The Sun.
London, England, 1855-11-14 00:00:00

SEBASTOPOL.

Drawn by Carlo Bassoli.
Published by Paul and Dominic Colnaghi.

The most brilliant panoramic view of the Town and
Harbour cf Sebastopol yet published, is the noble
coloured lithograph here presented to the English multi-
tude, as another of the " authentic series," issued perio-
dically from the press by the Messrs. Colnaghi. It por-
trays in one ample view the whole of that now memor-
able and historic scene, from Fort Alexander, on one
side, to Cemetery Fort, on the opposite extremity. It
represents Sebastopol as it was—before the siege. Not
as it is now—a heap of blood-stained ruins. It was taken
originally in those quieter times before the cannonading had
commenced, before the war, in fact, had been well dreamt of
—pencilled calmly on the Watch Tower in the centre of
the city by Carlo Bossoli. The spectacle rolled out be-
fore us on this ample scroll is that, indeed, of a noble
city, wonderful in very many particulars—wonderful in
its general beauty, in the picturesqueness of its situation,
in the splendour and magnitude of its fortifications.
Wonderful, too, by reason of its orderly arrangement,
its extraordinary cleanliness, and here and there for the
palatial magnificence of its architectural decorations.
The red-tiled roofs, the fresh green trees, the blue waters
of the various inlets of the Euxine, the yellowish tint of
the stone buildings, the tracery of broad and nu-
merous streets, all sparkling and bright in the
Crimean sunshine —are among the number of the
objects lending their united charms to this beautiful
coloured lithograph of the Town and Harbour of Sebas-
topol. It is altogether impossible to view the picture
without peculiar interest, or to muse over it without ex-
periencing emotions of a very profound and solemn cha-
racter. For—since the original drawing was first pen-
cilled, the drawing from which this lithograph has been
taken—what events have not transpired there in that
famous city, that city beleaguered for a whole year by
the united armies of France and England ! What lives
have not been lavished in its defence and its assault !
What agonies endured by besieged and besiegers ! What
hopes and fears have not been experienced since then
within its precincts ! Added to all which, the thought
that the place virtually no longer exists; being nowadays
a blackened mass of charred timber aad shattered ma-
sonry, instead of—as it was then —one of the most splen-
did and formidable seaports in the world. See transit
gloria mundi—" so the world wags !" Prince Menschi-
koff and Admiral Nachimoff, the Russian fleet, and for the
most part, too, the Russian army, in like manner have all
passed away during the dread interval. Sinope is no longer
unavenged. The war-vessels of the Muscovite navy in
the Black Sea are all either burnt or sunk—maritime
force, for that matter, the Czar has now no longer. Be-
sides which, he has had reft from him not only his impe-
rial navy in those waters, but with it also the huge for-
tified seaport of Sebastopol—until now the great stand-
ing menace of Christendom. Altogether, therefore, it is
by no means with emotions of grief, or even of awe
alone, that we cast our eyes upon this superb panoramic
sketch of the terrible advanced post of Russia on its
road to Constantinople—as it appeared, at least once
upon a time, in the days when Sebastopol was really in
existence--on the contrary, the feelings predominant in
our heart, as we gaze, are those, rather, of reverent gra-
titude and earnest exultation.