Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 3.djvu/227

 15ATTLF, OF THE ALMA. 201 battalions belonged to the Kazan regiment — a cilAP. corps which loyal Paissians had patience to call ' 'the llegiinent of the Grand Duke ]Iicliael.' After having marched down some way, the column came to a halt. It was then that, for the first time in that war, the soldiery of the Western Powers were bronght so near to a body of Piussian troops as to be able to scrutinise its material. The men of the column were of high stature and strictly upright, with broad, plain, whitish faces, all seemingly cast in a common mould, and very similar the one to the other. The long grey over- coat, worn alike by all the officers and men of the Eussian forces, and reaching down to the ankles, gave no clue to distinguish this mass from any other of the Czar's battalions ; but spiked helmets, glittering with burnished plates of brass, led some of the English to imagine that the column formed part of the Emperor's guard* The body was formed with great precision in close column, with a front of only one company ; but a chain of skirmishers thrown out on either flank in prolongation of the front rank, sought to combine with the solid formation of the column some of the advantages of an array in line. 7 The steady men were in the Imperial Guard in the Crimea. + The advantages of this hybrid formation were strongly urged about the middle of the last century by General Lloyd, an Englishman. General Lloyd was an officer in the service of Rus.sia, and it seems probable that the formation, of which he was a vehement advocate, may have teen adopted in the Russian service in consequence of his advice.
 * The notion was altogether ill-founded, there being none of