Page:The Letters Of Queen Victoria, vol. 3 (1908).djvu/16

2. Decisive successes were next obtained at Balaklava on the 25th of October, and at Inkerman on the 5th of November; but on the 14th a fierce gale did immense damage to life and property, both at Balaklava and on the sea. Meanwhile, indignation at home was aroused by the tidings of the breakdown of the commissariat and transport departments, and the deplorable state of the hospitals; Miss Florence Nightingale, who had sailed from England with a number of nurses, arrived at Scutari early in November, and proceeded to remedy deficiencies as far as possible; while Lord John Russell vainly urged on the Premier the substitution of Lord Palmerston for the Duke of Newcastle as Secretary for War. Sir Charles Napier, who, previously to his departure with the Baltic Fleet, had been féted at the Reform Club, and extravagantly lauded by Cabinet Ministers, was by the month of October engaged in a recriminatory correspondence with the First Lord of the Admiralty. At about the same time the Patriotic Fund was established under the presidency of Prince Albert.

In Parliament, the last vestige of the old Navigation System, limiting the coasting trade to British ships, was repealed, and a Bill also passed for preventing corrupt practices at elections. Owing to the war, the Reform Bill was withdrawn, Lord John Russell, on announcing the fact in Parliament, being overcome, and giving way to tears. In the short session, which took place during the latter half of December, a Foreign Enlistment Act was passed, providing for a force of 10,000 foreigners, to be drilled in this country.

The Exhibition Building, which had been constructed in Hyde Park in 1851, and had been re-erected at Sydenham, was opened with great ceremony by the Queen, and was henceforth known as the Crystal Palace.