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The next letter from the Crimea – that by Alfred Bryant – while it supplies additional interesting items concerning Sebastopol, verifies all that Lieut. Harkness had previously said about the ruined town and the effect of the bombardment. In his letter, which was commenced on the 2nd of October and not finished till the 13th, he says – “Dear Brother and Sister. – I have managed to snatch a few moments to write to you; for we are very busy to prevent a repetition of last winter’s misery and disaster. We are employed from morning till night, not in the heart-breaking work of the trenches, but in building huts, making roads, &c., which is easy compared with the other. I have seen the account in the papers of the fall of Sebastopol and of the rejoicing in England on the receipt of the news. I also saw Prince Gortschakoff’s account in which he states that he left 100 killed behind; but what he called 100 we should call between 2,000 and 3,000. I went down into the town the day after I sent you the last letter. It was horrifying to see the mutilated masses of what had once been men; they lay in heaps and rows all about the place – some in out of the way corners, where the poor wounded fellows had crawled to and died. Many of them were in an advanced state of decomposition, from which the stench was overpowering. Scarcely a house but had felt the effects of our shots pretty severely. The Russians, too, had destroyed almost everything they could before they left the town. The number of guns and the quantity of shot is enormous. The masts of the sunken ships are seen above the water in the harbour, where I have had a good swim. Several infernal machines have been picked up. Powder, both loose and in bags, lies scattered about everywhere, and many places are supposed to be mined; in fact the town is mined in all directions. I have made a collection of the different kinds of Russian bullets for you; also of the different sorts of coins current among us. These are Turkish, Russian, Sardinian, Greek, Austrian, and several others. I have also a Russian book and a couple of pictures, and I hope to be spared to bring them home. This sheet of paper and the order I got out of Fort Nicholas, in Sebastopol. I received my medal on the 6th. I have got a few pounds in the Regimental Savings Bank. E... will not have it, as she says she can earn enough herself, and is sure I must want it here; but I think it will be of more use in England, and I can do well enough without it. I don’t know if I told you, but before I left England she gave me a gold ring. I always wore it till one night in the trenches, a shot pitched close to me, driving the stones in all directions, one of which hit the ring, broke it in two, and imbedded it in the flesh; and, but for the ring, my finger would have been broken. I sent one piece to her, and the other I have. It is expected that we shall have a brush shortly on the Tchernaya. Our ships are all-