In the chap­ter titled “On the Scent,” dat­ed March 3, John Delane, the edi­tor of the *Times* of Lon­don, per­ceives that polit­i­cal ten­sion in Amer­i­ca is esca­lat­ing to a point where vio­lence might erupt. This con­flict, par­tic­u­lar­ly between the South­ern States and the Union fol­low­ing Lincoln’s elec­tion, could make for cap­ti­vat­ing news for his read­er­ship, par­tic­u­lar­ly those in Eng­land who might take some sat­is­fac­tion in Amer­i­ca’s strife.

To grasp the sit­u­a­tion first­hand, he decides to send Sir William Howard Rus­sell, a cel­e­brat­ed reporter known for his vivid accounts, par­tic­u­lar­ly from the Crimean War, to observe the tumul­tuous events in Amer­i­ca. Rus­sell had ini­tial­ly hes­i­tat­ed to accept the assign­ment, being con­cerned about his wife’s health and enjoy­ing a com­fort­able domes­tic life. He had spent years cov­er­ing var­i­ous con­flicts across the globe and was now immersed in the lit­er­ary cir­cles of Lon­don, social­iz­ing with notable fig­ures like Thack­er­ay and Dick­ens. How­ev­er, upon Thack­er­ay’s insis­tence that he must trav­el to learn about the unfold­ing cri­sis, Rus­sell con­cedes to the assign­ment.

He embarks on the steamship *Ara­bia* from Queens­land, Ire­land, along­side South­ern pas­sen­gers, includ­ing a for­mer U.S. Lega­tion mem­ber who joined the Con­fed­er­a­cy and Colonel Robert S. Gar­nett, a Vir­gin­ian offi­cer deter­mined to resign to fight for the South. Through these inter­ac­tions, Rus­sell gath­ers insight into the South­ern per­spec­tive on the con­flict. Gar­nett express­es a belief in a hier­ar­chy sup­port­ing slav­ery, view­ing it as a “divine insti­tu­tion,” denounc­ing equal­i­ty as a doc­trine and express­ing deep dis­dain for the North­ern states.

Dur­ing the four­teen-day voy­age, Rus­sell learns about the crit­i­cal issue con­cern­ing the own­er­ship of two fed­er­al prop­er­ties: Fort Pick­ens and Fort Sumter. He notes in his diary that there is wide­spread spec­u­la­tion about how the U.S. Gov­ern­ment will respond to the threats posed by the South­ern states, which have vowed to resist any attempts to sup­ply or rein­force fed­er­al gar­risons. Amidst this ten­sion, the Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ment appears par­a­lyzed, unable to pro­vide lead­er­ship as its sol­diers nav­i­gate the pre­car­i­ous sit­u­a­tion inde­pen­dent­ly.