With Fire and Sword, Henryk Sienkiewicz [year 7 reading list txt] 📗

Bodies lay dark under his feet; the others fell back, impelled by panic terror. “A div! a div!” howled they, wildly.

The howling was not without an answer. Half an hour had not passed when the whole field swarmed with footmen and horsemen. Cossacks ran up, and Tartars also with poles and bows and pieces of burning pitch-pine. Excited questions began to fly from mouth to mouth. “What is it, what has happened?” “A div!” answered the Tartars. “A div!” repeated the crowd. “A Pole! A div! Take him alive, alive!”

Pan Longin fired twice from his pistols, but those reports could not be heard by his comrades in the Polish camp. Now the crowd approached him in a half-circle. He was standing in the shade, gigantic, supported by the tree, and he waited with sword in hand. The crowd came nearer, nearer. At last the voice of command shouted: “Seize him!”

They rushed ahead. The cries were stopped. Those who could not push on gave light to the assailants. A whirl of men gathered and turned under the tree. Only groans came out of that whirl, and for a long time it was impossible to distinguish anything. At last a scream of terror was wrested from the assailants. The crowd broke in a moment. Under the tree remained Pan Longin, and at his feet a crowd of bodies still quivering in agony.

“Ropes, ropes!” thundered a voice.

The horsemen ran for the ropes, and brought them in the twinkle of an eye. Then a number of strong men seized the two ends of a long rope, endeavoring to fasten Pan Longin to the tree; but he cut with his sword, and the men fell on the ground on both sides. Then the Tartars tried, with the same result.

Seeing that too many men in a crowd interfere with one another, a number of the boldest Nogais advanced once more, wishing absolutely to seize the enormous man alive; but he tore them as a wild boar tears resolute dogs. The oak, which had grown together from two great trees, guarded in its central depression the knight; whoever approached him from the front within the length of his sword perished without uttering a groan. The superhuman power of Pan Longin seemed to increase with each moment. Seeing this, the enraged hordes drove away the Cossacks, and around were heard the wild cries: “Bows! bows!”

At the sight of the bows, and of the arrows poured out at the feet of his enemies from their quivers, Pan Longin saw that the moment of death was at hand, and he began the litany to the Most Holy Lady.

It became still. The crowds restrained their breath, waiting for what would happen. The first arrow whistled, as Pan Longin was saying, “Mother of the Redeemer!” and it scratched his temple. Another arrow whistled, as he was saying, “O glorious Lady,” and it stuck in his shoulder. The words of the litany had mingled with the whistling of arrows; and when Pan Longin had said, “Morning Star,” arrows were standing in his shoulders, his side, in his legs. The blood from his temples was flowing into his eyes; he saw as through a mist the field and the Tartars; he heard no longer the whistle of the arrows. He felt that he was weakening, that his legs were bending under him; his head dropped on his breast. At last he fell on his knees. Then he said, with a half groan: “Queen of the Angels⁠—” These words were his last on earth. The angels of heaven took his soul, and placed it a clear pearl at the feet of the “Queen of the Angels.”

LXI

Zagloba and Volodyovski were standing on the rampart next morning among the soldiers, looking carefully toward the tabor, from the side of which masses of peasants were approaching. Pan Yan was in counsel with the prince; but they, taking advantage of the moment of quiet, were talking about the preceding day and the present movement in the enemy’s tabor.

“That forebodes no good for us,” said Zagloba, pointing at the dark masses moving like an enormous cloud. “They are surely coming to an assault again, and here our hands will not move in their joints.”

“Why should there be an assault in the clear day? They will do nothing more this time,” said the little knight, “than occupy our rampart of yesterday, dig into our new one, and fire from morning till evening.”

“We might stir them up nicely with our cannon.”

Volodyovski lowered his voice. “We haven’t much powder. With our present use it will not last six days probably; but by that time the king will come surely.”

“Let him do what he likes. If only our Pan Longin, poor man, has got through in safety! I could not sleep the whole night. I was thinking only of him, and whenever I dozed I saw him in trouble; and such sorrow seized me that sweat stood out on my body. He is the best man to be found in the Commonwealth, looking with a lantern for three years and six weeks.”

“And why did you always jeer at him?”

“Because my lip is worse than my heart. But don’t make it bleed, Pan Michael, with remembrances, for as matters are I reproach myself; and God forbid that anything should happen to Pan Longin! I should have no peace till my death.”

“Don’t grieve so much. He never had any ill feeling against you, and I have heard him say himself, ‘An evil mouth, but a golden heart.’ ”

“God give him health, the worthy friend! He never knew how to talk in human fashion, but he made up for a hundred such deficiencies by great virtue. What do you think, Pan Michael, did he pass through?”

“The night was dark, and the peasants after the defeat were terribly tired. We had not a good watch; what must it have been with them?”

“Praise God