Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 3.djvu/151

BATTLE or TlIK AL.MA. 125 Liiwrciico falling was indeed the very g(xd he cii A i had sought, for he rolled at the foot of the L_ breastwork. At each flank of the work, no less than along its whole front, agile men were now fast bounding in. The enemy's still lingering skirmishers began to fall back, and descended — some of them slowly — into the dip where their battalions were massed. The bullc of our soldiery were up, and they flooded in over the parapet, hurrahing, jumping over, hur- rahing — a joyful English crowd. The cheer had not yet died away on the hill- side, when from the enemy's battalions standing massed in the hollow there rose up, as thuugli it had been wrung from the very hearts of brave men defeated, a long, sorrowful, wailing sound. This was the bitter and wholesome grief of a valiant soldiery not content to yield. For men who so grieve there is hope. The redoubt had been seized by our people ; it was not yet lost to the Czar. At the sight of the brass howitzer which was found in the work, a characteristic desire to assert the claims of private or corporate ownership be- gan to seize upon the crowd ; and more than one man — so they say — scratched his mark upon the piece, that he might make it the peculiar trophy of himself or his regiment. But there was a bet- ter prize than this within the reach of a nimble soldier ; for of the guns moving off towards the rear therc was one which, dragged by only three horses, had scarcely yet gained the rear of the