" By sheer steel and sheer courage Enuiskillener and Scot were winning their desperate way right through the enemy's squadrons, and already grey horses and red coats had appeared right at the rear of the second mass, when, with irresistible force, like one bolt from a bow, the 1st Royals, the 4th Dragoon Guards, and the oth Dragoon Guards, rushed at the remnants of the first line of the enemy, went through it as though it were made of pasteboard, and, dashing on the second body of Russians as they were still disordered by the terrible assault of the Greys and their companions, put them to utter rout. This Russian horse, in less than five minutes after it met our Dragoons, was flying with all its speed before a force certainly not half its strength. A cheer burst from every lip; in the enthusiasm oflSicers and men took off their caps and shouted with delight, and, thus keeping up the scenic character of their position, they clapped their hands again and again.
" Lord Raglan at once despatched Lieutenant Curzon, Aide-de-Camp, to convey his congratulations to Brigadier-General Scarlett, and to say * Well done! ' The gallant old officer's face beamed with pleasure when he received the message. ' I beg to thank his Lordship very sincerely,' was his reply. The Cavalry did not long pursue their enemy. Their loss was very slight, about thirty-five killed and wounded in both affairs. There were not more than four or five men killed outright, and our most material loss was from the cannon playing on our Heavy Dragoons afterwards, when covering the retreat of our Light Cavalry.
SECOND CHARGE OF THE GUARDS
AT THE BATTLE OF INKEEMANN.
The Battle of Inkermann has already been described at length in another part of this work. Mr. Simpson has chosen for delineation in this view the moment when the Guards, reinforced after their first check, are making their second successful charge into the well-known Sandbag Battery, from which they had been driven at an earlier period of the day by overwhelming numbers.
The rear and flanks of the battery as Avell as the sides of the steep ridge above the Tchernaya are crowded with the innumerable hosts of o»»<
[fragment illegible in the scan of the first edition]
the Russian infantry, whose closely-packed columns in vain struggle to keep at bay the thinned but undaunted line of their resolute assailants. Already the contest is becoming hand-to-hand, and the foreground is filled with a melee of Russians and Grenadiers, clubbing their muskets, and interchanging bayonet thrusts, as they near each other in the deadly strife. The sides, the front, and the interior of the battery, are thickly strewn with the dead and the dying of either side, and grey great-coats, flat caps, and bearskins, muskets and accoutrements, lie all around in inextricable confusion. Clouds of smoke in the centre of the picture indicate the fierce and continuous musketry fire which is rolling along the hostile lines, till it dies away in the far distance at the base of the hill, where the Russians have posted their artillery, dragged up to its top during the favouring obscurity of the preceding night. A shell from one of these guns is bursting in the very midst of our Grenadiers, close to the spot where four soldiers are carrying ofi" to the rear on a stretcher an ofiicer, evidently severely wounded. On the right the picturesque ruins of Inkermann, and the placid waters of the Tchernaya, bordered with a fringe of overshadowing trees, present a scene of peaceful repose, which contrasts strangely and mournfully with the fearful spectacle of havoc and desolation, and with the fierce raging of the storm of human passion, on the field of battle.
Such a scene, so vividly portrayed, cannot fail to awaken in every heart, not dead to the kindly influences of Christian charity and love to his fellow-men, the most earnest longing for the consummation purchased at so dear a price, — purchased with the life-blood freely poured from thousands of noble hearts, and with the agonised tears of those to whom the loved and lost were dearer than life itself, — a longing for peace honourable, just, and enduring, — not an insult to the dead, but a pledge of happiness and security to the living, and to the unborn generations who shall bless and cherish the memory of the heroes who perished to obtain it.
" Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals
The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies, But, beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of Love arise."