sted were they in watching what was going forward. Lord Cardigan
was seen to place himself at the head of the light cavalry, while Lord
Lucan came closer to them. All eyes, however, were riveted on Lord
Cardigan and the light cavalry; he could easily be distinguished by his
commanding yet slight figure, as he sat upon his tall charger at a
distance of some five horses' lengths in front of the line, which now
began to advance. The spectators expected to see the light cavalry
wheel with their left shoulders forward towards the Russians on their
right front, whom it was supposed they were about to attack. Instead of
doing so, Lord Cardigan, sitting in his saddle, with his face down the
valley, galloped on straight before him. Scarcely had he gone a hundred
paces, when a figure, recognised at once as that of Captain Nolan, was
seen to dash out from the left of the line and to gallop diagonally
across the front. The aide-de-camp was waving his sword, pointing
eagerly towards the Russians on the right, who were engaged in
endeavouring to carry off the guns captured from the Turks.

He had just passed Lord Cardigan when a shell burst close to him, and
his horse, wheeling suddenly, dashed back towards the advancing ranks.
At the same moment, his sword falling from his hand, while his arm
remained extended, a fearful shriek, unlike anything human, burst from
him, and his horse passing between the 13th Light Dragoons, he at length
fell to the ground a lifeless corpse. If, as it seems certain, his
object had been to point out the direction the cavalry were to charge,
Lord Cardigan took no notice of it, but continued on right down the
valley towards the Russian guns and masses of Russian horsemen at its
eastern end.

"Good heavens! they will be annihilated!" exclaimed Jack. "Where are
they going?"

Well might he have said that, for in a short time from the heights on
either side the Russians began to pour down showers of shot and shell
and rifle balls upon the devoted band. Many were seen to drop;
riderless horses came galloping back, some falling in their course,
others uttering cries of agony from the wounds they had received. Here
and there human forms could be distinguished, some lying in the quiet of
death, others writhing on the ground or endeavouring to drag themselves
back up the valley.

Now the guns in front sent forth their deadly missiles, filling the air
with dense clouds of smoke, into which the cavalry