The Court are exceedingly annoyed and alarmed at Raglan's failure; the Prince showed Clarendon (or told him of) a letter from Colonel Steele, who said that he had no idea how great a mind Raglan really had, but that he now saw it, for in the midst of distresses and difficulties of every kind in which the army was involved he was perfectly serene and undisturbed, and his health excellent! Steele meant this as a panegyric, and did not see that it really conveyed a severe reproach. The conviction of his incapacity for so great a command gains ground every day; he has failed in those qualities where everybody expected he would have succeeded best, even those who thought nothing of his military genius. But, having learnt what he knows of war under the Duke, he might at least have known how _he_ carried on war, and have imitated his attention to minute details and a general supervision of the different services, seeing that all was in order and the merely mechanical parts properly attended to on which so much of the efficiency as well as of the comfort of the army depended.[1] [Footnote 1: It may be proper to remark that a different and far more favourable view of Lord Raglan's capacity as a General will be found _infra_ at the beginning of Chapter XII. of this Journal, upon the evidence of Sir Edmund Lyons, who was entirely in the confidence of the Commander-in-Chief.] _January 19th._--We are still uncertain as to the real intentions of the Emperor of Russia, and whether he means to accept the terms offered by the Allies; but my own impression is that he will not accept them _in our sense_, and that he never will consent to the sacrifice of Sebastopol till we have taken the place and destroyed the fortifications, thereby rendering its dismantling a _fait accompli_. There is certainly nothing in the present state of our affairs which warrants our lofty pretensions, and the proposal of terms so humiliating to the Emperor. The only possible grounds that can be imagined for his acceptance are, his own knowledge of the state of his own country and of the resources he can command for carrying on the war, and a dispassionate and farsighted calculation of the disposition and of the resources of his opponents. It is not impossible that he may foresee that he must eventually succumb in a contest so unequal and in which the number of his enemies increases every day. He may deem it better to make certain sacrifices now, with the view of being able before long to retrieve his losses, than to expose himself to the chance and great probability of being obliged to make much greater sacrifices hereafter, and such as it will be more difficult for him to repair. The Duke of Bedford tells me that Aberdeen and Clarendon are both hopeless of peace, and that Lord John and Palmerston do not consider it so absolutely hopeless; Aberdeen says the negotiations will not last half an hour. ILL CONDUCT OF THE WAR.