obtained. Distant only about ten miles from that town, and connected with it by an excellent road, Balaclava so infinitely surpasses all other places for the attainment of the object in view, that there cannot be two opinions on the importance of possessing it, and its admirable harbor would be of incalculable value to the fleets. Nature has, however, made it so strong, that if the Russians have fully availed themselves of the facilities for defence, it might become a work of some difficulty to dislodge them; but it is very doubtful whether they have had sufficient time to erect batteries which could hold out long against the force that could be brought to bear on them. Supposing the whole of the batteries defending the harbor to be destroyed, no ships could enter with safety until all the positions on the heights which surround and overhang it had been carried. The coast between Balaclava and Cape Chersonesus being abrupt and precipitous, furnishes no suitable localities for the required purpose; but some of the bays on the northern boundary of the Chersonesean peninsula may possibly be found available. Were the allied armies in possession of the Chersonesus, they would find plenty of water, for there are two good sources towards Balaclava, though independent of it. One of these has been carried by an aqueduct to Sevastopol, and supplies the reservoir near the public gardens of that place. Destroying this aqueduct would be of no service towards reducing the town, as that from Inkerman would still remain, and the great fitting basin contains an immense quantity. Besides which, there are wells and some small streams at the head of the military harbor, whence the place formerly drew its only, though not very plentiful, supply. Another plan for attacking Sevastopol might be adopted by landing to the north of the bay of Inkerman, destroying or taking Fort Constantine and the other batteries from the rear, and thence bombarding the naval arsenal, the town, and ships; and, indeed, this is the only alternative if a footing cannot be effected in the Chersonesus. "The streets are built in parallel lines from north to south, and intersected by others from east to west; and the houses, being of limestone, have a substantial appearance. The public buildings are fine. The library erected by the Emperor for the use of naval and military officers, is of Grecian architecture, and is elegantly fitted up internally. The books are principally confined to naval and military subjects, and the sciences connected with them; history, and some light reading. "The club-house is handsome externally, and comfortable within. It contains a large ball-room, which is its most striking feature, and billiard rooms, which appeared to be the great centres of attraction; but one looked in vain for reading-rooms, filled with newspapers and journals. There are many good churches; and a fine landing-place of stone from the military harbor, approached on the side of the town, beneath an architrave supported by high columns. It also boasts of an Italian opera-house, the first performance for the season at which took place during our visit; but we cannot say much for the singing, the company being third-rate, and the voice of the prima donna' very much resembling at times a cracked trumpet. "The eastern side of the town is so steep that the mast-heads of the ships cannot be seen until one gets close to them. Very beautiful views are obtained from some parts of the place, and it is altogether agreeably situated. A military band plays every Thursday evening in the public gardens, at which time the fashionables assemble in great numbers. "As Sevastopol is held exclusively as a military and naval position, commerce does not exist; the only articles imported by sea being those required for material of war, or as provision for the inhabitants and garrison. "On the eastern side of the military harbor, opposite to the town, is a line of buildings consisting of barracks, some storehouses, and a large naval hospital, which we inspected. The wards are good, but too much crowded; many of the arrangements are bad, and the ventilation in some parts exceedingly defective, the effluvia being most offensive. "Sevastopol is not the port of construction for ships of war: they are all built at Nicholiev, on the river Bug, as Petersburg is the building-place for Cronstadt. But here all repairs are done, and stores and materials of war in great quantity kept in the naval arsenal. The works that have been accomplished in the little port appropriated to this department are immense. The quays are well and strongly built of limestone, with granite copings, under the superintendence of an English master mason. Along the eastern quay were ten large stone buildings for storehouses, then in the course of construction, five of which were already finished. "But all other works sink into insignifi "To supply the basin, and thence the canal, the water is brought eleven miles by a beautiful aqueduct of stone, into which the Black river has been turned beyond Inkerman. This passes at one part through an excavated tunnel 900 feet long, and is constructed on arches in five or six other places. "To form a great reservoir, and thus to insure a constant supply of water, an enormous dike of stone, like those of the pools of Solomon, near Bethlehem, was built across a mountain gorge, but on a much more stupendous scale. Mr. William Upton superintended the engineering department, and the work was achieved with perfect success; proper sluices being constructed to prevent too great a pressure in case of unusually heavy rain. Soon after all was finished, however, a terrific thunder storm arose; the valley rapidly filled with water, and a great landslip from the side of the mountain took place; the sluices were thus blocked up, and the flood at last poured over the top, taking away tier after tier of stones, until there was left nothing of the work of years but a jumbled mass of ruin. When we stood upon the remaining portion of this masonry, and marked its extraordinary strength and solidity, we could scarcely comprehend how the rushing of any amount of water could have produced such results.* In order to make sufficient space for the docks, the canal of which leads from the southern extremity of the little port, it was necessary to cut away a portion of the mountain, and on the top of the great perpendicular wall thus made, now stands a massive pile of stone buildings, used as the sailors' winter barracks. In case of an enemy penetrating the dockyard port, these barracks might be held as a formidable position by men armed with the Minié rifle; and it has been suggested that a couple of line-of-battle ships in the basin, with their broadsides to the port, and commanding it, would also form a battery of great power. Thus, in an attack by sea alone on Sevastopol, every inch of ground would have to be contested. A large filter has been erected, from which pipes are carried to the quay, into which a stream has been turned from the aqueduct; and when a ship requires a supply of water, she or the tanked barges have only to go alongside, a hose is attached to the pipe, put on board, and the process is accomplished with the greatest facility and expedition. No expense has been spared to render this naval arsenal perfect; and we doubt whether, in many respects, there is another in Europe so convenient, always supposing the works projected to have been carried out. The streets of Sevastopol, as may be expected, teem with soldiers and sailors; indeed, no one unconnected with the services lives there, and all but Russians are discouraged or forbidden to do so. The Jews were at one time ordered away from it entirely, but some few have been allowed to return. It was said that no foreigners were permitted to remain there more than twenty-four hours; but during a sojourn of ten days we met with no interference, although we visited and curiously examined all parts of the town, and every thing worth seeing in it." "On leaving the harbor we had another opportunity of taking a general view of those extraordinary fortifications which we had previously examined in detail, both on shore and from boats; and our opinion was confirmed, that with all their defects, whether in scientific principles or in carelessness of construction, a great sacrifice of life would follow an attack by sea alone with our present armament. But there appears no reason why England and France, with the talent and resources they have at their disposal, should not with facility produce artillery of a weight and range so great as to batter down these fortresses in succession, while at the same time their own ships remained comparatively free from danger.' On the whole, we can highly recommend this volume to our readers. It is written in an easy and unaffected style, rising, when the occasion calls for it, to much animation and graphic power. 66 These remarks were written before the late experiments were performed with Mr. Lancaster's gun." From Eliza Cook's Journal. FRANCES BROWN, THE BLIND POETESS. FOR several years past the name of Frances Brown has been familiar to general readers. We believe it was in the columns of the Athenæum that many of her smaller poems first appeared. The pieces were dated "Stranorlar"-a place we had never before heard of -quite out of the beat of business life. It turned out, however, that there really was such a place in the country of Donegal, in the north of Ireland, and that Stranorlar could even boast of its post-office. We were very much struck by the verses published by Frances Brown in the Athenaum. There was something extremely fascinating about them, in their sweet melancholy, their saddened gayety, or their cheerful philosophy. There was something new about them, which interested us. They did not run in the common rut, but excited a novel sensation in the reading. Then their rhythm was excellent, a quality in which English verse is often deficient. Take as an example the following well-known lines by Frances Brown :- THE FIRST. The first, the first!—oh! naught like it The earliest storm that strips the tree, But never as at first. For many a bitter blast may blow Between us and the grave; Our first-born joy-perchance 'twas vain, But can rejoice no more. Life hath no glory to bestow Like it-unfallen, uncursed; There may be many an after-glow, But nothing like the first. The rays of hope may light us on Through manhood's toil and strife, But never can they shine as shone The morning-stars of life; Though bright as summer's rosy wreath, Though long and fondly nursed, Yet still they want the fearless faith Of those that blessed us first. Its first love, deep in memory, And thus, whate'er our onward way, Are with us to the last. These lines appeared in the "Keepsake" for 1843, then edited by the Countess of Blessington, and from a note added to the poem by the fair editress, we learnt for the first time that the authoress of the numerous verses in the Athenæum which we, in common with thousands more, had so greatly admired, were written by a blind girl! We immediately felt interested about the writer's history, and longed to know how, in a remote village in the north of Ireland, a young woman, deprived of most of the ordinary helps to knowledge, having no intercourse with nature except though books, and doomed to live in solitary darkness in the midst of the beauties of the external world, should nevertheless have reared a temple of beauty in her own mind, and found therein not only joy and rejoicing for herself but to all others whom the press has brought within reach of her utterances. The story of the inner life of such an one, if it could be related in all its fulness, were indeed most interesting as well as most instructive. In any case it is curious to watch a strong mind developing itself; but where, as in this case, it is under conditions of social and physical disadvantage so great, it is most profitable as an example even to those much more favorably circumstanced, to watch the ardent mind groping, by the aid of its strong instincts, through the darkness of which it was conscious, appropriating to itself every thing whence it could draw nourishment, in the barren elements by which it was surrounded, and seizing upon all that could help it onward, while, by its own undirected energies, it was struggling upwards to the light. Frances Brown is of humble birth. She was born at Stranorlar, in the county Donegal, where her father was postmaster, a humble man of small means, but respectable character. At eighteen months old Frances was seized by the small-pox in its severest form, and when she recovered from the disease, it was at the sacrifice of her sight. She has never since seen the light of day. Of her early calamity Miss Brown has no recollection; and no forms of the outer world have followed her into her world of darkened word unintelligible to me happened to reach my ear, I was careful to ask its meaning from any person I thought likely to inform me a habit which was probably troublesome enough to the friends method, I soon acquired a considerable stock of and acquaintances of my childhood; but by this words; and, when farther advanced in life, enlarged it still more by listening attentively to my young brothers and sisters reading over the tasks required at the village school. They were generally obliged to commit to memory a certain portion of the Dictionary and English Grammar, each day; and by hearing them read it aloud frequently for that purpose, as my memory was better than theirs (perhaps rendered so by necessity,) I learned the task much sooner than they, and frequently heard them repeat it. My first acquaintance with books was neccessarily formed amongst those which are most common in country villages. 'Susan Gray,' The Negro Servant,'The Gentle Shepherd,' Mungo Park's Travels,' and, of of my literary friends, for I have often heard course, Robinson Crusoe,' were among the first them read by my relatives, and remember to have taken a strange delight in them when I am sure they were not half understood. Books have been always scarce in our remote neighborhood, and were much more so in my childhood: but the into my hands. It was The Heart of Mid Lo meditations. The hues and shapes of things, craving for knowledge which then commenced, as they present themselves to human eyes, my own in those days, my only resource was borgrew with my growth; and, as I had no books of are to her an utter blank, even in memory. rowing from the few acquaintances I had, to some She has been spared that perplexity which of whom I owe obligations of the kind that will often haunts the blind who have lost their never be forgotten. In this way I obtained the sight later in life, in the baffled attempts to reading of many valuable works, though genesummon up and recover the faded impres- rally old ones:-but it was a great day for me sions and images of a past life; for of things when the first of Sir Walter Scott's works fell as seen by her infant eyes she has no recol-thian,' and was lent me by a friend whose family lection whatever, nor is she pursued by regret were rather better provided with books than most for the loss of that which she was too young to in our neighborhood. My delight in the work appreciate. The mind has thus been left more was very great, even then; and I contrived, by clear to act in the conditions to which it was means of borrowing, to get acquainted, in a very limited; and by devices of her own, by the short time, with the greater part of the works of its illustrious author-for works of fiction, about this promptings of a clear natural intellect, by a careful process of self-culture, she has been enabled to see into the world of thought, and made the unpromising soil about her yield intellectual fruit of the most delightful and profitable kind. We cannot better relate the story of Miss Brown's early education than in her own words: time, occupied all my thoughts. I had a curious read-namely, lying awake, in the silence of night, mode of impressing on my memory what had been and repeating it all over to myself. To that habit I probably owe the extreme tenacity of memory which I now possess; but, like all other good things, it had its attendant evil, for I have often thought it curious that, whilst I never forget any scrap of knowledge collected, however small, yet the common events of daily life slip from my mein"I recollect very little," she says, " of my infantory so quickly that I can scarcely find any thing years. I never received any regular education, but very early felt the want of it: and the first time I remember to have experienced this feeling strongly, was about the beginning of my seventh year, when I heard our pastor (my parents being members of the Presbyterian church) preach for the first time. On the occasion alluded to, I was particularly struck by many words in the sermon, which, though in common use, I did not then understand; and from that time adopted a plan for acquiring information on the subject. When a again which I have once laid aside. But this misfortune has been useful in teaching me habits of order. About the beginning of my thirteenth year, (continues Miss Brown,) I happened to hear a friend read a part of Barnes's History of the French War.' It made a singular impression on my mind; and works of fiction, from that time, began to lose their value, compared with the far more wonderful Romance of History. But books of the kind were so scarce in our neighborhood, that Hume's History of England,' and two or made my first acquaintance with the 'Iliad' It was like the discovery of a new world, and effected a total change in my ideas on the subject of poetry. There was, at the time, a considerable manuscript of my own productions in existence, which, of course, I regarded with some partiality; but Homer had awakened me, and, in a fit of sovereign contempt, I committed the whole to the flames. Soon after I had found the Iliad,' I borrowed a prose translation of Virgil,'—there being no poetical one to be found in our neighborhood; and in a similar manner made acquaintance with many of the classic authors. But after Homer's, the work that produced the greatest impression on my mind was Byron's Childe Harold.' The one had induced me to burn my first manuscript, and the other made me resolve against verse-making in future; for I was then far enough advanced to know my own deficiency three other works on the same subject, were all I could read, till a kind friend, who was then the teacher of our village school, obliged me with that voluminous work, The Universal History.' There I heard, for the first time, the histories of Greece and Rome, and those of many other ancient nations. My friend had only the ancient part of the work; but it gave me a fund of information which has been subsequently increased from many sources; and at present I have a tolerable knowledge of history. In the pursuit of knowledge, my path was always impeded by difficulties too minute and numerous to mention; but the want of sight was, of course, the principal one,-which, by depriving me of the power of reading, obliged me to depend on the services of others;-and as the condition of my family was such as did not admit of much leisure, my invention was early taxed to gain time for those who could read. I sometimes did the work assigned to them, or rendered them other-but without apparent means for the requisite little services; for, like most persons similarly placed, necessity and habit have made me more active in this respect than people in ordinary circumstances would suppose. The lighter kinds of reading were thus easily managed; but my young relatives were often unwilling to waste their breath and time with the drier, but more instructive works which I latterly preferred. To tempt them to this, I used, by way of recompense, to relate to them long stories, and even novels, which perhaps they had formerly read but forgotten; and thus my memory may be said to have earned supplies for itself. About the end of my fifteenth year, having heard much of the Iliad, I obtained the loan of Pope's translation. That was a great event to me; but the effect it produced on me requires some words of explanation. From my earliest years, I had a great and strange love of poetry; and could commit verses to memory with greater rapidity than most children. But at the close of my seventh year, when a few Psalms of the Scotch version, Watts' Divine Songs,' and some old country songs, (which certainly were not divine,) formed the whole of my poetical knowledge, I made my earliest attempt in versification -upon that first and most sublime lesson of childhood, the Lord's Prayer.' As years increased, my love of poetry, and taste for it increased also, with increasing knowledge. The provincial newspapers, at times, supplied me with specimens from the works of the best living authors. Though then unconscious of the cause, I still remember the extraordinary delight which those pieces gave me, and have been astonished to find that riper years have only confirmed the judgments of childhood. When such pieces reached me, I never rested till they were committed to memory: and afterwards repeated them for my own amusement, when alone, or during those sleepless nights to which I have been, all my life, subject. But a source of still greater amusement was found in attempts at original composition; which, for the first few years, were but feeble imitations of every thing I knew - from the Psalms' to Gray's Elegy. When the poems of Burns fell in my way, they took the place of all others in my fancy-and this brings me up to the time when I improvements. In this resolution I persevered for several years, and occupied my mind solely in the pursuit of knowledge; but owing to adverse circamstances, my progress was necessarily slow. Having, however, in the summer of the year 1840, heard a friend read the story of La Perouse,' it struck me that there was a remarkable similarity between it and the one related in an old country song called The Lost Ship,' which I had heard in my childhood. The song in question was of very low composition; but there was one line at the termination of each verse which haunted my imagination, and I fancied might deserve a better poem. This line, and the story of La Perouse,' together with an irresistible inclination to poetry, at length induced me to break the resolution I had so long kept; and the result was the little poem called La Perouse' [since published in Frances Brown's collection of poems and lyrics.] Soon after, when Messrs. Gunn and Cameron commenced the publication of their 'Irish Penny Journal,' I was seized with a strange desire to contribute something to its pages. My first contribution was favorably received, and I still feel grateful for the kindness and encouragement bestowed upon me by both the editor and the publishers. The three small pieces which I contributed to that work were the first of mine that ever appeared in print, with the exception of one of my early productions which a friend had sent to a provincial paper. The Irish Penny Journal' was abandoned on the completion of the first volume; but the publishers, with great kindness, sent me one of the copies, and this was the first book of any value that I could call my own! But the gift was still more esteemed as an encouragement-and the first of the kind." About this time Miss Brown, in her remote retreat, heard of the Athenæum, and probably desirous of obtaining access to a wider circle of readers, she addressed a number of her small pieces to the editor. Months passed, and she had given up all for lost, when at length the arrival of many numbers of the journal, and a letter from the editor, aston |