of low hills, steep-faced and reddish-hued.

The Crimea! The land of promise; the great goal to which the thoughts
of every man in two vast hosts had been turned for many months past.
On the furze-clad common of Chobham camp, on the long voyage out, at
Gallipoli, while eating out their hearts at irritating inaction; on
the sweltering, malarious Bulgarian plains, fever-stricken and
cholera-cursed; at Varna, waiting impatiently, almost hopelessly, for
orders to sail, twenty thousand British soldiers of all ranks had
longed to look upon this Crimean shore. It was here, so ran the common
rumour, that the chief power of the mighty Czar was concentrated; here
stood Sebastopol, the famous fortress, the great stronghold and
arsenal of Southern Russia; here, at length, the opposing forces would
join issue, and the allies, after months of tedious expectation, would
find themselves face to face with their foe.

No wonder, then, that hearts beat high as our men gazed eagerly upon
the Crimea. The prospect southward was still more calculated to stir
emotion. The whole surface of that Eastern sea was covered with the
navies of the Western Powers. The long array stretched north and south
for many a mile; it extended westward, far back to the distant
horizon, and beyond: a countless forest of masts, a jumble of sails
and smoke-stacks, a crowd of fighting-ships and transports,
three-deckers, frigates, great troopers, ocean steamers, full-rigged
ships--an Armada such as the world had never seen before. A grand
display of naval power, a magnificent expedition marshalled with
perfect precision, moving by day in well-kept parallel lines; at
night, motionless, and studding the sea with a "second heaven of
stars."

Day dawned propitious on the morning of the landing: a bright, and
soon fierce, sun rose on a cloudless sky. At a given signal the boats
were lowered--a nearly countless flotilla; the troops went overboard
silently and with admirable despatch, and all again, by signal,
started in one long perfect line for the shore. Within an hour the
boats were beached, the troops sprang eagerly to land, and the
invasion was completed without accident, and unopposed.

The Royal Picts, coming straight from Gibraltar, had joined the
expedition at Varna without disembarking. The regiment had thus been
long on ship-board, but it had lost none of its smartness, and formed
up on the beach with as much precision as on the South Barracks
parade. It fe