In the middle of this fire, even though death swept past their heads, they didn’t stop making jokes; every time each cannon ball ricocheted, the young soldiers made a point of talking to it, and to give it advice. A ricocheting cannon ball can be seen from afar, as it jumps across the field, so if it was going to one side, to the left, they were calling to it: “Where are you going, blind man! get to the right!” and if it was going straight, they encouraged it: “good, good!” and so they spoke to it until it fell right in the middle of the enemy line and then they were applauding it. I don’t know now, how many hours that cannonade lasted. Although we passed each other feverishly beside the cannon, in the same way this play lasted too long, to not wish for nightfall. The Russian artillery had an obvious advantage over us, both in numbers, and in cannon gauge. They had already hit a few of our people, many were wounded, but everyone, although extremely tired, equally didn’t sink in spirits and nobody even thought about retreat. Suddenly from the left cannons roared horribly. The Muscovites had placed a new battery right there, which fired at us from the side. We turned two of our cannons against this new threat, with whom we needed to chat; but our position was becoming more and more unpleasant, because six field cannons to answer twenty heavy gauge cannons is no small matter! Our soldiers, at the sight of this imbalance of power, seemed to be stirred. Now their movements weakened, now our shots happened less frequently, and what’s more the anecdotes and jokes ceased completely. It seems that our commander was waiting until the Muscovites separated their forces, in order to profit from that moment and strike them; I suppose, although they aren’t tempting themselves to debate the battle plan. I only know that at the most critical moment we heard from the left a horse’s hoofbeat, rushing at a gallop and a few minutes later that second battery went silent, when it was conquered. Our commander turned around and dashed to the main strength of our troops, calling: “Forward at a trot! everyone forward!” And our entire cavalry, drawn up in two rows, moved out, passing our battery. “They’re going to charge!” cried our gunners and at once we ceased firing. How did it look? The young lancers with eager gaze, fevered face, burst impatiently forward, but advised or unadvised they still needed to obey the strict orders of the commander, who still repeated: “Trot! forward! trot!” You could see from the movement of the flags, how feverishly the soldiers’ hands were twitching. In the end the trumpets sounded, flags descended and now they kicked themselves off towards the enemy. “Forward! Gallop! everyone forward!”