Here Sladkovski’s voice trembled, tears appeared on his eyelids, but he spoke further. “You will have grievous times yet: siege guns are coming from Cracow, which two hundred infantry are bringing. One is a particularly dreadful cannon. Terrible assaults will follow. But these will be the last efforts. Endure yet these, for salvation is coming already. By these red wounds of God, the king, the hetmans, the army, the whole Commonwealth will come to rescue its Patroness. This is what I tell you: rescue, salvation, glory is right here — not distant.”
The worthy noble now burst into tears, and sobbing became universal.
Ah! still better news was due to that wearied handful of defenders, to that handful of faithful servants, and a sure consolation from the country.
The prior rose, approached Sladkovski, and opened wide his arms. Sladkovski rushed into them, and they embraced each other long; others following their example began to fall into one another’s arms, embrace, kiss, and congratulate one another as if the Swedes had already retreated. At last the prior said, —
“To the chapel, my brethren, to the chapel!”
He went in advance, and after him the others. All the candles were lighted, for it was growing dark outside; and the curtains were drawn aside from the wonder-working image, from which sweet abundant rays were scattered at once round about. Kordetski knelt on the steps, farther away the monks, the nobles, and common people; women with children were present also. Pale and wearied faces and eyes which had wept were raised toward the image; but from behind the tears was shining on each face a smile of happiness. Silence continued for a time; at last Kordetski began, —
“Under thy protection we take refuge, Holy Mother of God—”
Further words stopped on his lips, weariness, long suffering, hidden alarms, together with the gladsome hope of rescue, rose in him like a mighty wave; therefore sobbing shook his breast, and that man, who bore on his shoulders the fate of the whole country, bent like a weak child, fell on his face, and with weeping immeasurable had strength only to cry: “O Mary, Mary, Mary!”
All wept with him, but the image from above cast brightest rays.
It was late at night when the monks and the nobles went each his own way to the walls; but Kordetski remained all night lying in the chapel in the form of a cross. There were fears in the cloister that weariness might overpower him; but next morning he appeared on the bastions, went among the soldiers and the garrison, glad and refreshed, and here and there he repeated, —
“Children, the Most Holy Lady will show again that she is mightier than siege guns, and then will come the end of your sorrows and torments.”
That morning Yatsek Bjuhanski, an inhabitant of Chenstohova, disguised as a Swede, approached the walls to confirm the news that great guns were coming from Cracow, but also that the Khan with the horde was approaching. He delivered a letter from Father Anton Pashkovski, of the monastery at Cracow, who, describing the terrible cruelty and robbery of the Swedes, incited and implored the fathers of Yasna Gora to put no trust in the promises of the enemy, but to defend the sacred place patiently against the insolence of the godless.
“There is no faith in the Swedes,” wrote Father Pashkovski, “no religion. Nothing divine or human is sacred and inviolate for them. It is not their custom to respect anything, though guarded by treaties or public declarations.”
That was the day of the Immaculate Conception. Some tens of officers and soldiers of the allied Polish squadrons besought with most urgent requests Miller’s permission to go to the fortress for divine service. Perhaps Miller thought that they would become friendly with the garrison, carry news of the siege guns and spread alarm; perhaps he did not wish by refusing to cast sparks on inflammable elements, which without that made relations between the Poles and the Swedes more and more dangerous: ’tis enough that he gave the permission.
With these quarter soldiers went a certain Tartar of the Polish Mohammedan Tartars. He, amid universal astonishment, encouraged the monks not to yield their holy place to vile enemies, considering with certainty that the Swedes would soon go away with shame and defeat. The quarter soldiers repeated the same, confirming completely the news brought by Sladkovski. All this taken together raised the courage of the besieged to such a degree that they had no fear of those gigantic cannons, and the soldiers made sport of them among themselves.
After services firing began on both sides. There was a certain Swedish soldier who had come many times to the wall, and with a trumpet-like voice had blasphemed against the Mother of God. Many a time had the besieged fired at him, but always without result. Kmita aimed at him once, but his bow-string broke; the soldier became more and more insolent, and roused others by his daring. It was said that he had seven devils in his service who guarded and shielded him.
He came this day again to blaspheme; but the besieged, trusting that on the day of the Immaculate Conception enchantments would have less effect, determined to punish him without fail. They fired a good while in vain; at last a cannon ball, rebounding from an ice wall, and tripping along the snow like a bird, struck him straight in the breast and tore him in two. The defenders comforted themselves with this and cried out: “Who will blaspheme against Her another time?” Meanwhile the revilers had rushed down to the trenches, in panic.
The Swedes fired at the walls and the roofs; but the balls brought no terror to the besieged.
The old beggarwoman, Konstantsia, who dwelt in a cranny of the cliff, used to go, as if in ridicule of the Swedes, along the whole slope, gathering bullets in her apron, and threatening from time to time the soldiers with her staff. They, thinking her a witch, were afraid she would injure them, especially when they saw that bullets did not touch her.
Two whole days passed in vain firing. They hurled on the roof ship ropes very thickly steeped in pitch; these flew like fiery serpents; but the guards, trained in a masterly manner, met the danger in time. A night came with such darkness that, in spite of the fires, tar barrels, and the fireworks of Father Lyassota, the besieged could see nothing.
Meanwhile some uncommon movement reigned among the Swedes. The squeak of wheels was heard, men’s voices, at times the neighing of horses, and various other kinds of uproar. The soldiers on the walls guessed the cause easily.
“The guns have come surely,” said some.
The officers were deliberating on a sortie which Charnyetski advised; but Zamoyski opposed, insisting, with reason, that at such important works the enemy must have secured themselves sufficiently, and must surely hold infantry in readiness. They resolved merely to fire toward the north and south, whence the greatest noise came. It was impossible to see the result in the darkness.
Day broke at last, and its first rays exposed the works of the Swedes. North and south of the fortress were intrenchments, on which some thousands of men were employed. These intrenchments stood so high that to the besieged the summits of them seemed on a line with the walls of the fortress. In the openings at the top were seen great jaws of guns, and the soldiers standing behind them looked at a distance like swarms of yellow wasps.
The morning Mass was not over in the church when unusual thunder shook the air; the window-panes rattled; some of them dropped out of the frames from shaking alone, and were broken with a sharp shiver on the stone floor; and the whole church was filled with dust which rose from fallen plaster.
The great siege guns had spoken.
A terrible fire began, such as the besieged had not experienced. At the end of Mass all rushed out on the walls and roofs. The preceding storms seemed innocent play in comparison with this terrible letting loose of fire and iron.
The smaller pieces thundered in support of the siege guns. Great bombs, pieces of cloth steeped in pitch, torches, and fiery ropes were flying. Balls twenty-six pounds in weight tore out battlements, struck the walls of buildings; some settled in them, others made great holes, tearing off plaster and bricks. The walls surrounding the cloister began to shake here and there and lose pieces, and stru
ck incessantly by new balls threatened to fall. The buildings of the cloister were covered with fire.
The trumpeters on the tower felt it totter under them. The church quaked from continuous pounding, and candles fell out of the sockets at some of the altars.
Water was poured in immense quantities on the fires that had begun, on the blazing torches, on the walls, on the fire balls; and formed, together with the smoke and the dust, rolls of steam so thick that light could not be seen through them. Damage was done to the walls and buildings. The cry, “It is burning, it is burning!” was heard oftener amid the thunder of cannon and the whistle of bullets. At the northern bastion the two wheels of a cannon were broken, and one injured cannon was silent. A ball had fallen into a stable, killed three horses, and set fire to the building. Not only balls, but bits of grenades, were falling as thickly as rain on the roofs, the bastions, and the walls.
In a short time the groans of the wounded were heard. By a strange chance three young men fell, all named Yan. This amazed other defenders bearing the same name; but in general the defence was worthy of the storm. Even women, children, and old men came out on the walls. Soldiers stood there with unterrified heart, in smoke and fire, amid a rain of missiles, and answered with determination to the fire of the enemy. Some seized the wheels and rolled the cannon to the most exposed places; others thrust into breaches in the walls stones, beams, dung, and earth.
Women with dishevelled hair and inflamed faces gave an example of daring, and some were seen running with buckets of water after bombs which were still springing and ready to burst right there, that moment. Ardor rose every instant, as if that smell of powder, smoke, and steam, that thunder, those streams of fire and iron, had the property of rousing it. All acted without command, for words died amid the awful noise. Only the supplications which were sung in the chapel rose above the voices of cannon.
About noon firing ceased. All drew breath; but before the gate a drum was sounded, and the drummer sent by Miller, approaching the gate, inquired if the fathers had had enough, and if they wished to surrender at once. Kordetski answered that they would deliberate over the question till morning. The answer had barely reached Miller when the attack began anew, and the artillery fire was redoubled.
From time to time deep ranks of infantry pushed forward under fire toward the mountain, as if wishing to try an assault; but decimated by cannon and muskets, they returned each time quickly and in disorder under their own batteries. As a wave of the sea covers the shore and when it retreats leaves on the sand weeds, mussels, and various fragments broken in the deep, so each one of those Swedish waves when it sank back left behind bodies thrown here and there on the slope.
Miller did not give orders to fire at the bastions, but at the wall between them, where resistance was least. Indeed, here and there considerable rents were made, but not large enough for the infantry to rush through.
Suddenly a certain event checked the storm.
It was well toward evening when a Swedish gunner about to apply a lighted match to one of the largest guns was struck in the very breast by a ball from the cloister. The ball came not with the first force, but after a third bound from the ice piled up at the intrenchment; it merely hurled the gunner a number of yards. He fell on an open box partly filled with powder. A terrible explosion was heard that instant, and masses of smoke covered the trench. When the smoke fell away it appeared that five gunners had lost their lives; the wheels of the cannon were injured, and terror seized the soldiers. It was necessary to cease fire for the time from that intrenchment, since a heavy fog had filled the darkness; they also stopped firing in other places.
The next day was Sunday. Lutheran ministers held services in the trenches, and the guns were silent. Miller again inquired if the fathers had had enough. They answered that they could endure more.
Meanwhile the damage in the cloister was examined and found to be considerable. People were killed and the wall was shaken here and there. The most formidable gun was a gigantic culverin standing on the north. It had broken the wall to such a degree, torn out so many stones and bricks, that the besieged could foresee that should the fire continue two days longer a considerable part of the wall would give away.
A breach such as the culverin would make could not be filled with beams or earth. The prior foresaw with an eye full of sorrow the ruin which he could not prevent.
Monday the attack was begun anew, and the gigantic gun widened the breach. Various mishaps met the Swedes, however. About dusk that day a Swedish gunner killed on the spot Miller’s sister’s son, whom the general loved as though he had been his own, and intended to leave him all that he had, — beginning with his name and military reputation and ending with his fortune. But the heart of the old warrior blazed up with hatred all the more from this loss.
The wall at the northern bastion was so broken that preparations were made in the night for a hand-to-hand assault. That the infantry might approach the fortress with less danger, Miller commanded to throw up in the darkness a whole series of small redoubts, reaching the very slope. But the night was clear, and white light from the snow betrayed the movements of the enemy. The cannons of Yasna Gora scattered the men occupied in making those parapets formed of fascines, fences, baskets, and timbers.
At daybreak Charnyetski saw a siege machine which they had already rolled toward the walls. But the besieged broke it with cannon fire without difficulty; so many men were killed on that occasion that the day might have been called a day of victory for the besieged, had it not been for that great gun which shook the wall incessantly with irrestrainable power.
A thaw came on the following days, and such dense mists settled down that the fathers attributed them to the action of evil spirits. It was impossible to see either the machines of war, the erection of parapets, or the work of the siege. The Swedes came near the very walls of the cloister. In the evening Charnyetski, when the prior was making his usual round of the walls, took him by the side and said in a low voice, —
“Bad, revered father! Our wall will not hold out beyond a day.”
“Perhaps these fogs will prevent them from firing,” answered Kordetski; “and we meanwhile will repair the rents somehow.”
“The fogs will not prevent the Swedes, for that gun once aimed may continue even in darkness the work of destruction; but here the ruins are falling and falling.”
“In God and in the Most Holy Lady is our hope.”
“True! But if we make a sortie? Even were we to lose men, if they could only spike that dragon of hell.”
Just then some form looked dark in the fog, and Babinich appeared near the speakers.
“I saw that some one was speaking; but faces cannot be distinguished three yards away,” said he. “Good evening, revered father! But of what is the conversation?”
“We are talking of that gun. Pan Charnyetski advises a sortie. These fogs are spread by Satan; I have commanded an exorcism.”
“Dear father,” said Pan Andrei, “since that gun has begun to shake the wall, I am thinking of it, and something keeps coming to my head. A sortie is of no use. But let us go to some room; there I will tell you my plans.”
“Well,” said the prior, “come to my cell.”
Soon after they were sitting at a pine table in Kordetski’s modest cell. Charnyetski and the priest were looking carefully into the youthful face of Babinich, who said, —
“A sortie is of no use in this case. They will see it and repulse it. Here one man must do the work.”
“How is that?” asked Charnyetski.
“One man must go and burst that cannon with powder; and he can do it during such fogs. It is best that he go in disguise. There are jackets here like those worn by the enemy. As it will not be possible to do otherwise, he will slip in among the Swedes; but if at this side of the trench from which the gun is projecting there are no soldiers, that will be better still.”
“For God’s sake! what will the man do?”
“It is
only necessary to put a box of powder into the mouth of the gun, with a hanging fuse and a thread to be ignited. When the powder explodes, the gun — devil I wanted to say — will burst.”
“Oh, my son! what do you say? Is it little powder that they thrust into it every day, and it does not burst?”
Kmita laughed, and kissed the priest on the sleeve of his habit. “Beloved father, there is a great heart in you, heroic and holy—”
“Give peace now!” answered the prior.
“And holy,” repeated Kmita; “but you do not understand cannon. It is one thing when powder bursts in the butt of the cannon, for then it casts forth the ball and the force flies out forward, but another if you stop the mouth of a gun with powder and ignite it, — no cannon can stand such a trial. Ask Pan Charnyetski. The same thing will take place if you fill the mouth of a cannon with snow and fire it; the piece will burst. Such is the villanous power of powder. What will it be when a whole box of it explodes at the mouth? Ask Pan Charnyetski.”
“That is true. These are no secrets for soldiers,” answered Charnyetski.
“You see if this gun is burst,” continued Kmita, “all the rest are a joke.”
“This seems impossible to me,” said Kordetski; “for, first, who will undertake to do it?”
“A certain poor fellow,” said Kmita; “but he is resolute, his name is Babinich.”
“You!” cried the priest and Charnyetski together.
“Ai, father, benefactor! I was with you at confession, and acknowledged all my deeds in sincerity; among them were deeds not worse than the one I am now planning; how can you doubt that I will undertake it? Do you not know me?”
Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz Page 170
