ssioners who had been sent out, nearly a year before, to the
Crimea, to investigate the causes of the breakdown in various military
departments, presented a Report, censuring several high officials;
a Military Commission was accordingly appointed to investigate the
Report, and after sitting for some months at Chelsea, completely
exonerated the officials in question.

The Government having resolved to strengthen the administration of the
appellate jurisdiction of the House of Lords, Letters Patent were made
out purporting to create Sir James Parke, an ex-Judge, a Baron for
his life, under the title of Lord Wensleydale. After frequent and
protracted debates on this question, the Peers decided that such
a patent conferred no right to sit and vote in Parliament. The
Government gave up the contest by creating Sir James (who had no son)
a hereditary peer.

The Czar Alexander was crowned at Moscow in September with great
ceremonial, the Sultan being duly represented, while Lord Granville
was present as special Ambassador for the Queen. The discovery of
the cruelty with which political offenders were being treated in
Neapolitan prisons led to the rupture of diplomatic relations between
England in union with France on the one hand, and King Ferdinand on
the other; while a dispute as to the enlistment of recruits for the
English Army in the United States led to the dismissal of the British
Minister at Washington, and to temporary friction between the two
countries.

The provisions of the Treaty of Paris were not carried out without
considerable procrastination on the part of Russia, which, by its
method of evacuating Kars and surrendering Ismail and Reni, and by
laying claim to Serpent's Island at the mouth of the Danube, compelled
England to send a fleet to the Black Sea, to enforce strict observance
of the Treaty. By the end of the year the matter was arranged, though
in the meantime the possibility of Great Britain being represented at
the Czar's coronation had been imperilled.

The abuses which had long existed in the Government of Oudh induced
the Governor-General of India, early in the year, to issue a
proclamation placing that kingdom permanently under the authority of
the British Crown. Lord Dalhousie at this time retired from the office
(which he had held for eight years) of Governor-General, and was
succeeded by Lord Canning. It fell to the lot of the latter to
announce the commencement of hostilities between this