Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 3.djvu/136

 110 BATTLE OF THE ALMA. CHAP. Codrinnton had come out to the East with no I • '. higher rank than that of a colonel;* and his simple forage-cap had not the significance of the hat and the flowing plumes, which would have shown men far from the spot that a general officer was on the top of the bank. There were soldiers, however, who gained the top almost at the same moment as their leader. First one here and there, then knots, then bevies of men clambered up. Hitherto, the knowledge that there was to be an advance beyond the bank had been confined to the people who chanced to be near Sir George Brown or General Codrington ; but those who heard the words or caught the meaning of the divisional general and the brigadier, hastened to give effect to the will of their chiefs by sending their words along the line. The Eoyal Fusiliers, being on the extreme right of Codrington's brigade, was beyond the reach LaryYca of his personal guidance, but Lacy Yea,+ who and his t i FusiiiLTs. commanded the regiment, w^as a man of an on- ward, fiery, violent nature, not likely to suffer his cherished regiment to stand helpless under muzzles pointed down on him and his people by the skirmishers close overhead. The will of a horseman to move forward, no less than his power Coldstream ; but the Brevet of the 20th of June deprived him of his command by making liim a Major-General. He, however, remained in the East as a traveller, and was appointed on the 1st of September to the command of the 1st Brigade of the Light Division. t Pronounced Yaw.
 * He had come out in command of the 1st battalion of the