentrated against the Sapoun mountain and the Karabelnaya ravine, and that the town must be entered from both sides of the Careening Bay and the Mamelon Vert. But the unhappy besiegers already had sunk so deep in the routine of error, that they must be allowed to continue their works on the right and left attacks, so that, eventually, the storm might be made at the right place.

Niel, who landed in the Crimea on January 27, had a new organisation of the army in his pocket: Canrobert remained commander-in-chief, and the distinguished General de Martimprez was appointed chief of his staff, the same who, as protecting genius, had, with General Trochu, watched over the transport of the armada. The first corps d'armée, intended to operate on the left, was placed under the command of General Pelissier, who was summoned from Africa; the second corps, intended to operate on the right of the English, was entrusted to General Bosquet, who had so brilliantly decided the battle of Alma by turning the left Russian wing, and who hurried to aid the English at Inkerman, for which Lord Raglan, generally no great friend of the French, publicly thanked him in general orders.