Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 5.djvu/175

 THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. 153 assailants, and take his revel of battle in a spirit oh A P as fond as at the beginning, yet by this time less '_ anxious, less fierce, less diligent. Those truculent Scots, who had cut their way in without speaking, were now, whilst they fought, hurrahing. The din of sheer fighting had swelled into the roar of a tumult. Alexander Miller, the acting Adjutant of the Greys, was famous in his regiment for the mighty volume of sound which he drove through the air when he gave the word of command.* Over all Efforts °, . made to the clangour of arms, and all the multitudinous «iiy the T ■■ Greys. uproar, his single voice got dominion. It thun- dered out, ' Rally ! ' Then, still louder, it thun- dered, ' The Greys ! ' f The Adjutant, as it chanced, was so mounted that his vast, superb form rose high over the men of even his own regiment, and rose higher still over the throng of the Russians. Seized at once by the mighty sound, and turning to whence it came, numbers of the Scots saw their towering Adjutant with his reeking sword high in the air, and again they heard him cry, ' Rally ! ' — again hurl his voice at ' The Greys ! ' He did not speak in mere vehemence, like one who, although he cry ' Rally ! ' means only a war- cry or cheer. He spoke as an officer delivering voice could make itself heard, but I may so far venture as to say that the distance was such as to he computed by the mile. t It seems that, even when this regiment is addressed in the vocative case, it is customary to retain the definite article, and address it as ' The Greys.'
 * I dare not speak of the distance at which, as I learn, his