21 G EFFECT PRODUCED BY THE CHAP. Bucharest, people no longer tliouoht of the Czar XIII . L_ as they thought of him eight months before ; and the glory of thus breaking down the mili- tary reputation of Eussia is due of right, not to the Governments nor the armies of Fi'ance oi England, but to the warlike prowess of the Otto- man soldiery, and the ten or twelve resolute Englishmen who cheered and helped and led them. The failure of the attempted invasion was almost instantly followed by the relinquishment of Moldavia and Wallachia. The Emperor Nicho- las, as we saw, had been placed by Austria under the stress of a peremptory summons requiring him to withdraw from the Principalities; and the demand being supported by powerful bodies of troops, which threatened the flank of the intruding army, the Czar was schooled at last, and compelled to see that he must surrender his hold of the provinces which lie had chosen to call his ' material guarantee' Thus, by the course of the events which fol- lowed it, the Czar's last defeat on the Danube was made to appear more signal than it really was. Of course, men versed in war and in poli- tics knew that causes of a larger kind than a few hours' fight at Giurgevo were bringing about the abandonment of the Principalities ; but people who drew their conclusions from the mere ad- vance and retreat of armies, and from the issue of battles, were left to infer that the once-dreaded Emperor of the Eussias was chased from the
