Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 3.djvu/71

 BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 45 Europe had continued so long, that to many chap. men the si-dit was a new one ; and of the ' young soldiers who stood near, some imagined that their comrade had fallen down in a sudden fit; for they hardly yet hncw that for the most part, in modern warfare, death comes as though sent by blind chance, no one knows from whence or from whom. Since the enemy's artillery fire had now become AUai of our brisk, our leading infantry divisions were halted, siousor- 1 1 1 • 1 n n (Icred to lie and the men ordered to lie down, boon alter- down, wards, it was found that the 1st Division had also The First come within range, and it was then forthwith depioyt-a thrown into line. In preparing for this man- oeuvre, the Duke of Cambridge took care that ground should not be wanting. Both on his right and on his left he took more ground than had been occupied by the division which marched in his front. Whilst the Light Division in his front was jammed in and entangled with the 2d Division, the Duke had the happiness of seeing his Guards and Highlanders well extended, and competent to act along the whole length of that superb line. The effect of this deployment was, that the ex- treme right of the Duke's line became a force operating in support of the 2d Division, and that a part of his Highland Brigade, reaching much further eastward than the extreme left of the Light Division, became in that part of the field the true front of the British line. AVhen this manoeuvre v,;is completed, the men of the 1st Division hiv down.