Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 3.djvu/229

 BATTLH OF THE ALMA. 203 though it were a workl too scant for the strength chap. of the man and the passion that raged within '_^ him ; but wlien he turned, his dark eyes yiehled lire, and all the while from his deep-chiselled, merciless lips, there pealed the thunder of im- precation and command. "Wherever the men had got clustered together, there, fiercely coming, he Avedged his cob into the tliick of the crowd — the 'rooge' he would call it, in his old Eton idiom of speech — and by dint of ^vill tore it asunder. Though he could nut form an even array, yet he disentangled the thickest clusters of the soldiery, and forced the men to open out into a lengthened chain, approaching to line formation. Numbers of the Fusiliers were wanting, and, on the other hand, there were mingled with the battalion many of the soldiery of other regiments. With a force in this state, Yea was not in a condition to attempt a charge or any other combined movement. All he could hope to be able to do was to keep his people firm on their ground, to hinder them from contracting their front or gathering into heavy clusters, and then leave every man to make the best use he could of his riile. Continental generals would not easily believe that, upon fair, open ground, there could be a doubtful conflict between, on the one side, a body of fifteen hundred brave, steady, disciplined sol- diers, superbly massed in close column, and on the other a loose knotted chain of six or seven hundred light-infantry men without formation. Yet the fight was not so uner[ual as it seemed.