The parts of the Russian position they fronted were these. Evans's division extended across the entrance to the ravine up which ran the great road. This road passing the river by a wooden bridge, partially destroyed by the enemy, climbed a low ridge between two higher ridges, and on these higher ridges were two Russian batteries supported by six battalions. It was not only their fire, but that of the left shoulder of the field work on the slope of the Kourgané Hill, to which they were exposed; for while the guns on each side of the road swept the front, the heavier metal searched the left flank. The Light Division fronted the steep sides of the Kourgané Hill itself, and had to bear the fire of the big guns and of two batteries--that is, sixteen pieces posted on both sides of the entrenchment,--to meet the musketry and bayonets of sixteen battalions, and to stand prepared for the dense columns of cavalry which showed themselves on their left. Before Evans was rough and broken ground; before Sir George Brown, a bare hill-side. The troops were not allowed to cling long to the protection of the bank. On the right Evans's colonels got their men up to the mouths of the ravine; but there were only three battalions to contend with six; and although they were aided somewhat by the fire of the artillery massed on the east of Bourliouk, it required all the fortitude of officers and men to stand fast. For the battalions had been rent by the heavy artillery fire, and Evans himself had been wounded; yet he kept his place in the midst, and held his men together as became a veteran who had ridden in the thick of great battles thirty years before; and now his weak force was opposed to heavy odds, and had to endure, without flinching, shot, shell, and musketry.