The Government had been cautious, not to say timid; but they now entirely altered their demeanour. They suddenly became bold to the verge of rashness, and resolved at any price to take Sevastopol by a _coup de main_. It is true they were in complete ignorance of the strength, defences, armament, and capacity of that fortress; they knew little of its position, and nothing of the peninsula in which it is situated; and, while the transport of the army was more than defective, the commissariat and medical services were not in a much better condition. But these things seem to have pressed them lightly. Their opinion was strong, that Sevastopol was sure to fall, directly the Allied forces appeared before its ramparts; and its destruction, they doubted not, would bring about a peace, and cause the Tsar to relinquish his arrogant pretensions. As soon, therefore, as the raising of the siege of Silistria put an end to the war on Ottoman territory, they hastened to frame a despatch to Lord Raglan, dated June 29th, directing that an expedition against Sevastopol should be prepared. The despatch was so worded, that it left the British Commander little option but to comply. He therefore accepted the arduous undertaking which was pressed upon him, though he did so very much against his better judgment, and he announced his intention to the Government in a letter, dated July 19th.[217] It was early in September, as we have seen, before the armada was ready to sail from Varna. ----- Footnote 217: Kinglake, ii. 115, etc. It is not without interest to observe, that the draft of the despatch of June 29th, was submitted to the Cabinet the day before, and that it passed without modification or even comment. Mr. Kinglake tells us that the Ministers, upon whom devolved the momentous duty of directing the course of military operations at this critical time, “were overcome with sleep; ... the despatch, though it bristled with sentences tending to provoke objection, received from the Cabinet the kind of approval which is often awarded to an unobjectionable sermon” (_Ibid._, 94). -----