They fell to ravaging the neighborhood, burning, plundering, killing; but scarcely a man of them was to return. Charnyetski was on the other side of the San, it is true, but on the left bank were various “parties” of nobles and peasants; of these the strongest, that of Stjalkovski, formed of daring nobles of the mountains, had come that very night to Prohnik, as if led by the evil fate of the Swedes. When he saw the fire and heard the shots, Stjalkovski went straight to the uproar and fell upon the plunderers. They defended themselves fiercely behind fences; but Stjalkovski broke them up, cut them to pieces, spared no man. In other villages other parties did work of the same kind. Fugitives were followed to the very camp, and the pursuers spread alarm and confusion, shouting in Tartar, in Wallachian, in Hungarian, and in Polish; so that the Swedes thought that some powerful auxiliary of the Poles was attacking them, maybe the Khan with the whole horde.
Confusion began, and—a thing without example hitherto—panic, which the officers put down with the greatest effort. The king, who remained on horseback till daylight, saw what was taking place; he understood what might come of that, and called a council of war at once in the morning.
That gloomy council did not last long, for there were not two roads to choose from. Courage had fallen in the army, the soldiers had nothing to eat, the enemy had grown in power.
The Swedish Alexander, who had promised the whole world to pursue the Polish Darius even to the steppes of the Tartars, was forced to think no longer of pursuit, but of his own safety.
“We can return by the San to Sandomir, thence by the Vistula to Warsaw and to Prussia,” said Wittemberg; “in that way we shall escape destruction.”
Douglas seized his own head: “So many victories, so many toils, such a great country conquered, and we must return.”
To which Wittemberg said: “Has your worthiness any advice?”
“I have not,” answered Douglas.
The king, who had said nothing hitherto, rose, as a sign that the session was ended, and said,
“I command the retreat!”
Not a word further was heard from his mouth that day.
Drums began to rattle, and trumpets to sound. News that the retreat was ordered ran in a moment from one end of the camp to the other. It was received with shouts of delight. Fortresses and castles were still in the hands of the Swedes; and in them rest, food, and safety were waiting.
The generals and soldiers betook themselves so zealously to preparing for retreat that that zeal, as Douglas remarked, bordered on disgrace.
The king sent Douglas with the vanguard to repair the difficult crossings and clear the forests. Soon after him moved the whole army in order of battle; the front was covered by artillery, the rear by wagons, at the flanks marched infantry. Military supplies and tents sailed down the river on boats.
All these precautions were not superfluous; barely had the march begun, when the rearguard of the Swedes saw Polish cavalry behind, and thenceforth they lost it almost never from sight. Charnyetski assembled his own squadrons, collected all the “parties” of that region, sent to Yan Kazimir for reinforcements, and pursued. The first stopping-place, Pjevorsk, was at the same time the first place of alarm. The Polish divisions pushed up so closely that several thousand infantry with artillery had to turn against them. For a time the king himself thought that Charnyetski was really attacking; but according to his wont he only sent detachment after detachment. These attacked with an uproar and retreated immediately. All the night passed in these encounters—a troublesome and sleepless night for the Swedes.
The whole march, all the following nights and days were to be like this one.
Meanwhile Yan Kazimir sent two squadrons of very well trained cavalry, and with them a letter stating that the hetmans would soon march with cavalry, and that he himself with the rest of the infantry and with the horde would hasten after them. In fact, he was detained only by negotiations with the Khan, with Rakotsy, and with the court of Vienna. Charnyetski was rejoiced beyond measure by this news; and when the day after the Swedes advanced in the wedge between the Vistula and the San, he said to Colonel Polyanovski—
“The net is spread, the fish are going in.”
“And we will do like that fisherman,” said Zagloba, “who played on the flute to the fish so that they might dance, and when they would not, he pulled them on shore; then they began to jump around, and he fell to striking them with a stick, crying: ‘Oh, such daughters! you ought to have danced when I begged you to do so.’ ”
“They will dance,” answered Charnyetski; “only let the marshal, Pan Lyubomirski, come with his army, which numbers five thousand.”
“He may come any time,” remarked Volodyovski.
“Some nobles from the foothills arrived today,” said Zagloba; “they say that he is marching in haste; but whether he will join us instead of fighting on his own account is another thing.”
“How is that?” asked Charnyetski, glancing quickly at Zagloba.
“He is a man of uncommon ambition and envious of glory. I have known him many years; I was his confidant and made his acquaintance when he was still a lad, at the court of Pan Krakovski. He was learning fencing at that time from Frenchmen and Italians. He fell into terrible anger one day when I told him that they were fools, not one of whom could stand before me. We had a duel, and I laid out seven of them one following the other. After that Lyubomirski learned from me, not only fencing, but the military art. By nature his wit is a little dull; but whatever he knows he knows from me.”
“Are you then such a master of the sword?” asked Polyanovski.
“As a specimen of my teaching, take Pan Volodyovski; he is my second
