j;attle of the al:^ia. 113 For they were only clusters of men wiLlioui the en a r. strencfth of order: and masses of infantry, in a _, perfect state of formation, were heavily impend- inf]; over them. The columns which were the Battery nr> • 1 T 1 1 ■ 1 1 tlic Innlicr nearest to them were m the dip behind the re- siorosof ■ 1 J. theliill doubt, and so placed that, 'ithout any danger to brouKiit to them, the Russian battery which had been planted men. higlier up on the side of the Kourgane Hill could throw its fire into the site of the redoubt. The guns of this battery — the one that had brought Colonel Lawrence and his aide-de-camp, and perhaps many more, to the ground — were soon brought to bear upon those of our soldiery who stood within the redoubt ; and tliis fire, after killing and woundhig several men, drove the rest to seek cover by betaking themselves to the outer side of the parapet. Their move- ment, though it wanted the sanction of orders, was scarcely M'rong or unsoldierly ; for, since the men were without formation, their duty be- came like the duty of skirmishers, and the para- pet of the redoubt supplied that kind of shelter which the need of the moment demanded. Yet the movement looked like the beginning of a retreat, and apparently for that reason mainly General Codrington strove to check it,* for being at the moment on the outside of the work, he for the second time put his horse at the parapet,
- We saw liiin at one moment busied in establishing some of
Ixis men on the outside of the parapet, but it did not of course at all follow that he would approve the reflux movement of those soldiers who being within the work now began to pour out of it.
