The points chosen were the bridge and the hillock to the right. The masses, which in the morning sun looked like glittering waves, protected by the fire of their artillery, moved in excellent order down to the river side, notwithstanding the heavy fire of artillery which greeted them in front from the French, and in flank from the Sardinians. At the river the first column detached itself from the rest, and dividing into two cobimns crossed the river, which is now nearly everywhere easily fordable. Men carrying moveable wooden bridges preceded, but in the first rush the Russians, without waiting for bridges, went over wherever they could, and dispersing like a swarm of bees, rushed forward in columns, some against the bridge, and others against the hillock on the right.
As I said above, the continual apprehension of an impending attack had at last allnj-ed the interest for it, and, notwithstanding the signs which seemed to indicate some movement on the part of the Russians, everybody slept as soundly as possibleuntil awakened by the Kussian guns. Before the troops were properlj'' under arms the Russians were at the bridge and at the foot of the hillock. The 20th Icger and the 2nd battalion of Zouaves had to stand the first shock, and they certainly stood it gallantly. The rush of the Russians was splendid. Without losing their time with firing, they advanced with an ilcui scarcely ever seen in Russian troops. Some French soldiers of Camou's Division,who have during the winter guarded the trenches towards the Quarantine, and have had nearly daily skirmishes with the Russians, assured me that they never saw them moving on in such a style.
They were new troops, belonging, accoi'ding to the prisoners and wounded, to the 5th division of the 2nd corps d'annee lately arrived from Poland. But their ardour was soon checked. They could not carry their point, and were, after a short trial, repulsed both on the l^ridge and the hillock. The aqueduct which supplies the Turks, and which runs close to the foot of the hillock, formed the chief defence of the French. About nine or ten feet wide and several feet deep, it skirts the steep hills so close, that it is nearly in all places supported by a high embankment, oflferLng considerable difficulties for an advancing force, and exposing it, as soon as it reaches the top of it, to the musketry fire from the heights.
Notwithstanding this difficulty, the Russians crossed it on the right, and were beginning to scale the lieights, when, taken in flank by the Sardinian batteries, which fired with admirable precision, they were swept down wholesale and rolled into the aqueduct below. This first rush did not last more than ten minutes. The Russians fell back, but they had scarcely gone a few hundred yards when they were met by the second column, which was advancing a pas de charge to support the fu'st, and both umted and again rushed forward. This second attempt was more successful than the first. At the bridge they forded the river on the right and left, and forced the defenders of it to fall back. Scarcely was the bridge free when two guns of the 5th Light Brigade of Artillery crossed it and took up a position on the opposite side in an open space which divides two of the hillocks, and through which the road leads to the plain of Balaklava.
While those two guns passed the bridge a third crossed the river by a ford, and all three began to sweep the road and the heights. The infantry in the mean time, without waiting for the portable bridges, the greater part of which had, moreover, been thrown awaj' during the advance, rushed breast-deep into thewater. clinited up the cmbanktnent, and began to scale the heights on both sides. They succeeded on this point in getting up more than one-half of the ascent, where the dead and wounded aft-erwards showed clearly the mark which they reached; but by the time they arrived there the French were fully prepared and met them in the most gallant style. Notwitlistanding the exertions and the perseverance of the Eussians, they were by degrees forced back and driven, after an obstinate resistance, across the bridge, carrying away their guns.