e received the Garter; he died in
1861.]

[Footnote 99: This reform was effected in 1905.]

_Queen Victoria to Lord Panmure._

WINDSOR CASTLE, _22nd December 1855_.

The Queen has received Lord Panmure's answer to her letter from
Osborne, and is glad to see from it that he is quite agreed with the
Queen on the subject of the Land Transport Corps. She would _most
strongly_ urge Lord Panmure to give at once _carte blanche_ to Sir
W. Codrington to organise it as he thinks best, and to make him
personally responsible for it. We have only eight weeks left to the
beginning of spring; a few references home and their answers would
consume the whole of that time! The Army has now to carry their huts
on their backs up to the Camp; if it had been fighting, it would have
perished for want of them, like the last winter. If each Division,
Brigade, and Battalion has not got within itself what it requires for
its daily existence in the field, a movement will be quite impossible.

The Queen approves the intended increase of Artillery and Sappers
and Miners; but hopes that these will be taken from the _nominal_ and
_not_ the existing strength of the Army.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

TO CHAPTER XXV

After two years' duration, the Crimean War was terminated in March
1856, at a Conference of the Powers assembled at Paris, by a treaty
the principal terms of which provided for the integrity of Turkey,
and her due participation in the public law and system of Europe,
the neutralisation of the Black Sea, and the opening of its waters to
commerce (with the interdiction, except in a limited degree, of the
flag of war of any nation, and of the erection by either Russia or
Turkey of arsenals), free navigation of the Danube, cession of a
portion of Bessarabia by Russia, and the reciprocal evacuation of
invaded territories; the Principalities to be continued in their
existing privileges under the suzerainty of the Porte and a guarantee
of the Contracting Powers. No European protectorate was to be
established over the Sultan's Christian subjects. Certain general
principles of International Law were also agreed upon. In the course
of the summer, the Guards made a public re-entry into London; and the
Crimea was finally evacuated; great reviews of the returned troops
taking place at Aldershot. The thanks of Parliament were accorded to
the soldiers and sailors engaged, and peace-rejoicings celebrated on a
great scale.

The Commi