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Confident in the impregnability of his town, the Bey of Constantine had left his harem there and the ladies of it were shut up in the palace, which had been turned into head-quarters, and where I was living with Nemours. As may be imagined, this harem gave me subjects for many sketches, which disappeared, unluckily for me, in the sacking of the Tuileries on February 24th, 1848.
Ever since the battle of the Marne halted the German advance on Paris early in September, 1914, the forces of the Crown Prince had been striving unsuccessfully to break through the French lines north and east of Verdun, but the fortress had well maintained its reputation for impregnability and continued to bar the high road to Paris.
The captive balloon revealed the impregnability of Spion Kop, enabled Lord Roberts to ascertain the position of the Boer guns at the Battle of Paardeburg, and proved of invaluable assistance to the forces of General White during the siege of Ladysmith. Although the captive balloon is recognised as indispensable in military operations, its uses are somewhat limited.
In cracks and corners, fungi of poisonous hues adds another touch of wickedness. Manuel shivered with repulsion. Probably not in all the world, certainly not in the Western Hemisphere, is there a ruin of such historic terror as the Citadel of the Black Emperor on the summit of La Ferrière. A gleam of sun revealed the extraordinary impregnability of the place.
The engines of war had been moved over to the foot of the hill, and they directed their heavy projectiles against the farthest walls of the Acropolis. These were old and had not been repaired, since the Saguntines trusted in the impregnability of the steeps.
How inappropriate had been our jubilation! The citizens forgot their personal woes in sorrow for the brave men who after a series of brilliant successes had perished in the final effort. Magersfontein hit us hard, though we knew nothing of the "blazing indiscretions" connected with that fatal assault on positions of peculiar strength and impregnability.
It proved to be, as had already been surmised, merely an enormous mass of bare rock, without a scrap of soil or vegetation of any kind about its surface, and useful only as a citadel, into which, had it been planted in some more accessible spot on the earth's surface, it would undoubtedly have been converted, in which case it would have eclipsed even Gibraltar itself in the matter of impregnability.
The inaccessibility, the apparent impregnability, of this submerged iron fortress are most satisfactory; the officers and crew get down through a little hole in the deck, hermetically seal themselves, and go below; and until they see fit to reappear, there would seem to be no power given to man whereby they can be brought to light.
The remainder of the Chinese fleet was drawn up in Fatshan Channel, and the Chinese had made such extensive preparations for its defense, both on land and on the river, that they were convinced of the impregnability of its position. The Chinese position was unusually strong, and had been selected with considerable judgment.
If she had known the real difference that unconsciously kept her sons apart, her heart would have ached yet more. The stone was quarried high on the mountain, and a direct road was made for bringing it down to the water-side. The castle profited by the road in accessibility, but its impregnability was so far lessened.
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