Russians the poor boy had his right leg fearfully
crushed by a falling stone. He was found in the morning
by some Highlanders, and brought to his regiment
almost dead from loss of blood. Great was the joy of
all at seeing him, as he was about to be returned as
'killed' or 'missing.' 'Dangerously wounded' was
substituted, but he is now doing well."

When morning dawned on Sunday the 9th, the
retreat of the Russians was discovered. "The surprise,"
says the Times correspondent, "throughout the camp on
Sunday morning was beyond description when the news
spread that Sebastopol was on fire, and that the enemy
were retreating. The tremendous explosions, which
shook the very ground like so many earthquakes, failed
to disturb many of our wearied soldiers. When I rose
before daybreak, and got up to Cathcart's-hill, there
were not many officers standing on that favourite spot;
and the sleepers who had lain down to rest, doubtful of
the complete success of the French, and certain of our
own failure, little dreamt that Sebastopol was ours. All
was ready for a renewed assault upon the Redan, but
the Russians having kept up a brisk fire from the rifle
pits and embrasures to the last moment, and having
adopted the same plan along their lines, so as to blind
our eyes and engage our attention, abandoned it, as is
supposed, about twelve o'clock, and the silence having
attracted the attention of our men, some volunteers
crept up and looked through an embrasure, and found
the place deserted by all, save the dead and dying. Soon
afterwards, wandering fires gleamed through the streets
and outskirts of the town—point after point became
alight—the flames shone out of the windows of the
houses—rows of mansions caught and burned up, and
before daybreak, the town of Sebastopol—that fine and
stately mistress of the Euxine, on which we had so often
turned a longing eye,—was on fire from the sea to the
Dockyard Creek. Fort Alexander was blown up with
a stupendous crash, that made the very earth reel, early
in the night. At sunrise four large explosions on the
left followed in quick succession, and announced the
destruction of the Quarantine Fort and of the magazines
of the batteries of the Central Bastion and Flagstaff
Fort. In a moment afterwards the proper left of the
Redan was the scene of a very heavy explosion, which
must have destroyed a number of wounded men on both
sides. Fortunately the soldiers who had entered it early
in the night were withdrawn. The Flagstaff and
Garden Batteries blew up, one after another, at 4.45.
At 5.30 there were two of the largest and grandest
explosions on the left that ever shook the earth— most
probably from Fort Alexander and the Grand Magazine.
The rush of black smoke, gray and white vapour, masses
of stone, beams of timber, and masonry into the air was
appalling, and then followed the roar of a great
bombardment; it was a magazine of shells blown up into
the air, and exploding like some gigantic pyrotechnic
display in the sky—innumerable flashes of fire twittering
high up in the column of dark smoke over the town,
and then changing as rapidly into as many balls of white
smoke like little clouds. All this time the Russians
were marching with sullen tramp across the bridge, and
boats were busy carrying off matériel from the town, or
bearing men to the south side, to complete the work of
destruction and renew the fires of hidden mines, or light
up untouched houses. Of the fleet all that remained
visible were the eight steamers and the masts of the
sunken line-of-battle ships. As soon as it was dawn the
French began to steal from their trenches into the
burning town, undismayed by the flames, by the terrors
of these explosions, by the fire of a lurking enemy, or
by the fire of their own guns, which kept on slowly
discharging cannon, shot, and grape into the suburbs at
regular intervals, possibly with the very object of
deterring stragglers from risking their lives. But red
breeches and blue breeches, Kepi and Zouave fez, could
soon be distinguished amid the flames, moving from
house to house. Before five o'clock there were numbers
of men coming back with plunder, such as it was, and
Russian relics were offered for sale in camp before the
Russian battalions had marched out of the city. The
sailors, too, were not behindhand in looking for 'loot,'
and Jack could be seen staggering under chairs, tables,
and lumbering old pictures, through every street, and
making his way back to the trenches with vast accumulations
of worthlessness. Several men lost their lives
by explosions on this and the following day."

The same writer describes his visit to the ruined
city:—"Descending from the Malakhoff we come upon
a suburb of ruined houses open to the sea: it is filled
with dead. The Russians have crept away into holes
and corners in every house, to die like poisoned rats;
artillery horses with their entrails torn open by shot,
are stretched all over the space at the back of the
Malakhoff, marking the place where the Russians moved
up their last column to retake it under the cover of a
heavy field-battery. Every house, the church, some
public buildings, sentry boxes, all alike are broken and
riddled by cannon and mortar. Turning to the left we
proceed by a very tall snow-white wall of great length
to the dockyard gateway. This wall is pierced and
broken through and through with cannon. Inside are
the docks, which naval men say are unequalled in the
world. A steamer is blazing merrily in one of them.
Gates and store sides are splintered and pierced by shot.
There are the stately dockyard buildings on the right,
which used to look so clean and white and spruce.
Parts of them are knocked to atoms, and hang together
in such shreds and patches that it is only wonderful
they cohere. The soft white stones of which they and
the walls are made are readily knocked to pieces by a
cannon shot. Fort Paul is untouched. There it stands,
as if frowning defiance at its impending fate, right
before us, and warning voices bid all people to retire, and
even the most benevolent retreat from the hospital,
which is in one of these buildings, where they are tending
the miserable wounded. I visited it the next day.
Of all the pictures of the horrors of war which have
ever been presented to the world, the hospital of Sebastopol
presents the most horrible, heartrending, and
revolting. It cannot be described, and the imagination of
a Fuseli could not conceive anything at all like unto it.
How the poor human body can be mutilated and yet
hold its soul within, when every limb is shattered, and
every vein and artery is pouring out the life-stream,
one might study here at every step, and at the same
time wonder how little will kill! The building used as
an hospital is one of the noble piles inside the dockyard
wall, and is situate in the centre of the row at right
angles to the line of the Redan. The whole row was
peculiarly exposed to the action of shot and shell
bounding over the Redan, and to the missiles directed
at the Barrack Battery, and it bears in sides, roofs,
windows, and doors, frequent and destructive proofs of
the severity of the cannonade. Entering one of these
doors I beheld such a sight as few men, thank God,
have ever witnessed! In a low long room, supported by
square pillars, arched at the top, and dimly lighted
through shattered and unglazed window frames, lay the
wounded Russians, who had been abandoned to our
mercies by their general. The wounded did I say?
No, but the dead, the rotten and festering corpses of the
soldiers, who were left to die in their extreme agony,
untended, uncared for, packed as close as they could be
stowed, some on the floor, others on wretched trestles
and bedsteads, or pallets of straw, sopped and saturated
with blood, which oozed and trickled through upon the
floor, mingled with the droppings of corruption. With
the roar of exploding fortresses in their ears, with shells
and shot forcing through the roof and sides of the rooms
in which they lay, with the crackling and hissing of fire
around them, these poor fellows, who had served their
loving friend and master the czar but too well, were
consigned to their terrible fate. Many might have
been saved with ordinary care. In the midst of one of these
'chambers of horrors,'—for there were many of them
— were found some dead and some living English
soldiers, and among them poor Captain Vaughan of the
90th, who has since succumbed to his wounds. The
Great Redan was next visited. Such a scene of wreck
and ruin! All the houses behind it a mass of broken
stones—a clock turret, with a shot right through the
clock—a pagoda in ruins—another clock tower with all
the clock destroyed save the dial, with the words
"Barwise, London," thereon—cook-houses, where
human blood was running among the utensils; in one
place a shell had lodged in the boiler and blown it and