of which is twenty feet high. The wall and the bastion have a ditch in front, but there is neither covered way nor glacis in front of this ditch. Under the cannon of the round fort is situated a large fortified barrack, which has been lately flanked by several strong works. From that barrack runs a wall entirely surrounding the town, the port, and the arsenal, to beyond the careening basin towards the Tchernaya, at the extremity of the roadstead, which gives a development of from three and threequarters to five English miles, including the sinuosities. This wall is three feet thick, is crenellated, and has in front a ditch, the earth of which has been thrown in front to form a glacis covering the mason work in many places. This wall is not terraced that is, does not form a rampart above on which artillery can be placed. But on the points where, in a regular fortification, there would be bastions, the Russians have raised batteries, in the form of cavaliers, firing above the wall. The centre of the line is defended by the fort of Akhtiar, raised on a high point at the top of the town. At a little distance from this fort commence three ravines, descending to the roadstead. One, on the West, terminates by the Quarantine Bay; another, in the centre, cuts the town into two unequal parts; and the third, on the East, descends right to the North to form the port, which is the prolongation of that same ravine into the sea. It is principally at the lower opening of this ravine, and on the Western side of the port, that are accumulated the defences.

"Among the works destined to defend the ravine of

the port, two great batteries in the form of towers are mentioned; a recent construction, said to be built of stone and brick. From want of time to raise a third power at the bottom of the fort, the Russians have placed a line of battle ship, to perform the duty of a battery against the mouth of the ravine. Besides, the works are still going on, night and day, without interruption. Onehalf of the garrison is occupied with them, and all the able-bodied inhabitants are obliged to take part in them. Sebastopol is commanded almost on every side by hills rising one over the other to a great height, as already stated. But the nearest hills have been a long time back levelled by works which lasted twelve years; and the earth taken from them was removed to the side of the Quarantine, or to certain hollows which might facilitate the approaches. There is not, consequently, any height now commanding the town within 500 or 600 yards of the place."

CHAP. V.

ODESSA.

Is the chief commercial city in the south of Russia. It is situated on the north coast of the Black Sea, in 46° 28', N. lat. and 30° 43′, S. long., and contains about 70,000 inhabitants. It was founded by order of the Empress Catharine. The site was well chosen. The bay is extensive, the water deep, and the anchorage good. The appearance of the town "has often been compared to Brighton, but the line of cliffs on which it stands has a slight curve inwards, forming a shallow bay, with a radius of some three miles. These cliffs face the north-east, and towards the north they sink into low sandy mounds and flat endless steppes. Stretching out from below them, at the lower or south-easterly end of the town, runs a long fortified mole, at the end of which was a lighthouse. This is called the Quarantine Mole, and shelters a great crowd of ships of all nations. Their crews are never permitted to

go into the town, but are strictly imprisoned within a small walled-in and strictly-guarded quarantine district at the foot of the cliffs, even if they should happen to be detained there for six months at a time." At the northern extremity of the cliffs there was another mole, "called the Imperial Mole, enclosing a mass of Russian ships of all sorts, and some large stores or barracks. Both moles had a formidable array of embrasures, and there was a battery between them at the foot of the cliffs, but, as far as we could learn, they were badly off for guns. We counted over seventy empty embrasures. The steamers employed in the storming thereof in 1854, had orders to go as far as possible in-shore, so as to rake and destroy the Imperial Mole and shipping, but to avoid firing upon any part of the town or upon the shipping in the Quarantine Mole."

Odessa may have been termed hitherto the great corn emporium for Western Europe; in ordinary years more than 800 ships having entered and left that port, receiving corn in return for manufactured goods and other commodities. Whence we are to obtain our corn, and how Russia is to get the articles it requires in return, remains a question to be solved in the course of the war on which we have now entered.

Y

CHAP. VI.

REVEL AND CRONSTADT.*

AT the entrance to the Gulf of Finland, after the navigator has doubled the isle and lighthouse of Odensholm, the first points of interest are the fort of Rogervich and the great harbour called Port Baltic. Before Russia possessed the splendid harbours of Finland, vast works were begun by Peter the Great, and continued by the Empresses Elizabeth and Catharine, for the purpose of shutting in the port of Rogervich by a dyke and rendering it fit for a naval station. But the operations required were not less formidable than those of Cherbourg, and the Government ultimately abandoned them. Revel, which lies eight leagues from Rogervich, has thus become the first or westernmost military harbour on the gulf. The city of that name is the capital of Esthonia, contains some 25,000 inhabitants, and is situated about 130 leagues from St. Petersburg.

*This chapter has been chiefly extracted from the public journals.