Soyer's Culinary Campaign: Being Historical Reminiscences of the Late War.: With The Plain Art of Cookery for Military and Civil Institutions

was of great importance and assistance to me in removing the stoves from one regiment to another. I here take the opportunity of thanking those gentlemen, whose kindness almost made me forget, as far as business was concerned, the worthy Colonel Halliwell, who had removed his head-quarters to Balaklava, and pitched his tent upon the top of the hill facing the Genoese Tower, called the Marine Heights. The Ordnance-house was his place of business and mess-room; but now and then the warrior gourmet elevated the gastronomic art to the highest pitch by giving small parties on the summit or pinnacle of the rocky mountain. This was the case one day when I called. The gallant colonel was very busy embarking troops, but found twenty minutes’ spare time, in which he concocted the most delicious _Mayonnaise de homard_ I ever tasted, and which was partaken of by two Russian lady visitors. They were mother and daughter, of high birth, and accompanied by a Russian officer. The party had accepted the colonel’s invitation when he visited Bakschiserai. The elder lady was one of the maids of honour to the Dowager Empress of Russia. The lunch, though soon over, was exquisite, the colonel’s servant being every bit as good a judge of good things as his master. The champagne was as good as the Mayonnaise. As the colonel had to attend to business after lunch, the Russian officer, Colonel Halliwell’s aide-de-camp, two friends, and myself, had the pleasure of accompanying the ladies for a walk. Nothing proved more interesting to them than a visit to the Sanatorium Hospital, in hopes of seeing Miss Nightingale, of whom they had heard much. The former they saw, and were much pleased with it; but the good lady, to their chagrin, was absent at the Monastery. They consoled themselves by looking round her hut; but there was nothing to distinguish it from the others: it was, indeed, worse built, having been put up in a hurry. Their enthusiasm was the pure effect of imagination; and had we pointed out any other as the residence of that lady,