July 1, between Povanski and the settlement afterward called Marymont,
was celebrated a great field Mass, which ten thousand men of the
quarter-soldiers heard with attentive mind. The king made a vow that in
case of victory he would build a church to the Most Holy Lady.
Dignitaries, the hetmans, the knights made vows, and even simple
soldiers, following the example, each according to his means, for this
was to be the day of the final storm.
After the Mass each of the leaders moved to his own command. Sapyeha
took his position opposite the Church of the Holy Ghost, which at that
time was outside the walls; but because it was the key to the walls, it
was greatly strengthened by the Swedes, and occupied in fitting manner
by the troops. Charnyetski was to capture Dantzig House, for the rear
wall of that building formed a part of the city wall, and by passing
through the building it was possible to reach the city. Pyotr
Opalinski, the voevoda of Podlyasye, with men from Great Poland and
Mazovia, was to attack from the Cracow suburbs and the Vistula. The
quarter-regiments were to attack the gates of New City. There were so
many men that they almost exceeded the approaches to the walls; the
entire plain, all the neighboring suburban villages and the meadows
were overflowed with a sea of soldiers. Beyond the men were white
tents, after the tents wagons far away; the eye was lost in the blue
distance before it could reach the end of that swarm.
Those legions were standing in perfect readiness, with weapons point
forward, and one foot in advance for the run; they were ready at any
moment to rush to the breaches made by the guns of heavy calibre, and
especially by Zamoyski’s great guns. The guns did not cease to play for
a moment; the storm was deferred only because they were waiting for the
final answer of Wittemberg to the letter which the grand chancellor
Korytsinski had sent him. When about midday the officer returned with a
refusal, the ominous trumpets rang out around the city, and the storm
began.
The armies of the kingdom under the hetmans, Charnyetski’s men, the
regiments of the king, the infantry regiments of Zamoyski, the
Lithuanians of Sapyeha, and the legions of the general militia rushed
toward the walls like a swollen river. But from behind the walls
bloomed out against them rolls of white smoke and darts of flame; heavy
cannon, arquebuses, double-barrelled guns, muskets thundered
simultaneously; the earth was shaken in its foundations. The balls
broke into that throng of men, ploughed long furrows in it; but the men
ran on and tore up to the fortress, regarding neither fire nor death.
Clouds of powder smoke hid the sun.
Each attacked furiously what was nearest him,—the hetmans the gates of
New City; Charnyetski, Dantzig House; Sapyeha with the Lithuanians, the
Church of the Holy Ghost; the Mazovians and men of Great Poland, the
Cracow suburbs.
The heaviest work fell to the last-mentioned men, for the palaces and
houses along the Cracow suburbs were turned into fortresses. But that
day such fury of battle had seized the Mazovians that nothing could
stand before their onset. They took by storm house after house, palace
after palace; they fought in windows, in doors, in passages.
After the capture of one house, before the blood was dry on their hands
and faces, they rushed to another; again a hand-to-hand battle, and
again they rushed farther. The private regiments vied with the general
militia, and the general militia with the infantry. They had been
commanded before advancing to the storm to carry at their breasts
bundles of unripe grain to ward off the bullets, but in the ardor and
frenzy of battle they hurled aside every defence, and ran forward with
bare bosoms. In the midst of a bloody struggle the chapel of the Tsar
Shuiski and the lordly palace of the Konyetspolskis were captured. The
Swedes were destroyed to the last man in the smaller buildings, in the
stables of the magnates, in the gardens descending to the Vistula. Near
the Kazanovski Palace the Swedish infantry tried to make a stand in the
street, and reinforced from the walls of the palace, from the church
and the bell-tower of the Bernardines, which was turned into a strong
fortress, they received the attack with a cutting fire.
But the hail of bullets did not stop the attack for a moment; and the
nobles, with the cry of “Mazovians victorious!” rushed with sabres into
the centre of the quadrangle; after them came the land infantry,
servants armed with poles, pickaxes, and scythes. The quadrangle was
broken in a twinkle, and hewing began. Swedes and Poles were so mingled
together that they formed one gigantic mass, which squirmed, twisted,
and rolled in its own blood between the Kazanovski Palace, the house of
Radzeyovski, and the Cracow gate.
But new legions of warriors breathing blood came on continually, like a
foaming river, from the direction of the Cracow gate. The Swedish
infantry was cut to pieces at last, and then began that famous storm of
the Kazanovski Palace and the Bernardines’ Church which in great part
decided the fate of the day.
Zagloba commanded, for he was mistaken the day before in thinking that
the king called him to his person only to be present; for, on the
contrary, he confided to him, as to a famous and experienced warrior,
command over the camp servants, who with the quarter-soldiers and the
general militia were to go as volunteers to storm from that side.
Zagloba was willing, it is true, to go with these men in the rear, and
content himself with occupying the palaces already captured; but when
in the very beginning all vying with one another were mingled
completely, the human current bore him on with the others. So he went;
for although he had from nature great circumspection as a gift, and
preferred, where it was possible, not to expose his life to danger, he
had for so many years become accustomed to battles in spite of himself,
had been present in so many dreadful slaughters, that when the
inevitable came he fought with others, and even better than others, for
he fought with desperation and rage in a manful heart.
So at this time he found himself at the gate of the Kazanovski Palace,
or rather in the hell which was raging dreadfully in front of that
gate; that is, amid a whirlpool, heat, crushing, a storm of bullets,
fire, smoke, groans and shouts of men. Thousands of scythes, picks, and
axes were driven against the gate; a thousand arms pressed and pushed
it furiously. Some men fell as if struck by lightning; others pushed
themselves into their places, trampled their bodies, and forced
themselves forward, as if seeking death of purpose. No one had seen or
remembered a more stubborn defence, but also not a more resolute
attack. From the highest stories bullets were rained and pitch poured
down on the gate; but those who were under fire, even had they wished
could not withdraw, so powerfully were they pressed from behind. You
saw single men, wet from perspiration, black from smoke, with set
teeth, with wild eyes, hurling at the gate beams of such size that at
an ordinary time three strong men would not have been able to lift
them. So their strength was trebled by frenzy. All the windows were
stormed simultaneously, ladders were placed at the upper stories,
lattices were hewn from the walls. But still from those lattices and
windows, from openings cut in the walls, were sticking out
musket-barrels, which did not cease to smoke for a moment. But at last
such smoke ascended, such dust rose, that on that bright sunny day the
assailants could scarcely recognize one another. In spite of that they
did not desist from the struggle, but climbed ladders the more
fiercely, attacked the gate the more wildly, because the sounds from
the Church of the Bernardines announced that there other parties were
storming with similar energy.
Now Zagloba cried with a voice so piercing that it was heard amid the
uproar and shots: “A box with powder under the gate!”
It was brought to him in a twinkle; he gave command at once to cut just
beneath the bolt an opening of such size that the box alone would find
place in it. When the box was fitted in, Zagloba himself set fire to
the sulphur thread, then commanded,—
“Aside! Close to the wall!”
Those standing near rushed to both sides, toward those who had placed
the ladders at the farther windows. A moment of expectation followed.
A mighty report shook the air, and new bundles of smoke rose toward the
sky. Zagloba sprang forward with his men; they saw that the explosion
had not rent the gate to small pieces, but had torn the hinges from the
right side, wrested away a couple of strong beams, already partly cut,
turned the handle, and pulled off one half of the lower part, so that a
passage was open through which large men might enter easily.
Sharpened stakes, axes, and scythes began to beat violently on the
weakened door; a hundred arms pushed it with utmost effort, a sharp
crash was heard, and all one half fell, uncovering the depth of the
dark antechamber.
In that darkness gleamed discharges of musketry; but the human river
rushed forward with an irresistible torrent,—the palace was captured.
At the same time they broke in through the windows, and a terrible
battle with cold weapons began in the interior of the palace. Chamber
was taken after chamber, corridor after corridor, story after story.
The walls had been so shattered and weakened beforehand that the
ceiling in many rooms fell with a crash, covering with their ruins
Poles and Swedes. But the Mazovians advanced like a conflagration; they
penetrated every place, overturning with their long knives, cutting and
thrusting. No man of the Swedes asked for quarter, but neither was it
given. In some corridors and passages the piles of bodies so blocked
the way that the Swedes made barricades of them; the Poles pulled them
out by the feet, by the hair, and hurled them through the windows.
Blood flowed in streams through the passages. Groups of Swedes defended
themselves yet here and there, and repelled with weakening hands the
furious blows of the stormers. Blood had covered their faces, darkness
was covering their eyes, more than one sank on his knees, and still
fought; pressed on every side, suffocated by the throng of opponents,
the Scandinavians died in silence, in accord with their fame, as
beseemed warriors. The statues of divinities and ancient heroes,
bespattered with blood, looked with lifeless eyes on that death.
Roh Kovalski raged specially in the upper stories; but Zagloba rushed
with his men to the terraces, and when he had cut to pieces the
infantry defending themselves there, he hurried from the terraces to
those wonderful gardens which were famed throughout Europe. The trees
were already cut down, the rare plants destroyed by Polish balls, the
fountains broken, the earth ploughed up by bombshells,—in a word,
everywhere a desert and destruction, though the Swedes had not raised
their robber hands against this place, out of regard for the person of
Radzeyovski. A savage struggle set in there, too; but it lasted only a
short time, for the Swedes gave but feeble resistance, and were cut to
pieces under the personal command of Zagloba. The soldiers dispersed
now through the garden, and the whole palace was plundered.
Zagloba betook himself to a corner of the garden, to a place where the
walls formed a strong “angle,” and where the sun did not come, for the
knight wished to rest somewhat; and he rubbed the sweat from his heated
forehead. All at once he espied some strange monsters, looking at him
with hostility through an iron grating.
The cage was fixed in a corner of the wall, so that balls falling from
the outside could not reach it. The door of the cage was wide open; but
those meagre and ugly creatures did not think of taking advantage of
this. Evidently terrified by the uproar, the whistling of bullets, and
the fierce slaughter at which they had looked a moment before, they
crowded into a corner of the cage, and hidden in the straw, gave note
of their terror only by muttering.
“Are those monkeys or devils?” said Zagloba to himself.
Suddenly anger seized him, courage swelled in his breast, and raising
his sabre he fell upon the cage.
A terrible panic was the answer to the first blow of his sabre. The
monkeys, which the Swedish soldiers had treated kindly and fed from
their own slender rations, fell into such a fright that madness simply
seized them; and since Zagloba stopped their exit, they began to rush
through the cage with unnatural springs, hanging to the sides, to the
top, screaming and biting. At last one in frenzy sprang on Zagloba’s
shoulder, and seizing him by the head, fastened to it with all his
power; another hung to his right shoulder, a third caught him in front
by the neck, the fourth hung to his long split sleeves which were tied
together behind; and Zagloba, stifled, sweating, struggled in vain, in
vain struck blindly toward the rear. Breath soon failed him, his eyes
were standing out of his head, and he began to cry with despairing
voice,—
“Gracious gentlemen! save me!”
The cry brought a number of men, who, unable to understand what was
happening, rushed to his aid with blood-streaming sabres; but they
halted at once in astonishment, they looked at one another, and as if
under the influence of some spell they burst out in one great laugh.
More soldiers ran up, a crowd was formed; but laughter was communicated
to all as an epidemic. They staggered as if drunk, they held their
sides; their faces, besmeared with the gore of men, were twisting
spasmodically, and the more Zagloba struggled the more did they laugh.
Now Roh Kovalski ran down from an upper story, scattered the crowd, and
freed his uncle from the Simian embraces.
“You rascals!” cried the panting Zagloba, “I would you were slain! You
are laughing to see a Catholic in oppression from these African
monsters. I would you were slain! Were it not for me you would be
butting your heads to this moment against the gate, for you deserve
nothing better. I wish you were dead, because you are not worth these
monkeys.”
“I wish you were dead yourself, king of the monkeys!” cried the man
standing nearest.
“_Simiarum destructor_ (destroyer of monkeys)!” cried another.
“Victor!” cried the third.
“What, victor! he is _victus_ (conquered)!”
Here Roh Kovalski came again to the aid of his uncle, and struck the
nearest man in the breast with his fist; the man dropped to the earth
that instant with blood coming from his mouth. Others retreated before
the anger of Kovalski, some drew their sabres; but further disputes
were interrupted by the uproar and shots coming from the Bernardines’
Church. Evidently the storm continued there yet in full force, and
judging from the feverish musketry-fire, the Swedes were not thinking
of surrender.
“With succor! to the church! to the church!” cried Zagloba.
He sprang himself to the top of the palace; there, from the right wing,
was to be seen the church, which seemed to be in flames. Crowds of
stormers were circling around it convulsively, not being able to enter
and perishing for nothing in a cross fire; for bullets were rained on
them from the Cracow gate as thickly as sand.
“Cannon to the windows!” shouted Zagloba.
There were guns enough, large and small, in the Kazanovski Palace,
therefore they were drawn to the windows; from fragments of costly
furniture and pedestals of statues, platforms were constructed; and in
the course of half an hour a number of guns were looking out through
the empty openings of the windows toward the church.
“Roh!” said Zagloba, with uncommon irritation, “I must do something
considerable, or my glory is lost through those monkeys,—would that the
plague had stifled them! The whole army will ridicule me; and though
there is no lack of words in my mouth, still I cannot meet the whole
world. I must wipe away this confusion, or wide as this Commonwealth is
they will herald me through it as king of the monkeys!”
“Uncle must wipe away this confusion!” repeated Roh, with a thundering
voice.
“And the first means will be that, as I have captured the Kazanovski
Palace,—for let any one say that it was not I who did it—”
“Let any one say that it was not Uncle who did it!” repeated Roh.
“I will capture that church, so help me the Lord God, amen!” concluded
Zagloba.
Then he turned to his attendants who were there at the guns,—
“Fire!”
Fear seized the Swedes, who were defending themselves with despair in
the church, when the whole side wall began on a sudden to tremble.
Bricks, rubbish, lime, fell on those who were sitting in the windows,
at the port-holes, on the fragments of the inside cornices, at the
pigeon-holes, through which they were firing at the besiegers. A
terrible dust rose in the house of God, and mixed with the smoke began
to stifle the wearied men. One man could not see another in the
darkness. Cries of “I am suffocating, I am suffocating!” still
increased the terror. The noise of balls falling through the windows,
of leaden lattice falling to the floor, the heat, the exhalations from
bodies, turned the retreat of God into a hell upon earth. The
frightened soldiers stood aside from entrances, windows, and
port-holes. The panic is changed into frenzy. Again terrified voices
call: “I am suffocating! Air! Water!” Hundreds of voices begin to
roar,—
“A white flag! a white flag!”
Erskine, who is commanding, seizes the flag with his own hand to
display it outside. At that moment the entrance bursts, a line of
stormers rush in like an avalanche of Satans, and a slaughter follows.
There is sudden silence in the church; there is heard only the
beast-like panting of the strugglers, the bite of steel on bones, and
on the stone floor groans, the patter of blood; and at times some voice
in which there is nothing human cries, “Quarter! Quarter!” After an
hour’s fighting the bell on the tower begins to thunder, and thunders,
thunders,—to the victory of the Mazovians, to the funeral of the
Swedes.
The Kazanovski Palace, the cloister, and the bell-tower are captured.
Pyotr Opalinski himself, the voevoda of Podlyasye, appeared in the
blood-stained throng before the palace on his horse.
“Who came to our aid from the palace?” cried he, wishing to outcry the
sound and the roar of men.
“He who captured the palace!” said a powerful man, appearing before the
voevoda,—“I!”
“What is your name?”
“Zagloba.”
“Vivat Zagloba!” bellowed thousands of throats.
But the terrible Zagloba pointed with his stained sabre toward the
gate,—
“We have not done enough yet. Turn the cannon toward the wall and
against the gate. Advance! follow me!”
The mad throng rush in the direction of the gate. Meanwhile, oh wonder!
the fire of the Swedes instead of increasing is growing weak. At the
same moment some voice unexpected and piercing cries from the top of
the bell-tower,—
“Charnyetski is in the city! I see our squadrons!”
The Swedish fire was weakening more and more.
“Halt! halt!” commanded the voevoda.
But the throng did not hear him and rushed at random. That moment a
white flag appeared on the Cracow gate.
In truth, Charnyetski, having forced his way through Dantzig House,
rushed like a hurricane into the precincts of the fortress; when the
Danillovich Palace was taken, and when a moment later the Lithuanian
colors glittered on the walls near the Church of the Holy Ghost,
Wittemberg saw that further resistance was vain. The Swedes might
defend themselves yet in the lofty houses of Old and New City; but the
inhabitants had already taken arms, and the defence would end in a
terrible slaughter of the Swedes without hope of victory.
The trumpeters began then to sound on the walls and to wave white
flags. Seeing this, the Polish commanders withheld the storm. General
Löwenhaupt, attended by a number of colonels, went out through the gate
of New City, and rushed with all breath to the king.
Yan Kazimir had the city in his hands now; but the kind king wished to
stop the flow of Christian blood, therefore he settled on the
conditions offered to Wittemberg at first. The city was to be
surrendered, with all the booty collected in it. Each Swede was
permitted to take with him only what he had brought from Sweden. The
garrison with all the generals and with arms in hand were to march out
of the city, taking their sick and wounded and the Swedish ladies, of
whom a number of tens were in Warsaw. To the Poles who were serving
with the Swedes, amnesty was given, with the idea that surely none were
serving of their own will. Boguslav Radzivill alone was excepted. To
this Wittemberg agreed the more readily since the prince was at that
moment with Douglas on the Bug.
The conditions were signed at once. All the bells in the churches
announced to the city and the world that the capital had passed again
into the hands of its rightful monarch. An hour later a multitude of
the poorest people came out from behind the walls, seeking charity and
bread in the Polish camp; for all in the city except the Swedes were in
want of food. The king commanded to give what was possible, and went
himself to look at the departure of the Swedish garrison.
He was surrounded by church and lay dignitaries, by a suite so splendid
that it dazzled the people. Nearly all the troops—that is, the troops
of the kingdom under the hetmans, Charnyetski’s division, the
Lithuanians under Sapyeha, and an immense crowd of general militia,
together with the camp servants—assembled around his Majesty; or all
were curious to see those Swedes with whom a few hours before they had
fought so terribly and bloodily. Polish commissioners were posted at
all the gates, from the moment of signing the conditions; these
commissioners were intrusted with the duty of seeing that the Swedes
bore off no booty. A special commission was occupied with receiving the
booty in the city itself.
In the van came the cavalry, which was not numerous, especially since
Boguslav’s men were excluded from the right of departure; next came the
field artillery with light guns; the heavy pieces were given to the
Poles. The men marched at the sides of the guns with lighted matches.
Before them waved their unfurled flags, which as a mark of honor were
lowered before the Polish king, recently a wanderer. The artillerists
marched proudly, looking straight into the eyes of the Polish knights,
as if they wished to say, “We shall meet again!” And the Poles wondered
at their haughty bearing and courage unbent by misfortune. Then
appeared the wagons with officers and wounded. In the first one lay
Benedikt Oxenstiern the chancellor, before whom Yan Kazimir had
commanded the infantry to present arms, wishing to show that he knew
how to respect virtue even in an enemy.
Then to the sound of drums, and with waving flags, marched the
quadrangle of unrivalled Swedish infantry, resembling, according to the
expression of Suba Gazi, moving castles. After them advanced a
brilliant party of cavalry, armored from foot to head, and with a blue
banner on which a golden lion was embroidered. These surrounded the
chief of staff. At sight of them a murmur passed through the crowd,—
“Wittemberg is coming! Wittemberg is coming!”
In fact, the field-marshal himself was approaching; and with him the
younger Wrangel, Horn, Erskine, Löwenhaupt, Forgell. The eyes of the
Polish knights were turned with eagerness toward them, and especially
toward the face of Wittemberg. But his face did not indicate such a
terrible warrior as he was in reality. It was an aged face, pale,
emaciated by disease. He had sharp features, and above his mouth a
thin, small mustache turned up at the ends. The pressed lips and long,
pointed nose gave him the appearance of an old and grasping miser.
Dressed in black velvet and with a black hat on his head, he looked
more like a learned astrologer or a physician; and only the gold chain
on his neck, the diamond star on his breast, and a field-marshal’s
baton in his hand showed his high office of leader.
Advancing, he cast his eyes unquietly on the king, on the king’s staff,
on the squadrons standing in rank; then his eyes took in the immense
throngs of the general militia, and an ironical smile came out on his
pale lips.
But in those throngs a murmur was rising ever greater, and the word
“Wittemberg! Wittemberg!” was in every mouth.
After a while the murmur changed into deep grumbling, but threatening,
like the grumbling of the sea before a storm. From instant to instant
it was silent; and then far away in the distance, in the last ranks,
was heard some voice in peroration. This voice was answered by others;
greater numbers answered them; they were heard ever louder and spread
more widely, like ominous echoes. You would swear that a storm was
coming from a distance, and that it would burst with all power.
The officers were anxious and began to look at the king with disquiet.
“What is that? What does that mean?” asked Yan Kazimir.
Then the grumbling passed into a roar as terrible as if thunders had
begun to wrestle with one another in the sky. The immense throng of
general militia moved violently, precisely like standing grain when a
hurricane is sweeping around it with giant wing. All at once some tens
of thousands of sabres were glittering in the sun.
“What is that? What does that mean?” asked the king, repeatedly.
No one could answer him. Then Volodyovski, standing near Sapyeha,
exclaimed: “That is Pan Zagloba!”
Volodyovski had guessed aright. The moment the conditions of surrender
were published and had come to the ears of Zagloba, the old noble fell
into such a terrible rage that speech was taken from him for a while.
When he came to himself his first act was to spring among the ranks of
the general militia and fire up the minds of the nobles. They heard him
willingly; for it seemed to all that for so much bravery, for such
toil, for so much bloodshed under the walls of Warsaw, they ought to
have a better vengeance against the enemy. Therefore great circles of
chaotic and stormy men surrounded Zagloba, who threw live coals by the
handful on the powder, and with his speech fanned into greater
proportions the fire which all the more easily seized their heads, that
they were already smoking from the usual libations consequent on
victory.
“Gracious gentlemen!” said he, “behold these old hands have toiled
fifty years for the country; fifty years have they been shedding the
blood of the enemy at every wall of the Commonwealth; and to-day—I have
witnesses—they captured the Kazanovski Palace and the Bernardines’
Church! And when, gracious gentlemen, did the Swedes lose heart, when
did they agree to capitulate? It was when we turned our guns from the
Bernardines to the Old City. We have not spared our blood, brothers; it
has been shed bountifully, and no one has been spared but the enemy.
But we, brothers, have left our lands without masters, our servants
without lords, our wives without husbands, our children without
fathers,—oh, my dear children, what is happening to you now?—and we
have come here with our naked breasts against cannon. And what is our
reward for so doing? This is it: Wittemberg goes forth free, and
besides, they give him honor for the road. The executioner of our
country departs, the blasphemer of religion departs; the raging enemy
of the Most Holy Lady, the burner of our houses, the thief of our last
bit of clothing, the murderer of our wives and children,—oh, my
children, where are you now?—the disgracer of the clergy and virgins
consecrated to God! Woe to thee, country! Shame to you, nobles! A new
agony is awaiting you. Oh, our holy faith! Woe to you, suffering
churches! weeping to thee and complaint, O Chenstohova! for Wittemberg
is departing in freedom, and will return soon to press out tears and
blood, to finish killing those whom he has not yet killed, to burn that
which he has not yet burned, to put shame on that which he has not yet
put to shame! Weep, O Poland and Lithuania! Weep, ranks of people, as I
weep,—an old soldier who, descending to the grave, must look on your
agony! Woe to thee, Ilion, the city of aged Priam! Woe! woe! woe!”
So spoke Zagloba; and thousands listened to him, and wrath raised the
hair on the heads of the nobles; but he moved on farther. Again he
complained, tore his clothing, and laid bare his breast. He entered
also into the army, which gave a willing ear to his complaints; for, in
truth, there was a terrible animosity in all hearts against Wittemberg.
The tumult would have burst out at once; but Zagloba himself restrained
it, lest, if it burst too early, Wittemberg might save himself somehow;
but if it broke out when he was leaving the city and would show himself
to the general militia, they would bear him apart on their sabres
before any one could see what was done.
And his reckoning was justified. At sight of the tyrant frenzy seized
the brains of the chaotic and half-drunken nobles, and a terrible storm
burst forth in the twinkle of an eye. Forty thousand sabres were
flashing in the sun, forty thousand throats began to bellow,—
“Death to Wittemberg! Give him here! Make mince-meat of him! make
mince-meat of him!”
To the throngs of nobles were joined throngs more chaotic still and
made brutal by the recent shedding of blood, the camp servants; even
the more disciplined regular squadrons began to murmur fiercely against
the oppressor, and the storm began to fly with rage against the Swedish
staff.
At the first moment all lost their heads, though all understood what
the matter was. “What is to be done?” cried voices near the king. “Oh,
merciful Jesus!” “Rescue! defend! It is a shame not to observe the
conditions!”
Enraged crowds rush in among the squadrons, press upon them; the
squadrons are confused, cannot keep their places. Around them are
sabres, sabres, and sabres; under the sabres are inflamed faces,
threatening eyes, howling mouths; uproar, noise, wild cries grow with
amazing rapidity. In front are rushing camp servants, camp followers,
and every kind of army rabble, more like beasts or devils than men.
Wittemberg understood what was happening. His face grew pale as a
sheet; sweat, abundant and cold, covered his forehead in a moment; and,
oh wonder! that field-marshal who hitherto was ready to threaten the
whole world, that conqueror of so many armies, that captor of so many
cities, that old soldier was then so terribly frightened at the howling
mass that presence of mind left him utterly. He trembled in his whole
body, he dropped his hands and groaned, spittle began to flow from his
mouth to the golden chain, and the field-marshal’s baton dropped from
his hand. Meanwhile the terrible throng was coming nearer and nearer;
ghastly forms were surrounding already the hapless generals; a moment
more, they would bear them apart on sabres, so that not a fragment of
them would remain.
Other Swedish generals drew their sabres, wishing to die weapon in
hand, as beseemed knights; but the aged oppressor grew weak altogether,
and half closed his eyes.
At this moment Volodyovski, with his men, sprang to the rescue of the
staff. Going wedge-form on a gallop, he split the mob as a ship moving
with all sails bears apart the towering waves of the sea. The cry of
the trampled rabble was mingled with the shouts of the Lauda squadron;
but the horsemen reached the staff first, and surrounded it in the
twinkle of an eye with a wall of horses, a wall of their own breasts
and sabres.
“To the king!” cried the little knight.
They moved on. The throng surrounded them from every side, ran along
the flanks and the rear, brandished sabres and clubs, howled more and
more terribly; but the Lauda men pushed forward, thrusting out their
sabres from moment to moment at the sides, as a strong stag thrusts
with his antlers when surrounded by wolves.
Then Voynillovich sprang to the aid of Volodyovski; after him
Vilchkovski with a regiment of the king, then Prince Polubinski; and
all together, defending themselves unceasingly, conducted the staff to
the presence of Yan Kazimir.
The tumult increased instead of diminishing. It seemed, after a time,
that the excited rabble would try to seize the Swedish generals without
regard to the king. Wittemberg recovered; but fear did not leave him in
the least. He sprang from his horse then; and as a hare pressed by dogs
or wolves takes refuge under a wagon in motion, so did he, in spite of
his gout, throw himself at the feet of Yan Kazimir.
Then he dropped on his knees, and seizing the king’s stirrup, began to
cry: “Save me, Gracious Lord, save me! I have your royal word; the
agreement is signed. Save me, save me! Have mercy on us! Do not let
them murder me!”
The king, at sight of such abasement and such shame turned away his
eyes with aversion and said,—
“Field-marshal, pray be calm.”
But he had a troubled face himself, for he knew not what to do. Around
them were gathering crowds ever greater, and approaching with more
persistence. It is true that the squadrons stood as if for battle, and
Zamoyski’s infantry had formed a terrible quadrangle round about; but
what was to be the end of it all?
The king looked at Charnyetski; but Charnyetski only twisted his beard
with rage, his soul was storming with such anger against the
disobedience of the general militia. Then the chancellor, Korytsinski,
said,—
“Gracious Lord, we must keep the agreement.”
“We must!” replied the king.
Wittemberg, who was looking carefully into their eyes, breathed more
freely.
“Gracious Lord,” said he, “I believe in your words as in God.”
To which Pototski, the old hetman of the kingdom, cried,—
“And why have you broken so many oaths, so many agreements, so many
terms of surrender? With what any man wars, from that will he perish.
Why did you seize, in spite of the terms of capitulation, the king’s
regiment commanded by Wolf?”
“Miller did that, not I,” answered Wittemberg.
The hetman looked at him with disdain; then turned to the king,—
“Gracious Lord, I do not say this to incite your Royal Grace to break
agreements also, for let perfidy be on their side alone.”
“What is to be done?” asked the king. “If we send them to Prussia,
fifty thousand nobles will follow and cut them to pieces before they
reach Pultusk, unless we give them the whole regular army as a guard,
and we cannot do that. Hear, your Royal Grace, how the militia are
howling! In truth, there is a well-founded animosity against
Wittemberg. It is needful first to safeguard his person, and then to
send all away when the fire has cooled down.”
“There is no other way!” said Korytsinski.
“But where are they to be kept? We cannot keep them here; for here,
devil take it! civil war would break out,” said the voevoda of Rus.
Now Sobiepan Zamoyski appeared, and pouting his lips greatly, said with
his customary spirit,—
“Well, Gracious Lord, give them to me at Zamost; let them sit there
till calm comes. I will defend Wittemberg there from the nobles. Let
them try to get him from me!”
“But on the road will your worthiness defend the field-marshal?” asked
the chancellor.
“I can depend on my servants yet. Or have I not infantry and cannon?
Let any one take him from Zamoyski! We shall see.”
Here he put his hands on his hips, struck his thighs, and bent from one
side of the saddle to the other.
“There is no other way,” said the chancellor.
“I see no other,” added Lantskoronski.
“Then take them,” said the king to Zamoyski.
But Wittemberg, seeing that his life was threatened no longer,
considered it proper to protest.
“We did not expect this!” said he.
“Well, we do not detain you; the road is open,” said Pototski, pointing
to the distance with his hand.
Wittemberg was silent.
Meanwhile the chancellor sent a number of officers to declare to the
nobles that Wittemberg would not depart in freedom, but would be sent
to Zamost. The tumult, it is true, was not allayed at once; still the
news had a soothing effect. Before night fell attention was turned in
another direction. The troops began to enter the city, and the sight of
the recovered capital filled all minds with the delight of triumph.
The king rejoiced; still the thought that he was unable to observe the
conditions of the agreement troubled him not a little, as well as the
endless disobedience of the general militia.
Charnyetski was chewing his anger. “With such troops one can never be
sure of to-morrow,” said he to the king. “Sometimes they fight badly,
sometimes heroically, all from impulse; and at any outbreak rebellion
is ready.
“God grant them not to disperse,” said the king, “for they are needed
yet, and they think that they have finished everything.”
“The man who caused that outbreak should be torn asunder with horses,
without regard to the services which he has rendered,” continued
Charnyetski.
The strictest orders were given to search for Zagloba, for it was a
secret to no man that he had raised the storm; but Zagloba had as it
were dropped into water. They searched for him in the tents, in the
tabor, even among the Tartars, all in vain. Tyzenhauz even said that
the king, always kind and gracious, wished from his whole soul that
they might not find him, and even undertook a nine days’ devotion to
that effect.
But a week later, after some dinner when the heart of the monarch was
big with joy, the following words were heard from the mouth of Yan
Kazimir,—
“Announce that Pan Zagloba is not to hide himself longer, for we are
longing for his jests.”
When Charnyetski was horrified at this, the king said,—
“Whoso in this Commonwealth should have justice without mercy in his
heart would be forced to carry an axe in his bosom, and not a heart.
Faults come easier here than anywhere, but in no land does repentance
follow so quickly.”
Saying this, the king had Babinich more in mind than Zagloba; and he
was thinking of Babinich because the young man had bowed down to the
king’s feet the day before with a petition that he would not hinder him
from going to Lithuania. He said that he wished to freshen the war
there, and attack the Swedes, as he had once attacked Hovanski. And as
the king intended to send there a soldier experienced in partisan
warfare, he permitted Babinich to go, gave him the means, blessed him,
and whispered some wish in his ear, after which the young knight fell
his whole length at his feet.
Then, without loitering, Kmita moved briskly toward the east. Suba
Gazi, captured by a considerable present, permitted him to take five
hundred fresh Dobrudja Tartars; fifteen hundred other good men marched
with him,—a force with which it was possible to begin something. And
the young man’s head was fired with a desire for battle and warlike
achievements. The hope of glory smiled on him; he heard already how all
Lithuania was repeating his name with pride and wonder. He heard
especially how one beloved mouth repeated it, and his soul gave him
wings.
And there was another reason why he rode forward so briskly. Wherever
he appeared he was the first to announce the glad tidings: “The Swede
is defeated, and Warsaw is taken!” Wherever his horse’s hoofs sounded,
the whole neighborhood rang with these words; the people along the
roads greeted him with weeping; they rang bells in the church-towers
and sang _Te Deum Laudamus!_ When he rode through the forest the dark
pines, when through the fields the golden grain, rocked by the wind,
seemed to repeat and sound joyously,—
“The Swede is defeated! Warsaw is taken! Warsaw is taken!”