The Express.
London, England, 1857-11-16 00:00:00

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LONDON, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 16.

IN oar estimation, the most interesting letters
from the seat of war are those which are certain not
to be published, at least so long as any of the pre-
sent generation survive. The letters we mean us
these written on the eve of battle, or at the moment
when our breaching batteries were first opened on
the walls of Delhi—letters which contain no cura-
tive, but are simply an outpouring of the affections
in a moment of dread solemnity. Having been fa.
Toured with a perusal of • conaiderable number of
each letters, we have been deeply impressed with the
devoted family affection, the manly purity of mind, and
thesarnestAnostentatious religious feeling which they
. .

show to be the prevailing characteristios of the English
officers at present serving in India. They are filled
is a great Leann with touching reminisoenees of
wine and children, with arrangements for their
future benefit, and with such exclusively domestic
details. And mingled with these are frequent paren-
thetical remarks, indicating rather than expressing
the entire reliance of the writer on Divine prottc-
ties, and submission to His wise decrees. There is
a simplicity, an absence of all emphasis, a convenes,-
tional tone, in the expressions which bespeak since-
rity—which convey the idea of men whose happiness
has through life been sought and found in the inno-
cent relations of the family circle ; who are capable of
attachment as pm as it is enduring; and who can
rise on emergencies from mere fathers of families
into fearless and energetic Christian heroes. The
letters which have suggested these remarks add little
or nothing, it is true, to our knowledge of the pro-
gress of events ; but they do more—they afford vs
glimpses into the living spirit which animates and
imparts a character to these events. It is from such
men and such feelings that the true greatness of
England springs.

Hero and there we find an incidental sentence—
dropped, ma it were, unoonacionaly trona the pen of the
writer—which conveys a more picturempte idea of the

circumstances in which the letiers were written than
the most laboured description could. For example,
in one—which would appear to have been actually
written in one of the breaching batteries—we read,
under the date of the 13th of September—. We are
"on the eve of a great crisis. Our breaching bat-
" teries are playing upon the city walls ; and we
" can hear every salvo followed by the rattling of
" stones and the crashing of parapets, as they are
" destroyed under every discharge." This was the
position when the work wu scarcely well begun.
In another letter, of the 26th, we find the writer
pausing to look back on the strength of
the impedimenta he and his comrades had
surmounted :—" The ignorance of the strength
" of the fortifications of Delhi by the authori-
" ties both in England and India is most sin-
" gular. It has been fortified by our own engineers.
" and made as strong as en irregular fortification
" could well be. It is a very strong place of the se-
" cud class, with flanking defences, a deep ditch, and
" a perfect glacis." When our readers keep in mind
that this stronghold was amply stored with arms and
ammunition, and defended by men who could ties
their arms well, and knew that there was no hope
for quarter, they will credit the statement of the
writer of the above, that—" Old Crimeans allow

" that Indian warfare is no child's play."
From Lucknow we have as yet no such records
of individual feeling. When they do arrive, theirs
will be a yet more deeply tragic tale of the sickening
of hope deferred, of prolonged passive endurance, of
the prospect of unutterable suffering. If it be true—as
we are enured on good authority it ifs—that General
HAVELOCK has a daughter in Lucknow, what must
have been the feelings of the father at the moment
when he was compelled to retreat without achieving
the relief of the Residency ! What we do at pre-
sent know of the position of our countrymen and
countrywomen there is calculated to wind up our
feelings of anxious expectation to a painful degree
of intensity. We only know that not only the efficient
men of the garrison, but the sick and wounded, and
the women and children, must yet awhile remain
there, begirt with innumerable foes. Their state of
complete isolation is painfully suggested by some
letters from Cawnpore. " Since the 22nd," we
read in a letter written on the 30th of September,
" no vestige of news from the army has reached us.
" They ploughed a way through the tide of rebellion
" which overflows Oude, bat the waters have closed
" again, and we have no means of hearing from
" them or communicating with them. Yesterday
" 100 men, natives sent to bold Oonao and keep open
" the communication with Lneknow, were cat up
"by the rebels almost to a man. To-day
" our Cossids have returned with 'no news.' We
" have heard heavy firing, but nothing is certain."
And, again, on the Ist of October: "A salute has
" announced that Laeknow is in our hands. It seems
" that, although many Weide bare been despatched
" from General HAvaLocx's camp, the enemy have
" kept up such a strict blockade in the rear of his
" force that to pass was impossible. Even now they
" are in great force at Oonaol and Basratganj, and
" we expect to move out to-night, with 300 men and
" two gum, to escort provisions intended to meet
" them on the road. We fear the force most be
"running short, as they took with them only
" fifteen days' provisions, and ten days have already
" elapsed." In all probability when this was written
the force under Sir JANES OUTRAN (who is under-
stood to have assumed the command as soon as
Lneknow was entered) was already far advanced on
its return to Cawnpore. The chance is that its
retreat would be mach more harassed than its ad.
ranee. And the English left behind in Lacknow,
through the destruction of the assailants' batteries