“Man,” asked Pan Andrei, “what is that which shines so?”
“The church on Yasna Gora.”
“Glory to the Most Holy Lady!” cried Kmita. He took his cap from his head, and his men removed theirs.
After so many days of suffering, of doubts, and of struggles, Pan Andrei felt suddenly that something wonderful was happening in him, Barely had the words, “the church on Yasna Gora,” sounded in his ears when the confusion fell from him as if some hand had removed it.
A certain inexplicable awe seized hold of Pan Andrei, full of reverence, but at the same time a joy unknown to experience, great and blissful. From that church shining on the height in the first rays of the sun, hope, such as for a long time Pan Andrei had not known, was beating—a strength invincible on which he wished to lean. A new life, as it were, entered him and began to course through his veins with the blood. He breathed as deeply as a sick man coming to himself out of fever and unconsciousness.
But the church glittered more and more brightly, as if it were taking to itself all the light of the sun. The whole region lay at its feet, and the church gazed at it from the height; you would have said, “ ’Tis the sentry and guardian of the land.”
For a long time Kmita could not take his eyes from that light; he satisfied and comforted himself with the sight of it. The faces of his men had grown serious, and were penetrated with awe. Then the sound of a bell was heard in the silent morning air.
“From your horses!” cried Pan Andrei.
All sprang from their saddles, and kneeling on the road began the litany. Kmita repeated it, and the soldiers responded together.
Other wagons came up. Peasants seeing the praying men on the road joined them, and the crowd grew greater continually. When at length the prayers were finished Pan Andrei rose, and after him his men; but they advanced on foot, leading their horses and singing: “Hail, ye bright gates!”
Kmita went on with alertness as if he had wings on his shoulders. At the turns of the road the church vanished, then came out again. When a height or a mist concealed it, it seemed to Kmita that light had been captured by darkness; but when it gleamed forth again all faces were radiant.
So they went on for a long time. The cloister and the walls surrounding it came out more distinctly, became more imposing, more immense. At last they saw the town in the distance, and under the mountain whole lines of houses and cottages, which, compared with the size of the church, seemed as small as birds’ nests.
It was Sunday; therefore when the sun had risen well the road was swarming with wagons, and people on foot going to church. From the lofty towers the bells great and small began to peal, filling the air with noble sounds. There was in that sight and in those metal voices a strength, a majesty immeasurable, and at the same time a calm. That bit of land at the foot of Yasna Gora resembled in no wise the rest of the country.
Throngs of people stood black around the walls of the church. Under the hill were hundreds of wagons, carriages, and equipages; the talk of men was blended with the neighing of horses tied to posts. Farther on, at the right, along the chief road leading to the mountain, were to be seen whole rows of stands, at which were sold metal offerings, wax candles, pictures, and scapulars. A river of people flowed everywhere freely.
The gates were wide open; whoso wished entered, whoso wished went forth; on the walls, at the guns, were no soldiers. Evidently the very sacredness of the place guarded the church and the cloister, and perhaps men trusted in the letters of Karl Gustav in which he guaranteed safety.
XXXIX
From the gates of the fortress peasants and nobles, villagers from various neighborhoods, people of every age, of both sexes, of all ranks, pressed forward to the church on their knees, singing prayerful hymns. That river flowed slowly, and its course was stopped whenever the bodies of people crowded against one another too densely. At times the songs ceased and the crowds began to repeat a litany, and then the thunder of words was heard from one end of the place to the other. Between hymn and litany, between litany and hymn, the people were silent, struck the ground with their foreheads, or cast themselves down in the form of a cross. At these moments were heard only the imploring and shrill voices of beggars, who sitting at both banks of the human river exposed their deformed limbs to public gaze. Their howling was mingled with the clinking of coppers thrown into tin and wooden dishes. Then again the river of heads flowed onward, and again the hymns thundered.
As the river flowed nearer to the church door, excitement grew greater, and was turned into ecstasy. You could see hands stretched toward heaven, eyes turned upward, faces pale from emotion or glowing with prayer. Differences of rank disappeared: the coat of the peasant touched the robe of the noble, the jacket of the soldier the yellow coat of the artisan.
In the church door the crush was still greater. The bodies of men had become not a river, but a bridge, so firm that you might travel on their heads and their shoulders without touching the ground with a foot. Breath failed their breasts, space failed their bodies; but the spirit which inspired gave them iron endurance. Each man was praying; no one thought of aught else.
