Note 217 — Chapter VII · THE INVASION OF THE CRIMEA.

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).