Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/256

 212 THE BATTLE OF INKERMAN. CHAP. VI. 2d Period. The Russians overthrown on each fron* by the Guards. Seventh capture of the Sandbag Battery. Cessation of the enemy's retreat. His return to the conflict. battalion uttered its will in a burst of hurrahs, sprang forward with bayonets down, and drove straight at the hapless crowd of soldiery who, instead of attacking, had submitted to be at- tacked where they stood, with the parapet of the Battery in their rear. They broke and fled ; but this was not all that resulted, for the enemy's forces on the north front, bending under the force put upon them by the Scots Fusiliers, were in- volved in the common overthrow. Of the men falling back into the gorge of the Battery very many were obstructed in their flight by its para- pet ; and, some of these standing at bay, it was not without hand-to-hand fighting and slaughter that the Grenadiers put down all resistance and resumed their hold of the work. Our men were not in so orderly a state that at the will of a commander they could be brought back from the false position of the reconquered Battery to better ground in its rear ; but, for the present, at least, their officers were able once more to withhold them from a ruinous pursuit down the steeps ; and the enemy understanding the impunity thus conceded to him soon stayed his flight. His retreating masses dropped no further down the hillside than was needed for the attainment of shelter, and the ground close outside the Battery, if ever abandoned at all, was quickly repeopled by troops crowding under its parapet. Soon again, as had happened before, there were Kussians firing into the work through its two embrasures or over the parts of the para-