“We will prepare a cruel spectacle for them,” said he, at a council of war. “They will look on from the opposite bank when we strike the town, and they will not be able to give aid across the Vistula; and when we have Sandomir we will not let provisions come from Wirtz in Krakow.”
Lyubomirski, Vitovski, and others tried to dissuade Charnyetski from that undertaking. “It would be well,” said they, “to take such a considerable town, and we might injure the Swedes greatly; but how are we to take it? We have no infantry, siege guns we have not; it would be hard for cavalry to attack walls.”
“But do our peasants,” asked Charnyetski, “fight badly as infantry? If I had two thousand such as Mihalko, I would take not only Sandomir, but Warsaw.”
And without listening to further counsel he crossed the Vistula. Barely had his summons gone through the neighborhood when a couple of thousand men hurried to him, one with a scythe, another with a musket, the third with carabine; and they marched against Sandomir.
They fell upon the place rather suddenly, and in the streets a fierce conflict set in. The Swedes defended themselves furiously from the windows and the roofs, but they could not withstand the onrush. They were crushed like worms in the houses, and pushed entirely out of the town. Schinkler took refuge, with the remnant of his forces, in the castle; but the Poles followed him with the same impetuosity. A storm against the gates and the walls began, Schinkler saw that he could not hold out, even in the castle; so he collected what he could of men, articles and supplies of provisions, and putting them on boats, crossed to the king, who looked from the other bank on the defeat of his men without being able to succor them.
The castle fell into the hands of the Poles; but the cunning Swede when departing put under the walls in the cellars kegs of powder with lighted matches.
When he appeared before the king he told him of this at once, so as to rejoice his heart.
“The castle,” said he, “will fly into the air with all the men. Charnyetski may perish.”
“If that is true, I want myself to see how the pious Poles will fly to heaven,” said the king; and he remained on the spot with all the generals.
In spite of the commands of Charnyetski, who foresaw deceit, the volunteers and the peasants ran around through the whole castle to seek hidden Swedes and treasure. The trumpets sounded an alarm for every man to take refuge in the town; but the searchers in the castle did not hear the trumpets, or would not heed them.
All at once the ground trembled under their feet, an awful thunder and a roar tore the air, a gigantic pillar of fire rose to the sky, hurling upward earth, walls, roofs, the whole castle, and more than five hundred bodies of those who had not been able to withdraw.
Karl Gustav held his sides from delight, and his favor-seeking courtiers began at once to repeat his words: “The Poles are going to heaven, to heaven!”
But that joy was premature; for none the less did Sandomir remain in Polish hands, and could no longer furnish food for the main army enclosed between the rivers.
Charnyetski disposed his camp opposite the Swedes, on the other side of the Vistula, and guarded the passage.
Sapyeha, grand hetman of Lithuania and voevoda of Vilna, came from the other side and took his position on the San.
The Swedes were invested completely; they were caught as it were in a vise.
“The trap is closed!” said the soldiers to one another in the Polish camps.
For every man, even the least acquainted with military art, understood that inevitable destruction was hanging over the invaders, unless reinforcements should come in time and rescue them from trouble.
The Swedes too understood this. Every morning officers and soldiers, coming to the shore of the Vistula, looked with despair in their eyes and their hearts at the legions of Charnyetski’s terrible cavalry standing black on the other side.
Then they went to the San; there again the troops of Sapyeha were watching day and night, ready to receive them with sabre and musket.
To cross either the San or the Vistula while both armies stood near was not to be thought of. The Swedes might return to Yaroslav by the same road over which they come, but they knew that in that case not one of them would ever see Sweden.
For the Swedes grievous days and still more grievous nights now began, for these days and nights were uproarious and quarrelsome. Again provisions were at an end.
Meanwhile Charnyetski, leaving command of the army to Lyubomirski and taking the Lauda squadron as guard crossed the Vistula above the mouth of the San, to visit Sapyeha and take counsel with him touching the future of the war.
This time the mediation of Zagloba was not needed to make the two leaders agree; for both loved the country more than each one himself, both were ready to sacrifice to it private interests, self-love, and ambition.
The Lithuanian hetman did not envy Charnyetski, nor did Charnyetski envy the hetman, but each did homage to the other; so the meeting between them was of such character that tears stood in the eyes of the oldest soldiers.
“The Commonwealth is growing, the dear country is rejoicing, when such sons of heroes take one another by the shoulders,” said Zagloba to Pan Michael and Pan Yan. “Charnyetski is a terrible soldier and a true soul, but put Sapyeha to a wound and it will heal. Would there were more such men! The skin would fly off the Swedes, could they see this love of the greatest patriots. How did they conquer us, if not through the rancor and envy of magnates? Have they overcome us with force? This is how I understand! The soul jumps in a
