Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 6.djvu/287

 THK MAIN FIGHT. 243 to drive a bayonet through ilie Russian greatcoat; chap. and if piercing this tough, woollen armour a man ' should so use his strength as to transfix the trunk zd/^eriod of his adversary, and drive the blade home to its socket, this very success, it was likely, would make him, for the moment, defenceless ; because he might find — as did Hilton Sayer when he thus killed his man — that it was a hard task to with- draw the imbedded steel. Men speak to an in- stance of two foes slaying each other, for a Grena- dier named Sellars was run through, they declare, by a bayonet at the moment when he with his bayonet ran through that very assailant ; so that one and the other alike fell back with a groan ; and, the body of each proving tenacious of his antagonist's steel, whilst the hands of both loosed their grasp, it resulted that the two men in dying made a ghastly exchange of their firelocks. Private PuUen so fought as to win the admiration of his captain for exceeding bravery ; and indeed the man's coolness in danger left him time and inclination to indulge his cynical humour; for whilst still in the turmoil of the fight, though at a moment when the pressure of close bodily struggles was a little relaxed, he affected to become fastidiously disdainful of the Russians herded close in his front, declaring he would shoot nothing less than a general, and sarcasti- cally adjusting the sight of his firelock to a range of 300 yards. As for Bancroft, he had not been quelled ; for although, as we saw, he staggered back a few