With Fire and Sword by Henryk Sienkiewicz (big ebook reader .txt) 📕

“They will surely choose Yanitski to negotiate,” said Skshetuski, “for he speaks Tartar as well as Polish.”

“Ah, it is disgusting to hear him!” said Pan Longin, dropping his eyes.

“And so do I. The murzas and I are as well acquainted as white-faced horses. They wanted to give me their daughters when I was in the Crimea so as to have beautiful grandchildren, as I was young in those days, and had made no pacta conventa with my innocence like Podbipienta. I played many a prank.”

“And you repeat the same thing like a trained starling. It is clear that the Botvinians are not well acquainted with human speech yet.”

Further conversation was interrupted by a noise beyond the tent. The knights went out therefore to see what was going on. A multitude of soldiers were on the ramparts looking at the place round about, which during the night had changed considerably and was still changing before their eyes. The Cossacks had not been idle since the last assault; they had made a breastwork and placed cannon in it, longer and carrying farther than any in the Polish camp; they had begun traverses, zigzags, and approaches. From a distance these embankments looked like thousands of gigantic molehills; the whole slope of the field was covered with them; the freshly dug earth lay black everywhere in the grass, and every place was swarming with men at work. The red caps of the Cossacks were glittering on the front ramparts.

The prince stood on the works with Sobieski and Pshiyemski. A little below, Firlei was surveying the Cossack works through a field-glass, and said to Ostrorog⁠—

“The enemy are beginning a regular siege. I see we must abandon defence in the trenches and go to the castle.”

Prince Yeremi heard these words, and said, bending from above to the castellan: “God keep us from that, for we should be going of our own choice into a trap. Here is the place for us to live or die.”

“That’s my opinion too, even if I had to kill a Burlai every day,” put in Zagloba. “I protest in the name of the whole army against the opinion of the castellan of Belsk.”

“This matter does not pertain to you!” said the prince.

“Quiet!” whispered Volodyovski, jerking him by the sleeve.

“We will exterminate them in those hiding-places like so many moles,” said Zagloba, “and I beg your serene Highness to let me go out with the first sally. They know me already, and they will know me better.”

“With a sally!” said the prince, and wrinkled his brow. “Wait a minute! The nights are dark in the beginning now.” Here he turned to Sobieski, Pshiyemski, and the commanders, and said: “I ask you, gentlemen, to come to counsel.”

He left the intrenchment, and all the officers followed him.

“For the love of God, what are you doing?” asked Volodyovski, “What does this mean? Why, you don’t know service and discipline, that you interfere in the conversation of your superiors. The prince is a mild-mannered man, but in time of war there is no joking with him.”

“Oh, that is nothing, Pan Michael! Konyetspolski, the father, was a fierce lion, and he depended greatly on my counsels; and may the wolves eat me up today, if it was not for that reason that he defeated Gustavus Adolphus twice. I know how to talk with magnates. Didn’t you see now how the prince was astonished when I advised him to make a sally? If God gives a victory, whose service will it be⁠—whose? Will it be yours?”

At that moment Zatsvilikhovski came up. “What’s this? They are rooting and rooting, like so many pigs!” said he, pointing to the field.

“I wish they were pigs,” said Zagloba. “Pork sausage would be cheap, but their carrion is not fit for dogs. Today the soldiers had to dig a well in Firlei’s quarters, for the water in the eastern pond was spoiled from the bodies. Toward morning the bile burst in the dog-brothers, and they all floated. Now next Friday we cannot use fish, because the fish have eaten their flesh.”

“True,” said Zatsvilikhovski; “I am an old soldier, but I have not seen so many bodies, unless at Khotím, at the assault of the janissaries on our camp.”

“You will see more of them yet, I tell you.”

“I think that this evening, or before evening, they will move to the storm again.”

“But I say they will leave us in peace till tomorrow.”

Scarcely had Zagloba finished speaking, when long white puffs of smoke blossomed out on the breastwork, and balls flew over the intrenchment.

“There!” exclaimed Zatsvilikhovski.

“Oh, they know nothing of military art!” said Zagloba.

Old Zatsvilikhovski was right. Hmelnitski had began a regular siege. He had closed all roads and escapes, had taken away the pasture, made approaches and breastworks, had dug zigzags near the camp, but had not abandoned assaults. He had resolved to give no rest to the besieged; to harass, to frighten, to keep them in continual sleeplessness, and press upon them till their arms should fall from their stiffened hands. In the evening, therefore, he struck upon the quarters of Vishnyevetski, with no better result than the day before, especially since the Cossacks did not advance with such alacrity. Next day firing did not cease for an instant. The zigzags were already so near that musketry fire reached the ramparts; the earthworks smoked like little volcanoes from morning till evening. It was not a general battle, but a continual fusillade. The besieged rushed out sometimes from the ramparts; then sabres, flails, scythes, and lances met in the conflict. But scarcely had a few Cossacks fallen in the ranks, when the gaps were immediately filled with new men. The soldiers had no rest for even a moment during the whole day; and when the desired sunset came, a new general assault was begun. A sally was not to be thought of.

On the night of the