XCVI
It is written in no book how many battles the armies, the nobles, and the people of the Commonwealth fought with the enemy. They fought in forests, in fields, in villages, in hamlets, in towns; they fought in Prussia, in Mazovia, in Great Poland, in Little Poland, in Russia, in Lithuania, in Jmud; they fought without resting, in the day or the night.
Every clod of earth was drenched in blood. The names of knights, their glorious deeds, their great devotion, perished from the memory; for the chronicler did not write them down, and the lute did not celebrate them. But under the force of these exertions the power of the enemy bent at last. And as when a lordly lion, pierced the moment before with missiles, rises suddenly, and shaking his kingly mane, roars mightily, pale terror pierces straightway the hunters, and their feet turn to flight; so that Commonwealth rose ever more terrible, filled with anger of Jove, ready to meet the whole world. Into the bones of the aggressors there entered weakness and fear; not of plunder were they thinking then, but of this only—to bear away home from the jaws of the lion sound heads.
New leagues, new legions of Hungarians, Transylvanians, Wallachians, and Cossacks were of no avail. The storm passed once more, it is true, between Brest, Warsaw, and Krakow; but it was broken against Polish breasts, and soon was scattered like empty vapor.
The King of Sweden, being the first to despair of his cause, went home to the Danish war; the traitorous elector, humble before the strong, insolent to the weak, beat with his forehead before the Commonwealth, and fell upon the Swedes; the robber legions of Rakotsy’s “slaughterers” fled with all power to their Transylvanian reed-fields, which Pan Lyubomirski ruined with fire and sword.
But it was easier for them to break into the Commonwealth than to escape without punishment; therefore when they were attacked at the passage, the Counts of Transylvania, kneeling before Pototski, Lyubomirski, and Charnyetski, begged for mercy in the dust.
“We will surrender our weapons, we will give millions!” cried they; “only let us go!”
And receiving the ransom, the hetmans took pity on that army of unfortunate men; but the horde trampled them under hoofs at the very thresholds of their homes.
Peace began to return gradually to the plains of Poland. The king was still taking Prussian fortresses; Charnyetski was to take the Polish sword to Denmark, for the Commonwealth did not wish to limit itself to driving out the enemy.
Villages and towns were rebuilt on burned ruins; the people returned from the forests; ploughs appeared in the fields.
In the autumn of 1657, immediately after the Hungarian war, it was quiet in the greater part of the provinces and districts; it was quiet especially in Jmud.
Those of the Lauda men who in their time had gone with Volodyovski, were still somewhere far off in the field; but their return was expected.
Meanwhile in Morezi, in Volmontovichi, in Drojeykani, Mozgi, Goshchuni, and Patsuneli, women, boys, and girls, with old men, were sowing the winter grain, building with joint efforts houses in those “neighborhoods” through which fire had passed, so that the warriors on their return might find at least roofs over their heads, and not be forced to die of hunger.
Olenka had been living for some time at Vodokty, with Anusia and the sword-bearer. Pan Tomash did not hasten to his Billeviche—first, because it was burned, and second, because it was pleasanter for him with the maidens than alone. Meanwhile, with the aid of Olenka, he managed Vodokty.
The lady wished to manage Vodokty in the best manner, for it was to be with Mitruny her dowry for the cloister; in other words, it was to become the property of the Benedictine nuns, with whom on the very day of the coming New Year poor Olenka intended to begin her novitiate.
For after she had considered everything that had met her—those changes of fortune, disappointments, and sufferings—she came to the conviction that thus, and not otherwise, must be the will of God. It seemed to her that some all-powerful hand was urging her to the cell, that some voice was saying to her—
“In that place is the best pacification, and the end of all earthly anxiety.”
She had determined therefore to follow that voice. Feeling, however, in the depth of her conscience that her soul had not been able yet to tear itself from the earth with completeness, she desired first to prepare it with ardent piety, with good works and labor. Frequently also in those efforts echoes from the world hindered her.
For example, people began to buzz around that that famous Babinich was Kmita. Some contradicted excitedly; others repeated the statement with stubbornness.
Olenka believed not. All Kmita’s deeds, Kmita and his service with Yanush Radzivill, were too vividly present in her memory to let her suppose for one instant that he was the crusher of Boguslav, and such a trusty worker for the king, such an ardent patriot. Still her peace was disturbed, and sorrow with pain rose up afresh in her bosom.
This might be remedied by a hurried entrance to the cloister; but the cloisters were scattered. The nuns who had not perished from the violence of soldiers during wartime were only beginning to assemble.
Universal misery reigned in the land, and whoso wished to take refuge behind the walls of a convent had not only to bring bread for personal use, but also to feed the whole convent.
Olenka wished to come with bread to the cloister—to become not merely a sister, but a nourisher of nuns.
The sword-bearer, knowing that his labor was to go to the glory of God, labored earnestly.
He went around the fields and the buildings, carrying out the labors of the autumn which with the coming spring were to bear fruit. Sometimes he was accompanied by Anusia,
