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OBJECT OF THE WAR.

to send out a larger army than she ever before employed.

And, then, we used to hear such nonsense about our dignified and noble allies, the Turks, and the importance of preserving the Ottoman empire. What we have been fighting for, is not to keep the Turks in Constantinople, so much as to keep the Russians out. Then we were told that the Turks were a highly progressive race; and that no country had improved so much of late years as Turkeywhen those who know the country could affirm that all improvements have been carried out by the Franks, and that the Turks cannot improve, in one sense of the term their religion is against it. Lord Stratford himself said, to a friend of mine, that nothing could be done with the Turks by fair means, and that everything he had got them to do, in the way of reform and improvement, had been forced upon them by compulsion, the only argument they would listen to; even going so far as to say, that the first step to improvement would be to shoot all the pashas, who were corrupt and peculating, almost to a man.

CHAPTER II.

ARRIVAL OF THE TROOPS.

On the first of April we heard that General Canrobert had arrived at Gallipoli, with about seven hundred French troops. A few days after, Sir George Brown arrived there in the Golden Fleece, with the Rifles, and some Sappers. The French, very properly, were not long in making themselves felt by the Turks. It was said, that wanting a suitable place for hospital, they took possession of the college of Dervishes for the purpose; and that, as the contracts for supplying wood to the troops, were not fulfilled, Canrobert threat

ened if it did not speedily arrive, to pull down the houses and use them as firewood.

At this time, the commissariat staff had arrived at Constantinople, as well as a number of medical officers; these, together with the engineer officers, who, had been there from the first, were long left without any head, power, or instructions as to what steps they were to take. For the reception of the troops soon to arrive, some competent general should have been out there, at least two months before, so as to give him time to become acquainted with the locality, the country, and the people he had to deal with; and with full power and authority to make every requisite provision for the reception of our army.

As it was, one cold, snowy morning, the fourteenth of April, being Good Friday, a large steamer was unexpectedly seen to enter the Bosphorus, no one knew what she was, or where from; but her decks were covered with wondering soldiers, for which no barrack accommodation or commissariat arrangements had yet been made. It was the Himalaya,

OF BRITISH TROOPS.

21

with General Adams and staff; and the 33rd and 41st regiments on board. When the General sent on shore to know where he was to go, or what to do, some time elapsed before any responsible person could be found. The large barracks at Scutari, had been assigned to us by the Turks, but they were still full of Turkish soldiers; and, of course, abominably dirty.

Had the barracks been ready, the weather was too severe for the troops to land there; so they remained on board until the next day, when the Himalaya went alongside the Scutari shore, and the men disembarked. Very few natives came to see them. One would have thought that the first appearance of foreign troops in their country, would even have attracted the curiosity of the apathetic Turks.

The day following following - the Cambria and Indus arrived, with the 49th and 77th regiments. From the absence of definite instructions, which should have been given at Gallipoli, they went on to Beicos Bay, where they remained for a couple of days.

By this time, a considerable force both of

French and English troops was collected at Gallipoli; and the intelligence from there, was to the effect that the two armies were on the most friendly terms; and, that Sir George Brown had commenced his eastern career, exactly in that peculiar style by which he was distinguished, and disliked at the Horse Guards.

By every letter received from Schumla and the Danube, there were fresh accounts of the excesses and atrocities committed by the Bashi Bozouks.

At Tirnova-not long since-some of them violated four women, and then cut off their breasts, that they might not suckle Giaours! They plundered their own people, and, at the same time, were of little or no use as soldiers -for they could not be brought to face the 'Moscov,' as the Russians are called by the Turks. Omar Pasha was said to have hung some of them, but without having much effect upon the others.

On the 23rd of April, Sir De Lacy Evans arrived in the City of London; and, on the 24th, came the Medway, bringing, from Portsmouth, my old regiment, the 95th-whose