In the execution of his task, the Author has aimed chiefly at accuracy; and, if he has failed in securing this most important quality of an historian, he can honestly aver that it has not been for lack of painstaking and careful research. His principal authorities have been the public despatches of the Allied Generals and Admirals, but he has derived many hints and much valuable information from the work of Colonel Hamley, the able and spirited letters of the correspondents of the London press, especially to those of the gifted and brilliant Times Correspondent,* as well as from the private letters of a dear and valued friend, which describe, with the simple eloquence of truth, the stirring events in which he has borne a distinguished part, from the first starting of the expedition until the present day; and, if he has omitted to acknowledge any other, similar obligations, it has been the result of oversight, and not of an unfair intention to rob any contemporary author of the fruits of his labours. G. B.
* Sir William Howard Russell, LL.D London, March, 1856.
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE CAMPAIGN.
The spring of 1851 witnessed a ceremony as imposing, perhaps, as any in the world's history.
Beneath the roof of a palace, constructed with a rapidity only rivalled by the fairy structures of the Arabian Nights, and whose boldness of design, and exquisite delicacy of detail, formed at once the apology and the vindication of an age supposed to be more devoted to the engrossing pursuits of commerce than to the cultivation of those arts which have shed so bright a lustre on other times, had been gathered the products of the Civilisation of the Universe. Every country in Europe, and, in a less degree, each quarter of the globe, found itself here represented, in its arts and sciences, its commerce, and its industry. The softening of international prejudices, and the increased facilities of communication, which resulted from nearly forty years of uninterrupted European tranquillity, had prepared the way for the great congress of all nations within this temple of peaceful progress; where the fair-haired, son of the farthest North might gaze in wondering admiration on the bright eyes and raven locks of the Andalusian girl, where nationalities the most opposed merged themselves in the common fraternity of mankind, and where prejudices the most inveterate were effaced, spite of themselves, in the presence of the genus loci.
The inauguration of this scene of more than fabled magnificence, and more than Oriental splendour, was the grateful task of that gracious Lady, whose pure domestic life, no less than her exalted public virtues, had rendered her name symbolic in the hearts of her subjects with the highest of bloodless triumphs, as it has since become of sterner and more terrible achievements.
Deep as must have been her interest in the scene, it was yet heightened by the reflection that at her side, and united to her by a tie almost unknown in former alliances of royalty, stood the originator of the scheme; he whose well-cultivated mind had conceived, and whose faith in his fellow-men had
THE EAST.
matured, spite of discouragement and opposition, a plan so gigantic that its failure would have been as little a disgrace, as its success proved beyond the most sanguine expectation.
Peace with folded wings brooded in the pure sunny atmosphere over her temple and her worshippers, — Peace, in her fairest and gayest form, and few could have been found amidst the motley throng wh