Vienna and Sebastopol both send us reports which torture ex-
pectation without assuaging it. The renewed bombardment has become a fact ; the assault is still an implied promise. The -vast preparations throughout the winter—tons of shot and shell carried up..to the heights, and the heavy guns and huge mortars placed in position from left to right of the attack—were brought into use on the 9th of April, in a line of fire stretching from Inkerman to Quarantine Bay at the sea corner of the Sebastopol waters. The authentic reports as yet received, alike from Allied and Russian sources, represent the advantage of the firing for three days and nights as remaining with the besiegers. Prince Gortschakoff admits a heavy loss from the fire of the first day and night. The French appear to have ruined much of the defences, and to have seized, held, and fortified advanced positions on their extreme right and on their left. A large body of Turks, picked men, and headed by Omar Pasha, from Eapatoria, have reinforced the Allied army before Sebastopol. Great confidence seems to be felt in the immediate result of this grand attack ; but the accounts are as yet too imperfect for us to judge the correctness of that confidence. At Vienna, some change seems to have taken place. Rumour says that Austria is "drawing back " ; and the Bear party on our Stook Exchange insist that Rumour is right. The actual posi- tion is of course a question of fact, which we shall learn before long; but no light is as yet thrown upon it, except the doubtful light of a peculiar silence in the official organs of the French and English Governments, and a peculiar difference between the lan- guage of the Moniteur and of the Emperor Napoleon. The diplo- matic chapter of the memoir on the progress of the war and the negotiations is directed particularly to show that there is a promise on the part of Austria to fulfil the treaty of December 2 by fighting, if Russia do not make peace on the four points, and that it is her interest to do so. In his speech at the Guildhall, Napoleon says nothing of Austria or " the Allies," though much of " the Western Powers."
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