ow road beyond La Belle Alliance, filled with
artillery and broken infantry. Here was instantly a wild _melee_: the
infantry tried to escape as best they could, and at the same time turn
and defend themselves; the artillery drivers turned their horses to the
left and tried to scramble up the bank of the road, but the horses were
immediately shot down; a young subaltern of the battery threw his sword
and himself on the ground in the act of surrender; his commander, who
wore the cross of the Legion of Honour, stood in defiance among his
guns, and was bayoneted, and the subaltern, unwisely making a run for
his liberty, was shot in the attempt. The _melee_ at this spot placed
us amid such questionable companions, that no one at that moment could
be sure whether a bayonet would be the next moment in his ribs or not."

It puts a sudden gleam of humour into the wild scene to read how
Colonel Sir Felton Harvey, who led a squadron of the 18th, when he saw
the Old Guard tumbling into ruins, evoked a burst of laughter from his
entire squadron by saying in a solemn voice, "Lord Wellington has won
the battle," and then suddenly adding in a changed tone, "If we could
but get the d----d fool to advance!" Wellington, as a matter of fact,
had given the signal that launched his wasted and sorely tried
battalions in one final and victorious advance. Vivian's cavalry still
remained to the Duke--the 10th and 18th Hussars--and they, at this
stage, made a charge almost as decisive as that of the Household and
Union Brigades in the morning. The 10th crashed into some cuirassiers
who were coming up to try and relieve the flank of the Guard, overthrew
them in a moment, and then plunged into the broken French Guard itself.
These veterans were retreating, so to speak, individually, all
formation wrecked, but each soldier was stalking fiercely along with
frowning brow and musket grasped, ready to charge any too audacious
horsemen. Vivian himself relates how his orderly alone cut down five
or six in swift succession who were trying to bayonet the British
cavalry general. When Vivian had launched the 10th, he galloped back
to the 18th, who had lost almost every officer. "My lads," he said,
"you'll follow me"; to which the sergeant-major, a man named Jeffs,
replied, "To h----, general, if you will lead us!" The wreck of
Vandeleur's brigade, too, charged down the slope more to the left;
batteries were carried, cavalry squadrons smashed, and inf