several Russian soldiers remained for some time among our men, who seemed to regard them with a sort of good-humored patronage, calling them "Rooskies," and presenting them with pipes and tobacco. One of them, who, besides tobacco, got a brass tobacco-box, absolutely grinned with delight. From this point of view (the ground in front of the advanced batteries of our right attack) the whole plain undulated in every direction. into bluffs and knolls; every where it was bare and covered with short grass, plentifully dotted with gray stones. In front was the Redan, and nearer to us a line of screens, of gray stone, like rude sentry-boxes, each holding a rifleman.

According to arrangement, the white flag was to be kept flying in our batteries till that in the Mammelon was lowered. At a quarter past three, the bodies being all removed, and the Russians having withdrawn within their defenses, it disappeared, and presently the puffs from the Russian rifle-pits and French lines. showed that the ground lately crowded with soldiers of both armies working in unison was again the scene of strife. A gun and mortar from Gordon's battery threw shells into the work on the Mammelon; the nearest French battery at Inkermann did the same; the guns on the Mammelon, opposed to the latter, replied; the Malakoff guns fired on the French lines and on our right battery; and two 9-pounders in our right advanced work sent their shot bounding among the Russian rifle-pits.

In the night the Russians connected the pits by a trench, which they extended to the verge of the ravine. Thus an intrenched line was formed and occupied within eighty yards of the French, supported by, while it covered, the Mammelon.

During March, the railway advanced steadily toward the heights. Since Admiral Boxer had taken charge of the port of Balaklava, convenient wharves had been built on both sides of the harbor. On the side opposite the town, at the Diamond

Wharf, great quantities of stores were landed; a branch of the railway ran to the wharf on each side, where an artillery officer superintended the transmission of the guns and ammunition toward the camp. About the middle of the month the railway had advanced three-quarters of a mile up the hill beyond Kadukoi, where an engine was set up, and trains began to run; and a week later all the powder landed at Balaklava was conveyed to a depot still nearer the camp. At the end of the month the rails reached the top of the plateau, and conveyed seventy tons of stores per day. An electric telegraph was also established at head-quarters, communicating with Balaklava, with different parts of the camp, and with the right and left attacks.

We had now been half a year before Sebastopol. Coming in the middle of autumn, we had seen the season fade while we expected to enter the city. At that time there had been no thought of wintering on the heights; our speculations were directed to the chances of occupying the place, or returning to Constantinople, and to our own possessions in the Mediterranean, to await the next campaign. Rumor had already named the divisions. which were respectively to occupy Scutari, Corfu, and Malta. Then, unawares, came the dreary winter, and the daily struggle to maintain ourselves, amid snow, choked roads, filth, and death. The warm days of March had begun to dissipate the impressions of that time of misery, and it was now looked back on as a dismal dream filled with gloom, carcasses, and a nameless horror. Our present prospects, though much brighter, were no less dubious. Negotiations for peace were pending, while we were preparing for another attack with increased means, but with confidence diminished by former disappointment. A few days would see commenced, either the armistice as the preliminary of peace, or a bloody struggle with doubt beyond. Before our eyes was the great If, Sebastopol-that once taken, we could venture to

look forward either to a glorious return, or to a brilliant campaign.

Though the English public, and many in the army, were inclined to take a gloomy view of affairs, yet to the Russians they must have worn a far less promising aspect than to us. The great provoker and conductor of the war was gone—he who alone knew the intricacies of Russian policy, and could set in motion the cumbrous machinery of his monarchy. There was no great name now for the Russian soldiers to invoke, no great reputation to look to for shelter. The garrison of Sebastopol had resisted thus far successfully, it is true, though their constancy had never been proved by an assault, and the north side was still open. But the force at Eupatoria was now increased to forty-five thousand, with five thousand cavalry, and might soon threaten their communications with Simferopol. Day and night our guns broke the silence, and our shot whistled among them; in the Malakoff and Mammelon alone they were said to lose a hundred men a day. Each day saw our works advancing, and they knew that we were accumulating the means for a second attack, which, successful or not, must cause them terrible loss. A great part of their large fleet had been sunk; a war steamer, French or English, watched the harbor incessantly; and our vessels passed to and fro, at all hours, in full view of the place, bringing supplies, troops, and regular intelligence from England and France.

The remarkable event of the month was the death of the Czar. Happening, as it did, beyond all calculation, it seemed at first to cut the Gordian knot which complicated the affairs of Europe. Every where it was felt that a great constraining power had ceased; but the relief thus brought left something for the imagination to regret. In a dearth of great men he had risen tall and massive above the northern horizon, while in the cabinets of

Europe his subtlety and force were felt and acknowledged; in his own vast dominions he commanded not merely unquestioning obedience, but universal veneration. With far more truth than the Grand Monarque he might have said, "L'état c'est moi;” he was indeed embodied Russia. The enormous power wielded by a single man was heightened by the mystery which surrounded it, and in the dissolution of the cloud-capped fabric, this everyday world lost something of romance.

CHAPTER XX.

VIEW OF THE WORKS.

POSITION OF THE SPECTATORS-SEBASTOPOL THE BARRACKS-FORT NICHOLAS-FORT CONSTANTINE—THE LEFT SUBURBS-CHAPMAN'S BATTERYGORDON'S BATTERY-THE REDAN-FORT PAUL-THE MALAKOFF HILL AND TOWER-THE MAMMELON-FIRING THE MORTARS-VICTORIA REDOUBT-NORTH SIDE OF THE HARBOR-SIEVERNAIA-VAST BURYINGGROUND-WITHIN THE WORKS-THE TRENCHES-THE BATTERIES-MODE OF AIMING A MORTAR-BURSTING OF A SHELL-BOYAUX OR ZIGZAGSTHE FLAG-STAFF BATTERY-BRITISH ADVANCED BATTERY-VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH-RUINED HOUSE-FRENCH PARALLEL-RUSSIAN CEMETERY-SHARP-SHOOTERS-A GRAVE JOKE-FRENCH MINE-MAISON DE

CLOCHETON.

THE works of the besiegers, though extraordinarily diffuse and extensive, had now assumed the appearance of regular scientific attacks. The batteries, no longer isolated, nor confined to one line, were connected by parallels; and those in advance were approached by regularly-constructed boyaux, or zigzag trenches. If the reader will accompany me to a commanding point, I will endeavor to set before him a view of the siege operations.

In front of the light division camp, near the Woronzoff road, is a building marked on the plans as the picket-house. Down the slope beyond, and a little to the right of it, is a mortar battery, and a hundred yards beyond the battery is a small breastwork of stone, covered with earth from a ditch in front, and of sufficient thickness to resist a shot. A few spectators with tele