196 THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. CHAP, had the advantage of seeing all from high, com-
- manding ground ; but nothing less than his pecu-
liar and instinctive faculty for the reading of a battle-field could have enabled him at the instant to grasp the whole import of what to others was a dim, complex scene, devoid of expression, and to send down an order so closely adapted to the exigency as the one which he had despatched. To strike at the nearest of the Eussians that could be found on the Causeway Heights — or, in other words, at those Odessa battalions which stood ranged in front of the Arabtabia — this plainly was the task which (by reason of there being no infantry division yet present on the ground) invited the enterprise of our squadrons ; and this also, we shall see, was the task which the order now coming enjoined. Two points We shall see that the French, when so minded, enemy's could direct an attack with their cavalry upon available for the head of the Eussian detachment now hold- »ttaek. ing the Fedioukine Hills — an attack somewhat similar in its nature to the one which Lord Eaglan desired to have made against the tip of Liprandi's position on the Causeway Heights. In truth, there were two ranges of heights, each affording to the cavalry of the Allies so good a point for attack, that the one was decisively chosen — though chosen in vain — by Lord Eaglan, and the other by General Morris, the Commander of the French cavalry division.*
- See again the diagram ante, p. 183, and Plate 5, taking
care to understand that the first position of the Odessa regri-
