eating and talking, I heard one or two curious incidents that occurred here when the Cossacks first came.  In the course of reconnoitring the country, five Cossacks, with an under-officer, came upon a post of twenty Roumanian soldiers, likewise under the command of an under-officer.  The five Cossacks immediately arrested the twenty Roumanians, brought them in to headquarters, and reported them to General Skobeleff as prisoners of some unknown army.  The Cossacks were not quite sure, apparently, whether they were Turks or not, so they thought that they had better bring them in, an operation to which the Roumanians, although vastly superior in numbers, consented with not a little murmuring.’[180]

This anecdote, it must be understood, was told by a party of Russian officers, and is unworthy of critical examination, but it shows in what estimation they held the men who were afterwards to be their indispensable helpmates, and in a sense their leaders and preservers.  Other writers represented the Roumanian soldiers in a more favourable light from the beginning of the war.  Their coolness under fire has already been mentioned, and the same correspondent, in describing the defensive operations at Kalafat, says:  ’I was struck with the admirable conduct at this time of the Roumanian gunners, who never flinched in the slightest degree under the trying ordeal.’[181] After their defeats before Plevna and elsewhere, the Russians, too, began to estimate their allies at something nearer their real value.

‘The Russian authorities,’ writes the same correspondent in the month of August, ’are greatly pleased with the appearance and apparent efficiency of the Roumanian artillery.  Indeed, the Roumanian troops are everywhere now spoken of with a consideration not previously evinced.’[182]

No more talk now of five Russians running in twenty Roumanians; and we shall hear quite a different story presently.  And not alone had the soldiers risen in Muscovite esteem, but the Russians were beginning to understand that there might be some virtue in the commanders also; for about September 1, or a day or two previously, they so far admitted their superiority as to invite Prince Charles to take the command-in-chief of the whole Russo-Roumanian army before Plevna, which he did, with the Russian general Zotoff as chief of his staff and second in command.

On this occasion he issued an address to the Roumanian soldiers, reminding them that success for the Turks would mean pillage and desolation in their fatherland, assuring them that, although their numbers were few, he had confidence in their courage, and in their ability to retain for Roumania the good opinion which she deserved and enjoyed amongst the nations of Europe.  He concluded by announcing, in modest terms, his own appointment as Commander-in-chief of the allied armies.

[Footnote 179:  According to Col.  Fife Cookson the Bulgarians, during this war, were guilty of atrocities as deep-dyed as any that had previously caused such indignation in Europe; but he also says (p. 23), ’In this war armed Bulgarians resisting the Turks were looked upon as rebels, and received no quarter.’]