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 BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 251. tary speech, he 'brought forward his right shoul- chap. ' der.' * Still respecting the presence of the ' defeated Kazan troops, he did not carry this man- oeuvre so far as to place his battalion bodily on the flank of the Vladimir column ; but he carried it far enough to make the column a mark for the troops which formed his left wing. The Vladimir Column. I Grenadier Guards. Vladimir was wrapped in fire ; was wrapped in that fire which is hardly tolerable to soldiery massed in column — fire poured upon its flank.^f Colonel Hood, dated the day after the battle. One of the characteristics yhich can hardly fail to interest any one who has had the advantage of reading Colonel Hood's letters, is the exceeding modesty which makes him continuall}' seek to ascribe all merit to others rather than to himself. Thus, although, in hurriedly writing the six words above quoted, he chanced to use the first person, he hastened, in a subsequent letter from the banks of the Alma, to give the whole merit of the man- ceuvre to the battalion. He writes, 'Instinctively our men biought right shoulders forward.' — Note to ith Edition. t ' Instinctively our men brought right shoulders forward, ' and commenced file-firing with such coolness and accuracy ' that the effect was instantaneous. They [the Eussians] were ' checked perceptibly with astonishment at the telling nature of our flank-fire.' N.B. — The word which I have Titten ' per- ' ceptibly ' seems in the original to have the syllable ' im ' at its commencement, but I imagine that the word as I have written it was the one intended.- -iVbie to ith Edition.
 * 'I brought up my right shoulder.' — Private letter from