The Deluge- Volume 2

by Henryk Sienkiewicz

  Half an hour later they found two other corpses. Evidently they were marauders or sick men whom Babinich’s Tartars had seized while pursuing the prince.

  “But why did the prince retreat?”

  Douglas knew him too well—that is, both his daring and his military experience—to admit even for a moment that the prince had not sufficient reasons. Therefore something must have intervened.

  Only next day was the affair explained. Pan Byes Kornie had come from Prince Boguslav, with a party of thirty horse, to report that Yan Kazimir had sent beyond the Bug against Douglas the full hetman Pan Gosyevski, with six thousand Lithuanians and Tartar horse.

  “We learned this,” said Pan Byes, “before Babinich came up; for he advanced very carefully and attacked frequently, therefore annoyingly. Gosyevski is twenty or twenty-five miles distant. When the prince received the tidings, he was forced to retreat in haste, so as to join Radzeyovski, who might be cut to pieces easily. But by marching quickly we made the junction. The prince sent out at once parties of a few tens of men in every direction, with a report to your worthiness. Many of them will fall into Tartar or peasant hands, but in such a war it cannot be otherwise.”

  “Where are the prince and Radzeyovski?”

  “Ten miles from here, at the river.”

  “Did the prince bring back all his forces?”

  “He was forced to leave the infantry, which is coming through the thickest forest, so as to escape the Tartars.”

  “Such cavalry as the Tartar is made to go through the densest forests. I do not expect to see that infantry again. But no one is to blame, and the prince acted like an experienced leader.”

  “The prince threw out one party the most considerable to Ostrolenko, to lead Gosyevski into error. He will go to Ostrolenko at once, thinking that our whole force is there.”

  “That is well!” said Douglas, comforted. “We will manage Gosyevski.”

  And he marched without delay to join Boguslav and Radzeyovski. They met that same day, to the great delight, especially, of Radzeyovski, who feared captivity more than death, for he knew that as a traitor and the originator of all the misfortunes of the Commonwealth he would have to give a terrible answer. But now, after the junction with Douglas, the Swedish army had more than four thousand men; therefore it was able to offer an effective resistance to the forces of the full hetman. He had, it is true, six thousand cavalry; but Tartars—except those of Babinich, who were trained—could not be used in offensive battle, and Pan Gosyevski himself, though a skilled and learned warrior, was not able, like Charnyetski, to inspire men with an enthusiasm which nothing could resist.

  But Douglas was at a loss to understand why Yan Kazimir should send the full hetman beyond the Bug. The Swedish king with the elector was marching on Warsaw; a general battle must therefore follow, sooner or later. And though Yan Kazimir was at the head of a force superior in numbers to the Swedes and the Brandenburgers, still six thousand men formed too great a force for the King of Poland to set aside voluntarily.

  It is true that Gosyevski had saved Babinich from trouble, but still the king did not need to send out a whole division to the rescue of Babinich. Hence there was in this expedition some secret object, which the Swedish general, despite all his penetration, could not divine.

  In the letter of the King of Sweden sent a week later great alarm was evident, and as it were astonishment caused by that expedition, but a few words explained the reasons of this. According to the opinion of Karl Gustav, the hetman was not sent to attack Douglas’s army, nor to go to Lithuania to aid the uprising there, for in Lithuania the Swedes, as it was, were not able to do anything but to threaten Royal Prussia, namely, the eastern part of it, which was completely stripped of troops.

  “The calculation is,” wrote the king, “to make the elector waver in faithfulness to the treaty of Marienburg and to us; which may easily happen, since the elector is ready to enter into alliance with Christ against the Devil and at the same time with the Devil against Christ, so as to win something from both.”

  The letter ended by enjoining on Douglas to strive with all his forces not to let the hetman go to Prussia, “who if he cannot reach there in the course of a few weeks, will be forced beyond doubt to return to Warsaw.”

  Douglas saw that the task given him did not surpass his powers at all. Not so long before he had met with a certain success in opposing Charnyetski himself; therefore Gosyevski was not terrible. The Swedish general did not hope, it is true, to crush Gosyevski’s division, but he felt certain that he would be able to stop him and curb all his movements.

  In fact, from that moment began very skilful approaches of the two armies, which, avoiding on both sides a general battle, endeavored each to flank the other. Both leaders emulated each other; but the experienced Douglas was in so far superior that he did not let Gosyevski advance beyond Ostrolenko. But Babinich, saved from Boguslav’s attack, did not hasten to join the Lithuanian division, for he occupied himself with great zeal on that infantry which Boguslav in his hurried march to Radzeyovski was forced to leave behind. Babinich’s Tartars, guided by local woodmen, pursued night and day, finishing every moment the incautious or those who dropped into the rear. Lack of provisions forced the Swedes at last to separate into small detachments which could find food more easily; this was all that Babinich was waiting for.

  He divided his forces into three commands, under lead of Akbah Ulan, Soroka, and himself, and in a few days he destroyed the greater part of that infantry. It was an untiring hunt after men in forest thickets, in willows, in reeds,—a hunt full of noise, uproar, shouting, shooting, and death.

  Widely did it spread the glory of Babinich’s name among the Mazovians. Bands collected and joined Gosyevski at Ostrolenko itself, when the full hetman, whose march was only a demonstration, received a command from the king to march back to Warsaw. For a short period only could Babinich rejoice with his acquaintances; namely, with Zagloba and Volodyovski, who at the head of the Lauda squadron attended the hetman. But they greeted one another very cordially, for great friendship and intimacy existed already between them. The young colonels were sharply annoyed that they could not act now against Boguslav; but Zagloba consoled them by pouring frequently into their glasses, and saying,—

  “That is nothing! My head has been working since May over stratagems, and I have never racked it over anything in vain. I have a number ready,—very excellent stratagems; but there is no time to apply them, unless at Warsaw, whither we are all marching.”

  “I must go to Prussia,” said Babinich, “and cannot be at Warsaw.”

  “Can you reach Prussia?” asked Volodyovski.

  “As God is in heaven, I shall spring through; and I promise you sacredly to make not the worst cabbage-hash, for I shall say to my Tartars, ‘Riot, my soul!’ They would be glad even here to draw the knife across people’s throats; but I have told them that pay for every violence is the rope. But in Prussia I will give way even to my own will. Why should I not spring through? You were not able; but that is another thing, for it is easier to stop a large force than such a party as mine, with which it is easy to hide. More than once was I sitting in the rushes, and Douglas’s men passed right there, knowing nothing of me. Douglas too will surely follow you, and leave the field free to me.”

  “But, as we hear, you have wearied him out too,” said Pan Michael, with satisfaction.

  “Ah, the scoundrel!” added Zagloba. “He had to change his shirt every day, he sweated so. You never stole up to Hovanski better than to him, and I must acknowledge that I could not have done better myself, though, in his time, Konyetspolski said that Zagloba in partisan warfare was unsurpassed.”

  “It seems to me,” said Pan Michael to Kmita, “that if Douglas returns he will leave Boguslav here to attack you.”

  “God grant it! I have the same hope,” answered Kmita, quickly. “Were I to seek him, and he
me, we should find each other. He will not pass through me a third time; and if he does, then I shall not rise again. I remember your secrets well; and all the Lubni thrusts I have in memory like ‘Our Father.’ Every day, too, I try them with Soroka, so as to train my hand.”

  “What are stratagems good for?” exclaimed Pan Michael; “the sabre is the main thing.”

  This maxim touched Zagloba somewhat; therefore he said at once: “Every windmill thinks that the main thing is to whirl its wings. Do you know why, Michael? Because it has chaff under its roof; that is, in its head. Military art rests on stratagems; if not, Roh Kovalski might be grand hetman and you full hetman.”

  “And what is Pan Kovalski doing?” asked Kmita.

  “Pan Kovalski has now an iron helmet on his head, and justly, for cabbage is best out of a pot. He has grown rich on plunder in Warsaw, has come into good repute, and gone to the hussars, to Prince Polubinski, and all so as to be able to put a spear into Karl Gustav. He comes every day to our tent, and stares to see if the neck of the decanter is sticking out of the straw. I cannot break that lad of drinking. Good example goes for nothing; but I prophesied to him that this desertion of the Lauda squadron would turn out evil. The rogue! the thankless fellow! in return for all the benefits which I have shown him, such a son for a lance!”

  “But did you rear him?”

  “My dear sir, do not make me a bear-trainer! To Sapyeha, who asked me the same question. I answered that he and Roh had the same preceptor, but not me; for I in youthful years was a cooper, and knew how to set staves very well."[10]

  “To begin with, you would not dare to tell that to Sapyeha,” said Volodyovski; “and secondly, though you grumble at Kovalski, you love him as the apple of your eye.”

  “I prefer him to you, Pan Michael; for I could never endure May-bugs, nor soapy little fellows who at the sight of the first woman who comes along play antics like German dogs.”

  “Or like those monkeys in the Kazanovski Palace, with which you were carrying on war.”

  “Oh, laugh, laugh! You can take Warsaw without me next time.”

  “Was it you, then, who took Warsaw?”

  “But who captured the Cracow Gate? Who invented captivity for the generals? They are sitting now on bread and water in Zamost; and when Wittemberg looks at Wrangel, he says, ‘Zagloba put us here!’ and both fall to weeping. If Sapyeha were not ill, and if he were present, he would tell you who first drew the Swedish claw from the skin of Warsaw.”

  “For God’s sake!” said Kmita, “do this for me,—send news of that battle for which they are preparing at Warsaw. I shall be counting the days and nights on my fingers till I know something certain.”

  Zagloba put his finger to his forehead. “Listen to my forecast,” said he, “for what I tell you will be accomplished as surely as that this glass is standing before me— Is it not standing before me?”

  “It is, it is! Speak on.”

  “We shall either lose this general battle, or we shall win it—”

  “Every man knows that!” put in Volodyovski.

  “You might be silent, Michael, and learn something. Supposing that we lose this battle, do you know what will happen? You see you do not know, for you are moving those little awls under your nose like a rabbit. Well, I will tell you that nothing will happen—”

  Kmita, who was very quick, sprang up, struck his glass on the table, and said,—

  “You are beating around the bush!”

  “I say nothing will happen!” repeated Zagloba. “You are young, therefore you do not know. As affairs now stand, our king, our dear country, our armies may lose fifty battles one after another, and the war will go on in the old fashion,—the nobles will assemble, and with them the lower ranks. But if they do not succeed one time, they will another, until the enemy’s force has melted away. But when the Swedes lose one great battle, the Devil will take them without salvation, and with them the elector to boot.”

  Here Zagloba grew animated, emptied his glass, struck it on the table, and continued,—

  “Listen,—for you will not hear this from every mouth, for not every one knows how to take a general view of things. Many a man is thinking, ‘What is waiting for us now? how many battles, how many defeats,’—which, in warring with Karl, are not unlikely,—’how many tears, how much bloodshed, how many grievous paroxysms?’ And many a one will doubt and blaspheme against the mercy of God and the Most Holy Mother. But I tell you this: do you know what is waiting for those vandal enemies?—destruction; do you know what is waiting for us?—victory! If they beat us one hundred times, very well; but we will beat them the hundred and first time, and that will be the end.”

  When he had said this, Zagloba closed his eyes for a moment, but soon opened them. He looked ahead with gleaming vision, and suddenly shouted with the whole force of his breast: “Victory! victory!”

  Kmita was flushed from delight: “In God’s name, he is right, he speaks justly. It cannot be otherwise! Such an end has to come!”

  “It must be acknowledged that you are not lacking here,” said Volodyovski, putting his finger on his forehead. “The Commonwealth may be occupied; but to stay in it is impossible, so at last the Swedes will have to go out.”

  “Well, is that it? I am not lacking!” said Zagloba, rejoiced at the praise. “If that is true, then I will prophesy further. God is with the just!” Here he turned to Kmita. “You will finish the traitor Radzivill; you will go to Taurogi, recover the maiden, marry her, rear posterity. May I have the pip on my tongue if this will not happen as I say! But for God’s sake, don’t smother me!”

  Zagloba was rightfully cautious, for Kmita seized him in his arms, raised him, and began to hug him so that the old man’s eyes were bursting out. He had barely come to his feet and recovered breath, when Pan Michael, greatly delighted, seized him by the hand,—

  “It is my turn! Tell what awaits me.”

  “God bless you, Michael! your pretty tufted lark will hatch out a whole brood,—never fear. Uf!”

  “Vivat!” cried Volodyovski.

  “But first, we will make an end of the Swedes,” added Zagloba.

  “We will, we will!” cried the young colonels, shaking their sabres.

  “Vivat! victory!”

  CHAPTER L.

  A Week later Kmita crossed the boundaries of Electoral Prussia at Raygrod. It came to him easily enough; for before the departure of the full hetman he disappeared in the woods so secretly that Douglas felt sure that his party too had marched with the whole Tartar-Lithuanian division to Warsaw, and he left merely small garrisons in the castles for the defence of those parts.

  Douglas, with Radzeyovski and Radzivill, followed Gosyevski.

  Kmita heard of this before passing the boundary, and grieved greatly that he could not meet his mortal enemy eye to eye, and lest punishment might come to Boguslav from other hands,—namely, from Volodyovski, who also had made a vow against him.

  Hence, not being able to wreak vengeance on the person of the traitor for the wrongs done the Commonwealth and himself, he wreaked it in terrible fashion on the lands of the elector.

  That very night in which the Tartars had passed the boundary pillar, the heavens grew red from flames. An uproar was heard, with the weeping of people trampled by the foot of war. Whoso was able to beg for mercy in the Polish tongue was spared at command of the leader; but German settlements, colonies, villages, and hamlets were turned into a river of fire, and the terrified inhabitants went under the knife.

  And not so swiftly does oil spread over the sea when the sailor pours it to pacify the waves, as that chambul of Tartars and volunteers spread over quiet and hitherto safe regions. It seemed that every Tartar was able to double and treble himself, to be at the same time in a number of places, to burn, to slay. They spared not even grain in the field, nor trees in the gardens.

  Kmita had
held his Tartars so long in the leash that at last, when he let them free like a flock of birds of prey, they grew almost wild in the midst of slaughter and destruction. One surpassed the other; and since they could not take captives, they swam from morning till evening in blood.

  Kmita himself, having in his heart no little fierceness, gave it full freedom, and though he did not steep his own hands in the blood of defenceless people, he looked with pleasure on the flow of blood. In his soul he was at rest, and conscience reproached him with nothing; for this was not Polish blood, and besides it was the blood of heretics; therefore he judged that he was doing a work pleasing to God, and especially to the saints of the Lord.

  The elector, a vassal, therefore a servant of the Commonwealth and living from its bounties, was the first to raise his sacrilegious hand against it; therefore punishment was his due, and Kmita was purely an instrument of God’s vengeance.