Presently, without sound of trumpet, but conforming to the pace of the Brigadier, the first line broke into the gallop. It had barely started when Captain Nolan rode across the front from left to right, shouting and waving his sword. “No, no, Nolan,” shouted Captain Morris, “that won’t do, we have a long way to go and must be steady.” As he spoke a fragment of a shell struck Nolan to the heart. His horse swerved and trotted back through the squadron interval with his rider still firm in the saddle, and then with an unearthly cry the body of Nolan dropped to the ground. This was the first shell that fell into the Light Brigade. Meanwhile the handful of squadrons, with the Seventeenth and 13th at their head, rode on with perfect steadiness, and in beautiful order, into the ring of the Russian fire. [Sidenote: 1854--25th Oct.] Then men and horses began to drop fast in the first line. The survivors closed up and rode on. The trumpet sounded no charge; the officers uttered no stirring word; the men gave no cheer; for this was no headlong rush of reckless cavaliers, but an orderly advance of disciplined men. Throughout this ride down the valley there was but one word continually repeated, “Close up”; and the men closed in to their centre, and with an ever-diminishing front rode on. Those who watched the advance from the heights a mile away saw the line expand as the stricken men and horses floundered down, and contract once more like some perfect machinery as the survivors took up their dressing and rode on. But at last the gaps became so frequent and so wide that men could close up no more; and then the whole of the first line sat down and raced for the guns. The Russians were ready for them and met them at about eighty yards distance with a simultaneous discharge of every gun in the front battery. How many men fell under this salvo we shall never know. By this time two-thirds of the first line must have fallen: the remaining third rode on. In a few seconds they had plunged into the smoke and were among the Russian guns.