CHAP. himself how best he could act. The result was that V.

Defeat and flight of the Russian Lancers.

he determined to rely upon the power which can be exerted by sheer impact. He resolved that, whilst charging at the head of his little band of horsemen, he would single out the Russian officer whom he perceived to be the leader of the opposing force, and endeavour to overthrow him by the shock of a heavy concussion. To do this the more effectively he discarded the lessons of the riding-school, clenched a rein in each hand, got his head somewhat down; and, as though he were going at a leap which his horse, unless forced, might refuse, drove full at the Russian chief. The assailant came on so swift, so resolute, and, if so one may speak, with such a conscientious exactness of aim that, for the Russian officer who sat in his saddle under the disadvantage of having to await the onset, there remained no alternative at the last moment but either to move a little aside or else be run down without mercy by this straightforward, pious hussar. As was only natural, the charger of the Russian officer shrank aside to avoid the shock; and Shewell, still driving straight on, with all his momentum unchecked, broke through the two ranks of the Lancers. He was well followed by his seventy horsemen. Upon their close approach some of the Russian Lancers turned and made off; but the rest stood their ground and received the shock prepared for them. By that shock, however, they were broken and overthrown. It is true that in the moment of the impact, or in the moments immediately following, men had, some of them, a fleeting opportunity for the use of the sword or the lance, and one

V.

at least of our Hussars received a great number of CHAP. slight wounds from the enemy's spearheads; but the clash was brief. The whole of these three Russian squadrons were quickly in retreat, a part of them going back into the fold betwixt the Causeway Heights from which just before they had issued, whilst the rest fled across to the Fedioukine Hills; and there is reason for inferring that these last attached themselves to the other three squadrons of their regiment which had been posted, as we saw, on the northern side of the valley.

retreat.

After having thus conquered their way through the Shewell's body of Lancers opposed to them, Colonel Shewell and those who had followed him in his victorious charge could see a good way up the valley; but their eyes searched in vain for an English force advancing to their support; and, in truth, the very attempt which Jeropkine's Lancers had just been making, went far to show that no English succours were near; for it is evident that the endeavour to cut off our Hussars by showing a front towards the Russian rear would never have been made by troops which were able to see a red squadron coming down to the support of their comrades. Therefore, having now cut open a retreat not only for themselves, but also for such of the other remnants of the Light Brigade as might be near enough to seize the occasion, Shewell's regiment and the men who had joined it continued to pursue the direction in which they had charged, in other words to retire. Colonel Shewell, it seems, did not judge that the condition of things was

CHAP. such as to warrant any attempt at the usual operation

V.

of governing a retreat by fronting from time to time. with a portion of the force; and those who remained of the seventy had only to withdraw up the valley with such speed as they could. In this movement they were followed by Captain Jenyns and the few men of the first line-men chiefly, it is supposed, of the 13th Light Dragoons-who had been acting under his guidance, or riding, at all events, near him.

When our retreating horsemen had ridden clear of Jeropkine's discomfited Lancers, they began once more to incur severe fire from those batteries on the Causeway Heights and those rifles in the same part of the field which had thinned their ranks during the advance; but they were not molested by cavalry, and they observed, without knowing the cause of the change, that there was silence on the Fedioukine Hills.*

It happened, as might be expected, that, in the trail of our small body of retreating Hussars, there were both mounted, and dismounted men who had been so disabled by their own wounds or by the wounds or the overwearied state of their horses as to be more or less lagging behind. The sight of these disabled horsemen did not so far tempt Jeropkine's defeated squadrons as to bring them all back into the valley; but his Lancers, here and there coming singly, or else in small knots, pressed on, for a time, in pursuit, and killed or

* This result, as we know, was owing to D'Allonville's attack with the Chasseurs d'Afrique.