REVIEW.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIII, Issue 203, 25 September 1878, Page 2

REVIEW.

The Life of the Prince Consort, Vol. 111, Theodore Martin. London, Spottiswoode & Co. Tn two former numbers of the Mail we reviewed the two volumes of the life of the Prince Consort which had then appeared. A third volume has lately beeD published which, Loth from the nature of its contents, and the particular time selected, and no doubt properly selected, for its publication, has excited the profoundest interest, not merely in our owu couutry but throughout Christendom. The preseut volume deals with the Crimean War, and enters into the full details of the negotiations before, during, and after the siege of Sebastopol. It throws a new, and we must confess, an unexpected light on the Prince Cousort's opinions and conduct at that time, and proves most conclusively that so far from being as was expected at the time in favor of Russia, he was, of all who had any direct share in the government of the country, the bitterest enemy of Russia. The severe terms of reprobation in which he writes of the conduct of the King of Prussia, the brother of the present monarch, and the shilly-shallying of Austria's statesmen, show that he was heart and soul in the war. Every letter and every paper indeed manifest the most earnest desire thatit should be pushed to a successful termination, and it was probably owing to the Prince's personal influence over the Emperor of the French that Napoleon was induced to persevere long after the French people had wearied of the war. We must do full justice to the extreme anxiety manifested both by the Queen and the Prince in the well-being of the army. He suggested the system of sending periodical returns every fortnight, not only of the number of the troops but of the quantities and condition of the stores and munitions of war required for the army, a plan which enabled the authorities at home to judge as to the articles likely to be required long before the supply was exhausted. It is evident from the memorandum which prefaces the recommendation of this scheme that the Priuce took a pretty accurate measure of Lord Raglan's fitness to command an army in the field. Sucli a post requires a peculiar combination of qualities which few men possess. To be a good commander a man should not merely be brave, but he should have a powerful mind, a strong will, inflexible justice even to the verge of severity, quickness in forming a plan aud firmness in adhering to it. Coupled with these mental qualifications he should be in the prime and vigor of life, so as to be able to share with his soldiers all the hardships of a campaign. Such being some of the qualifications reqnired, the British Cabinet, with their usual happy regard for the fitness of things, selected an elderly gentleman in rather delicate health, of aimable character, who had passed the last thirty years of his life in an office in Whitehall, signing papers and poring over returns! To assist him they sent a number of other elderly gentlemen who ought to have been carefully nursing their gout in the cosiest of arm chairs, by the snuggest of fires. No wonder things went wrong. No wonder that the soldiers of the wealthiest nation of the world sickened aud died by thousands for want of the commonest necessaries of life — food aud clothing. They were commanded by one of the kindest hearted men that ever lived, and one of the truest and bravest of gentlemen, but by a man who, in spite of Mr Kinglake, was no more fit to command an army than he was to manage a Manchester cotton spinniug factory. They wanted a man like Napoleon or Wellington, a^man who would have hanged two or three commissaries and purveyors.until the lesson was taught the remainder that the troops must be fed and clothed, and the Hospitals provided with what was necessary. They wanted a man like Sir Thomas Picton, who, when his division was without bread, sent for the Assistant Commissary- General who was in charge and asked him : — " Sir, did you ever see an Assistant Com-missary-General hung?" " No, Sir Thomas." ''Well, sir, there will be an Assistant Commissary-General hung to-morrow morning if the troops do not get their bread." The Assistant Commissary-Generai went off to the Duke and complained that Sir Thomas Picton had threatened to hang him. All the comfort he got was by the Duke asking him "Did Sir Thomas Picton say that he would hang you to-morrow morning if the troops had no bread?" " He really did, your Grace." " Then you'd better get the bread, for by Heavens he'll do it." The writer happened to be present when Lord Raglan paid a visit to the wounded in the unsuccessful attack on the Redan on the IStJi of June. The melancholy and careworn expression of the Comraander-iu-Chief's face as he passed dowu through the huts where the wounded lay, was very marked. A few days after he died. Peace to his ashes! We canuot congratulate Mr Theodore Martin on the literary merits of this third volume. It is interesting — to those who are old enough to have been witnesses of and actors in the stirring events of 1854 and 1855, it is iutensely interesting,— but this arises from the new lights thrown upon the events of the period by the documents with which Mr Martin has been entrusted. He contrives to narrate deeds of valour and endurance, which even now make the hearts of those who witnessed them throb, and their eyes flash, much as an oyster endowed with speech would recount the events of its domestic history. It was, perhaps, beyond his powers to emulate the stirring periods of Kinglake, but he might surely have given us something a little better than an additional volume of Rymer's Focdera. It may assist the young people of the present day whose ideas of the hardships suffered by our army in the Crimea are somewhat vague and indefinite if we state a little incident which occurred in the spring of 1855. The present writer was visiting a friend of his, an officer in the 63rd Regiment, when he saw about thirty men drawn up as if on parade. He remarked to his friend, " What a small company you have there!" " Company!" was the indignant reply, "company, .indeed ; that, Sir, is the 03rd Regi-

ment on jjarad'e., Why, we only mustered seven rank end file oft parade one day." Those who saw the emaciated and feverstricken forms of the gallant Jtien who had fonght at Alma and Inkerman, and borne the cold and starvation of that terrible winter 6n the heights above Sebastopol, will never forget t!te spectacle presented to their view. The gay guardsman, whose spotless uniform and pipeclayed be?ts had 'excited the admiratiou of every beholder, was carried into the hospital in a coat of which the original scarlet was hardly visible for mud aiid clay, torn and patched and ragged,, while its wearer only looked like the ghost of his former self. It was not ouly the danger of death or wounds ia ftuSle that they suffered from, but the harassing wotiz oi the trenches, the fatigues of their daily duty performed in cold and hunger, and without snfflcient clothing, and the disease and weakness brought on by insufficient nourishment. These things try troops, and the army that can bear these and yet stand its ground against daily attacks and sorties, shows higher qualities than even the da?inog charge of Balaclava required. All thescr things they, bore with a patience and fortitude beyond all ptftise.- To no small exteut they were sustained ftf ihe sympathy of the Queen and the nation. J?o sooner were the wauts of the army made known *ban supplies poured in from every side. These came too late to save the lives and health o? She troops, but they bore testimony at least 1o the sftapathy that was felt for them. The i Queen's Jtiessage (evidently Her Majesty's j own composition) Was printed and posted up | in every ward of the yeutari hospitals, and was really of immense service in keeping up the men's spirits. The measures proposed by the Prince Consort were eminently judicious; but we cannot help wondering how it was that it should be left to him to suggest them. There must have been gross incompetence both at the War Office and the Horse Guards. This volume reveals the same preternatural activity on the part of the Prince Consort, and the seme mistaken estimate of his position in the country to which we called attention in our review of the former volumes. His interference with departmental business was carried to such an exteut that no Minister with any spirit would tolerate from the Prime Minister. Even the Governor of a Crown colony who is responsible for everything done in his colony, would act most injudiciously if he attempted to interfere with his subordinates in the way the Prince interfered in the War and Foreign Departments. The amusing feature of the case is that throughout all the three volumes there is not one expression of doubt either on the part of the Prince or his biographer as to his perfect competency to decide on any of the innumerable questions that were brought before him. It seems to have been taken for grunted that omniscieuce and infallibility were his characteristics— in fact Mr Martin apologises in his preface for noc being able to find a flaw or defect in the perfect character of the Prince. One very obvious defect was his utter inability to conceive that under every possible combination of circumstances he could err. Besides the papers about the Crimean war the volume contains an account of the visit of the Queen and Prince to Paris, and of the marriage of the Princess Royal.