point of the bayonet in a succession of fierce and impetuous assaults which carried them at last into the redoubt. So successful were they, that they forgot discipline, and in disobedience to the orders they had received, rushed precipitately towards the Malakoff battery in a wild courageous effort to carry that also, but they were met with a tornado of artillery which compelled them to pause and then to retreat. It was a critical moment. The Russian reserves bore down upon them, driving them back in confusion (but fighting still), and retook the Mamelon, but only to be swept out of it again by the French reserves of General Brunet, who in their turn came on with an irresistible rush, and soon were masters of the position, which a large body of engineers rapidly converted into a fortress of attack against the place of which it had been one of the most formidable defences. Thus the allies won, at great cost of life, a position which might have been occupied without resistance at an earlier date. The Sapone or White Works were taken with equal élan and daring, but the cost of that day's work altogether to the allies was 5000 men killed and wounded.

The French Palace of Industry was opened in Paris on the 17th of May. We have already noted the return visit of the queen and the prince consort to the emperor and empress in the following August. In his address on the inauguration of the Exhibition the emperor said, "In inviting all nations hither, it has been my desire to open a temple of concord." On the same day the attack on the Russian fortresses before Sebastopol was renewed by another tremendous bombardment, The English had advanced their "zigzags" from the Quarries considerably beyond the Redan, of which they were now to attempt to take possession. French holding the Mamelon and the White Forts were to endeavour to seize the Malakhoff, and as this was the more important, it was agreed that the advance of the English troops in the Redan should be regulated by the progress made by their allies in their assault on the Malakhoff. The plan which was subsequently adopted may have been good, but

The

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unfortunately its success greatly depended upon the prompt response to a given signal. The Russians fought bravely and offered a stubborn resistance, which it would have required the united effort of the French troops to overcome. Through an unfortunate mistake that effort was divided. The firing of a rocket was to be the signal for a simultaneous attack of the two French divisions. General Meyran mistook an exploding shell for the rocket, and gave the word for his division to advance before that of General Brunet was ready. The consequence was, that the tremendous fire of the Malakhoff and all its subsidiary batteries was concentrated on his division, which, after the fall of the general himself, was thrown into confusion and retreated; so that when the signal rocket was really fired, General Brunet, who was to have advanced against another side of the Malakhoff at the same moment that General. Meyran made his attack, found his division exposed as the other had been to the whole fire of the Russian batteries, and was also obliged to retire. The consequence of these failures extended to the British operations, and though Major-general Eyre, leading his men gallantly onward, actually forced his way into a large suburb of the town and for seventeen hours held the position he had gained, till he was obliged to withdraw his troops for want of a reinforcement which never came,the repulse was complete, and the Russians made the most of their triumph. This serious, though only temporary check, added to the physical weakness and the great mental anxiety which he had endured, probably hastened the fatal effects of the sickness from which Lord Raglan had for so long been suffering. He had borne much blame, had gone out to besiege Sebastopol in a manner which he had not personally accepted as wise or advisable, and he must have felt that he was unable to cope with the difficulties by which he was at first surrounded, while he was unsupported by practical administrative ability at home. On the 8th of June, ten days after the unsuccessful attack on the Malakhoff and the Redan, he died. His death was attributed to cholera, but the disease had doubtless been aggravated

by overwork and anxiety. General Simpson, a man who was also broken in health, succeeded him by right of seniority, and he was confirmed in the command by the appointment of the government, but only subsequently to make way for Sir William Codrington.

This then was the position of the army in the Crimea, and at home the government was already beginning to feel some embarrassment because of the increasing number of its previous supporters as well as of its opponents, who were now desirous of continuing negotiations, on the basis of the proposed four points, for the purpose of obtaining peace. The failure of the conference at Vienna had caused a great deal of excitement in the country, and, as we have seen, the ministry was sharply attacked in both houses. Earl Grey had proposed that an humble address be presented to her majesty "to thank her for having ordered the protocols of the recent negotiations at Vienna to be laid before us; to inform her majesty that this house deeply deplores the failure of the attempt to put an end by these negotiations to the calamities of the war in which the country is now engaged; and to express an opinion that the proposals of Russia were such as to afford a fair prospect of concluding a peace by which all the original objects of the war might have been gained, and by which her majesty and her allies might have obtained all the advantages which can reasonably be demanded of Russia." The debate which followed ended in negativing the motion without a division. But the opposition from another point of view was equally vigorous. While, on one side, there were expressions of a decided hope that the negotiations, which Lord Palmerston had declared had not been absolutely closed, would be continued and conducted to such an issue as to obtain peace; on the other, severe strictures were passed on the government for not having more effectually prosecuted the war. On the 24th of May, just before the Whitsuntide recess, Mr. Disraeli brought forward a resolution as follows:"That this house cannot adjourn for the recess without expressing its dissatisfaction with the ambiguous language and uncertain conduct of her majesty's government in refer

ence to the great question of peace or war, and that under these circumstances the house feels it a duty to declare that it will continue to give every support to her majesty in the prosecution of the war until her majesty shall, in conjunction with her allies, obtain for the country a safe and honourable peace."

Besides this motion there was one by Mr. Milner Gibson for an address to the crown, expressing regret that the opportunity offered by the Vienna conferences for bringing the negotiations to a pacific issue had not been improved, and asserting that the interpretation of the third point conceded by Russia furnished the elements for renewed conferences and a good basis for a just and satisfactory peace. It was understood that this motion was to be supported by Mr. Gladstone, Sir James Graham, and Mr. Sidney Herbert; but on being assured by Lord Palmerston, in answer to a question from Mr. Sidney Herbert, that the conferences were not yet closed, and that Austria was still charged with propositions for peace, these gentlemen brought their influence to bear on Mr. Milner Gibson, who consented to postpone his motion until after the Whitsuntide recess.

On the reassembling of parliament, Mr. Disraeli, in a speech of three hours' duration, vigorously attacked the government in introducing the motion of which he had given notice, but his sarcasms were chiefly levelled against Lord John Russell, who had, he said, first as foreign minister and again as plenipotentiary, compromised the interests of the nation. Nor were the government less to blame. They had been weak and vacillating in their action, appealing to Austria as a mediator, and vainly expecting her to be an ally. It was time to end these "morbid negotiations" for peace, which only inspired distrust in our allies, our generals, our officers, our aristocracy, and to close the conferences. "I am against this principle of 'leaving the door open,'" said Mr. Disraeli; "shut the door, and let those who want to come in knock at the door, and then we shall secure a safe and honourable peace."

A member for a great city, he continued, one of her majesty's privy council, placed on

were continued in order to obtain military glory, we should tempt the justice of Him in whose hands was the fate of armies to launch upon us his wrath.

Mr. Gladstone was accused of inconsistency, and his attitude in relation to the war was denounced in severe terms, but he was not alone in the opinions which he had so unhesitatingly expressed. While the Derbyites had combined with Layard and his friends and with Lord Ellenborough to overturn the ministry without success, and the motion brought forward by Lord Grey had been concerted with Lord Aberdeen, it was suspected that the "peace party" would obtain the adherence not only of Mr. Gladstone but of the Peelites with Gladstone and Graham at their head.1 The debate on Mr. Milner Gibson's motion, resumed after the recess, was to clear up the state of parties. The house and the country were to know whether Lord John Russell had actually approved the proposals of Austria. Lord Palmerston could not explain the situation fully while communications were still proceeding, but Mr. Disraeli, Sir Bulwer Lytton, and others, were determined, if possible, to draw the government' into a declaration.

Russell himself replied to Gladstone with considerable force, and in quite a warlike spirit. The naval power of Russia in the Black Sea must be restricted, and to restrict it was no more of an indignity than it was when Mr. Gladstone had joined his colleagues in the measure. The refusal of Russia to submit to it was a sure indication that she continued to cherish designs against Constantinople, and that the peace of Europe would again be disturbed at no distant date if the means of aggression were not taken away

1 Four years afterwards Sir James Graham, speaking to Mr. Bright about the attack he (Mr. Bright) had made upon him and the government after the Napier dinner at the Reform Club, said, "You were entirely right about that war and we were entirely wrong, and we should never have gone into it."

Sir George Cornewall Lewis, after he had succeeded Mr. Gladstone in the Palmerston government, wrote, "This war has been distasteful to me from the beginning, and especially so from the time when it ceased to be defensive and the Russian territory was invaded. My dislike of it, and my conviction of its repugnance to the interests of England and Europe, was only increased with its progress."

from her by the conditions of peace. Security for Turkey for the future as well as for the present was the object of the war. So determined was the speech of the ex-plenipotentiary that it was taken as an assurance that the government would adopt a course rendering Mr. Disraeli's motion unnecessary, and a great many votes against it (including Mr. Roebuck's) were influenced by this vigorous denunciation of Russia.

These arguments were of course entirely contradicted by Mr. Bright and Mr. Cobden. The latter had moved the adjournment of the debate till after the holidays, and the former rose to ask the government what really were the objects of the war, whether these objects had been secured and accomplished, and whether there could be anything in prospect which would justify the government and the house in proceeding further with the war. He showed from their own declarations that there was no kind of sympathy that could lead them into war for the oppressed nationalities of Europe, for Hungary or Poland, and probably they would also repudiate interference on behalf of Italy. It was for Turkey and the general system of Europe that we were struggling, and in fact the whole matter always resolved itself into some general mystification. Without charging Lord John Russell with dishonesty he asked whether the terms which were offered to Russia at the conference were offered in earnest, or whether the statement made by the Times was correct, that the object of the conference was not to bring about a peace but to shame Austria into becoming a faithful and warlike ally.2

"When the Aberdeen government, of which the noble lords were members," said Mr. Bright, "originally agreed upon these terms, their object was that the Black Sea should be

It may be noticed with no other emphasis than belongs to a peculiar coincidence, that Lord Palmerston, writing (May 28th) to the Emperor of the French, who was more inclined for hastening a peace and attached more value to the active co-operation of Austria than we did, had said: "Victorieux en Crimée, nous commanderons l'amitié, peut-être même l'épée de l'Autriche; manquant de succès en Crimée, nous n'avons pas même sa plume." ("Victorious in the Crimea, we shall command the friendship, perhaps even the sword of Austria; failing there, we have not even her pen.")