Our losses that day were great both in lives and in stores, twenty-one vessels being wrecked off the mouth of Balaklava Harbour. A magazine ship carrying ten million rounds, and the _Prince_, one of our largest transports, laden with warm clothing and stores of all descriptions, went down. The French lost a line-of-battle ship and the _Pluton_ off Eupatoria, where a Turkish line-of-battle ship sank with all hands. Many of the houses in Sevastopol were unroofed in the height of the gale. The Admiral again made the signal, “Well done, _Queen_.” She was anchored off the mouth of the Katcha River, six miles north of Sevastopol, and during a lull in the storm sent boats to rescue men from several Austrian and Greek ships which had gone ashore. It was work of considerable danger, increased by the stupid barbarity of a few Cossacks, who fired on the rescue parties, wounding two of our men. Captain Michell, to whom this rescue was due, was not only brave himself, but possessed the more uncommon courage, that of daring to order others to risk their lives. He had previously offered to break the boom which closed the harbour mouth, by taking his ship at it under all plain sail; but, not unnaturally perhaps, his offer was declined by the Admiral. The rudder-head of the _Queen_ was cracked by the action of the waves, and a week later I see by the Captain’s letters to his wife, and to the Commander who was with the brigade on shore, when the Admiral wished to send the _Queen_ and the other sailing vessels down to the Bosphorus, Michell objected on the ground that if the line-of-battle ships could not physically assist the troops, yet their presence might do something to encourage them. Later he was ordered down, and writing to the Admiral from the Bosphorus in January 1885, mentions he has only 330 men on board out of 970 the establishment, all the others having landed. CHAPTER VI 1854–5--A NAKED AND STARVING ARMY Indescribable sufferings of the old soldier--Contrast of naval with military system--Commodore Lushington’s work--Lunch with Lord Raglan--_Times_ correspondent saves remnant of Army--Christmas Day--Captain Peel’s plan for cutting out a Russian ship--A pony’s sagacity.