He replied, that to be taken into Sebastopol, or even to be led nearer, required that the eyes of myself and the drummer should be blindfolded, to which I assented; and he proceeded carefully to muffle Dicky Roll and me in such a manner as to place us in utter darkness. He then gave me his arm, I took the drummer by the hand, and in this grotesque fashion, which excited some laughter in the trenches, the trio proceeded, stumbling and awkwardly, towards the city. I heard the increasing buzz of many voices around us, the unbarring of a heavy wicket, the clatter of musket-butts on the pavement, and occasionally a hoarse order or word of command issued in what seemed the language of necromancy. Caissons, and wagons heavily laden, rattled along the streets; I felt that I was _inside_ Sebastopol; but dared not without permission unbind my eyes, save at the risk of being run through the body by this fellow in the long coat, or made a prisoner of war, and despatched towards Perecop with my hands tied to the mane of a Cossack pony. The sensation and the conviction were most tantalising; but I was compelled to submit, and knew that we were proceeding through the thoroughfares of that place towards which I had daily turned my field-glass with the most intense curiosity, and which we knew to be one vast garrison rather than a town, with whole streets of barracks, arsenals, and government houses. A change of sounds and of atmosphere warned me that we were within doors. My guide withdrew the bandages, and then Dicky and I looked around us, dazzled with light, after being in darkness for nearly half an hour. I was in a large whitewashed room, plainly furnished, uncarpeted, heated by a stove of stone in one corner, with an _eikon_ in another. On the table of polished deal lay some books, a copy or two of the _Invalide Russe_, the _Moskauer Zeitung_, Panaeff's _Russian Snobs_, the vernacular for that familiar word being _khlishch_. On the walls hung maps and documents--orders of the day, perhaps--in Russian. Through the two large windows, which we were warned not to approach, I obtained a glimpse of the hill on which the residence of Prince Menschikoff was situated. On one side I saw that the streets ran in parallel lines down to the water edge; on the other to where the new naval arsenals lay, in the old Tartar town which was known by the name of Achtiare in the days of Thomas Mackenzie, the Scoto-Russian admiral who first created Sebastopol, and whose _khutor_, farm or forest for producing masts, excited so much speculation among our Highland Brigade. Everywhere I saw great cannon bristling, all painted pea-green, with a white cross on the breech.