The thunder of the Artillery continued pealing forth in an uninterrupted roll, and the scene became awfully grand. The guns having once obtained the required range, were fired without intermission. Instantaneous flashes met the eye, all along the Heights, succeeded by volumes of smoke bounding forth along the ground in front, and enveloping the Batteries in clouds. The earth trembled beneath the dread concussion. The oldest soldiers had never witnessed a cannonade conducted with such fury, with such desperation. [Illustration] The Allied Columns of Infantry were lying down upon the ground to shelter themselves as much as possible from the iron shower that fell fast and heavily--round shot, tearing frightful rents directly through their masses, or ploughing up the earth beside them; shells, bursting in the midst of the serried Columns, and scattering destruction in their fall, or previously burying themselves in the soft loose soil to be again forced upwards in eruptions of iron, mud, and stones, that fell among them like volcanic fragments. During this terrible conflict of Artillery, NEY was making his preparatory dispositions with the Cavalry which NAPOLEON had desired him to launch against the Anglo-Allied Right Wing. He first formed for attack, MILHAUD's Corps of _Cuirassiers_, consisting of twenty four Squadrons; and directed LEFÈBVRE DESNOUETTE's Light Cavalry Division of the Guard, comprising seven Squadrons of Lancers and twelve Squadrons of _Chasseurs_, to follow and support--in all forty three Squadrons--constituting a magnificent array of gallant horsemen. As they began to advance, the First Line, of _Cuirassiers_, shone in burnished steel, relieved by black horse hair crested helmets; next came the Red Lancers of the Guard, in their gaudy uniform, and mounted on richly caparisoned steeds, their fluttering lance flags heightening the brilliancy of their display; whilst the Third Line, comprising the _Chasseurs_ of the Guard, in their rich costume of green and gold, with fur trimmed pelisses _à la hussard_, and black bearskin shakos, completed the gorgeous, yet harmonious, colouring of this military spectacle. Though formed in successive Lines of Columns in the hollow space on the immediate left of La Haye Sainte, where they were sheltered in some degree from the cannonade that raged so furiously above them, the Rear Lines obliqued to the left on the advance, and became _echelonned_ to the First Line, so as to present a general front extending from the Charleroi road on their right to the Hougomont inclosures on their left.