They knew that the Crisis of Sebastopol was approaching; Pelissier, in persisting in that refusal, even after the fall of Sebastopol, proved how well he had studied his profession, and the opinions and the conduct of great commanders, both ancient and modern; he showed how well he had profited by being trained in that great school of war bequeathed to France by the great Napoleon—or, I should rather say, by the first Napoleon, for the epithet is now no longer distinctive as applied to that name.