Page:Memorials of Capt. Hedley Vicars, Ninety-seventh Regiment by Marsh, Catherine, 1818-1912.djvu/222

212 band who has been removed to a higher and belter world within a fortnight. Captain Craigie. R.E., we lost about ten days ago, Surely these are warnings to us. 'Prepare to meet thy God' is written as with the finger of God. May He himself prepare our souls, by fixing our wandering hearts more entirely on himself.

"The action of last night — I might almost dignify it by the name of 'battle' — has been a glorious and decisive victory. It was Inkermann on a small scale — an attack in very great force, and on all points; and everywhere they were beaten back with vigour and heavy loss. I saw at least three hundred Russian bodies lying on the field. We calculated that their loss must have exceeded twelve hundred men. The French lost five hundred, and the English four officers and about fifty men.

"Vicars was in the advanced parallel of our right attack, with a picquet of his regiment. The enemy attacked the French lines close alongside where he lay; a ravine only separated them. They at first drove back the French, and part of them then turned to their right, crossed the ravine, and took our trench in flank. We were unprepared, and at first thought the advancing body was one of the French; but Vicars found out they were the Russians, and ordered his men to lie down, and wait till they came within twenty paces. When the enemy was close enough, Vicars shouted, 'Now 97th, on your pins, and charge!' They poured in a volley, charged, and drove the Russians quite out of the trench. Vicars himself struck down two Russians, and was in the act of cutting down a third with his sword, when another man, who was quite close [for the coat was singed], fired. The ball entered his uplifted right arm, close to where it joins the shoulder, and he fell. The main artery was divided, and he must have bled to death in a few minutes.

"Thus his end was as peaceful and painless as a soldier's death could be; and nothing could have been more noble, devoted, and glorious than his conduct in this, his first and last engagement. Surely this must afford some consolation to those who loved him.

"He was universally beloved; and none can doubt who knew him that he is now in the presence of that great and holy God whom on earth he deeply loved, and earnestly and successfully sought to serve.