That heroic and dashing encounter, in which the battle was to the swift--for it will be remembered that they had outstripped the rest of the army--is one that can never be forgotten in the annals of our history. Slowly, point by point, they gained the advantage, and finally drove the enemy from the summit. But, having taken the position, they had to hold it again and again against the furious efforts of the enemy to dislodge them. The reckless dash of their ascent could only be equalled by the stubborn resistance with which they held on, and, time after time, Laborde's battalions were driven back. Finally, the Northumberland Fusiliers came to their assistance, and the enemy was forced to retire. This was a victory set upon a hill, and, in the same spirit in which it was witnessed that day by thousands of opposing forces, so it is for ever pictured in our minds. With the battle of Roliça in their traditions, the Norfolk Regiment, as we write, are no doubt adding to the list of their brilliant achievements. In this battle a memorable act of heroism glorifies a page of history--a page written in the Norfolk blood of Sergeant-Major Richards. At the time when our skirmishers advanced rapidly, and the echo of their quick musketry fire hung reverberating in the ravine and hollow as they ran from cover to cover, two companies crept up two separate passes among the rocks and debouched upon the summit of the ridge. The foremost of the 9th, on emerging two or three at a time from their narrow passage, were ambushed by the enemy. Blake, their brave Colonel, was killed, and many of his men fell around him. When the ambuscade rushed forth to grips, Sergeant-Major Richards, though riddled with lead, and bleeding from a dozen bayonet wounds, stood over his beloved commander and fought to the death. This brave fellow, than whom there was never a braver, said, as he was dying, "I should not have cared so much if only our Colonel had been spared." In those few words, at such a moment, breathed the true spirit of the Norfolks, and that glorious simplicity of thought and singleness of eye--fine, grand, unconsciously sublime--runs through every line of our great Book of Battles. We are not glad that our enemy of to-day has not written such a book, nor do we trouble to wish he had: the fact is fixed that he has not. Indeed, he had never the material for such a book, for it is obvious that the same barbarous hand that struck out an innocent Louvain could not insert such an anachronism as the heroic death and noble sentiment of a Sergeant-Major Richards of the Norfolks.