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178 BATTl.H OF THE ALMA. CHAP. I. Causes of the depres- sion which had come upon llie French. Operations on the Telegraph Heiglit. English Head(iuarters, strangely placed as they were in the midst of the Russian position, were a scene of robust animation, and that Lord Itaglan looked and spoke like a man Avho had the foe in his power. XXVI. It is now time to speak of events which had been bringing the French army into a state of increased depression. We saw that General Kiriakoff, commanding the Paissian left wing, had charge of the Telegraph Height, and confronted the Divisions of Prince Napoleon and Canrobert, having also on his left and left front, though at greater distances, the two separated brigades of Bosquet's Division, and the five battalions of Turks. The infantry force remaining under Kiria- koffs orders had been reduced, by Prince Ment- schikoff's abstraction of the ' Moscow ' troops, to a force of only nine battalions ; and afterwards, when the second ' Moscow ' battalion rejoined the rest of the corps, the infantry force remaining under Kiriakoff consisted only of the four * Tar- ' outine ' and the four ' Militia ' battalions. The part which these ' Taroutine ' and ' Militia ' bat- talions had been taking in the battle may be told in a summary w^ay. They did not attack the French, and were not themselves attacked by any French infantry; but, because kept massed in battalion columns, upon slopes which faced towards their adversaries, they were exposed to a good deal of artillery-fire at long range, and were from