were anchored in their waters, while frigates and steamers and line-of-battle ships kept passing up and down in continuous streams, waking the echoes of the Dardanelles with endless salutes, not a being ever came down to glance at the scene. The old crones sat knitting in their dingy hovels; the men, i.e., the Greeks, slouched about the corners in their baggy breeches, and the pretty and dirty little children continued their games without showing the smallest sign of curiosity, though a whole fleet was blazing away its thunder in an Imperial welcome within a few yards of them. As for the Turks, they sat so obstinately on their shelves and smoked their apathetic pipes so pertinaciously--they were so determined in resenting the impulses of curiosity--that one's fingers were perpetually itching to indulge in the luxury of giving them a slap in the face, and it was all but impossible to resist the impulse of trying what effect a kick would have had in disturbing such irritating equanimity. There were no Chobham crowds to break the uniformity of the lines of military, but great numbers of the English soldiery, in their Sunday costume, turned out and "assisted" at the ceremony. Shortly before twelve o'clock, a brilliant staff--it did indeed literally blaze in gold and silver, brass and polished steel, as the hot sun played on rich uniforms and accoutrements--was visible coming up the valley from the direction of the town. They were preceded by four vedettes, French dragoons with brazen helmets and leopard-skin mountings; the various staff officers in advance; then Prince Napoleon, in the uniform of a Lieutenant-General, and General Canrobert, in full dress and covered with orders, on one side, and Sir George Brown on the other, both somewhat in the rear. The effect of the _cortége_ as it swept past, the vision of prancing horses and gorgeous caparisons, of dancing plumes, of gold and silver lace, of hussar, dragoon, artillery, rifle, Zouave, spahi, lancer, of officers of all arms, dressed with that eye to effect which in France is very just as long as men are on horseback, was wonderful. It flashed by like some grand procession of the stage, if one can so degrade its power and reality by the comparison. It was not gratifying to an Englishman to observe the red coatee and cocked hat; the gold epaulettes and twist of the British officers looked very ill amid all the variety of costume in which the French indulged, nor was it without reason that the latter complained they could not tell which was the general or which the captain by their uniforms.