Along the road I marvelled at everything. Since that was my first time in the Ukraine, I saw the strangest deeds and strangest things. That country is warlike; there the common man too is more resolute and daring than with us, and in peasants there is courage of which a noble would not be ashamed. When you pass through a settlement, though people know you to be a man of birth, they hardly raise a cap, and look you straight in the eyes. In every cottage there is a sabre and a musket, and more than one peasant has a hatchet-headed staff in his hand, like a noble in another place. There is a daring nature in these people. They even make small account of commissioners of the Commonwealth; for this the sabre has punished them already, and will punish them more in the future. The vicinity of pagans, and continual readiness for warfare, has developed their courage. They cultivate the earth not too willingly; and if any one wins profit from tillage, he prefers to settle on his own fields rather than on those of a master. On the other hand, they join escorts of nobles, or light squadrons of the Commonwealth readily, and are excellent warriors, especially in scouting and skirmishing, though in battle non cunctant (they are not slow). They raise shouts, and go at the enemy as if they were smoke, cutting and thrusting. Each of their settlements is more like a tabor than a village; they keep multitudes of horses, which feed winter and summer in the steppes, and are as swift as those of the Tartars. Many of these people betake themselves also to the islands of the Dnieper, and there at the Saitch lead a life in the fashion of monks, but military and quite robber-like. From these uncontrolled actions our dear country has suffered much, and will suffer much more in the future, till it tames them. It would be difficult for a noble, or even a great lord, to keep them in one place; for time after time they break away to empty steppes, of which in those regions there are many; they settle in the steppes and live at their own will. In form of body, and in manners, they are different from our peasants; they are tall and strong, dark in complexion, more like Tartars; their mustaches are black, as with the Wallachians; they shave their heads after the fashion of pagans, leaving on the very crown only a tuft, thick and long.
Seeing and considering all this, I wondered greatly at that land and at everything in it; and as I have called it warlike, I repeat now, that a country more suited to an armed and mounted people it would be vain to seek throughout the whole earth. When some of these people are killed, others ride in from all sides and along every road, just as if flocks of birds were flying in; and throughout that wild steppe it is easier to hear the sound of muskets, the clatter of sabres, the neighing of horses, the fluttering of flags in the wind, and the shouts of warriors, than the lark in a meadow.
Old minstrels, greatly honored by every one, go about there as in Podolia and Volynia. These, being blind, play on lyres and sing knightly songs; these minstrels cause courage and love of glory to flourish greatly. Warriors in those regions, seeing that they live to-day and to-morrow decay, esteem their own lives as a broken copper, and spend their blood as a magnate spends gold, caring more for a beautiful death than for life and earthly goods. Others love war above everything, and though often of high birth, they become almost wild in continual fighting, and go to battle as if to a wedding, with great rejoicing and songs. In time of peace they are terribly grieved at not finding an outlet for warlike humors, hence they are dangerous to public peace. These men are called "the desperate." When a warrior is killed, all count that an ordinary occurrence, and even his nearest friends do not mourn overmuch for him, saying that it beseems a man more to die in the steppe, than in bed, like a woman.
Indeed, in that land is the best school and practice of knighthood. When a young regiment has passed one year or two in a stanitsa, it becomes as keen as a Turkish sabre, so that neither German cavalry nor Turkish janissaries can stand before its fury when they are equal in numbers; and what must it be for other inferior soldiers, as, for example, the Wallachians, or any kind of hireling? It is easy to quarrel in the steppe; and this should be avoided, for the whole country is swarming with armed men.
Advancing with my attendant, I met household troops of the Pototskis, the Vishnyevetskis, the Kisiels, the Zbaraskis, in various uniforms, black, red, and many-colored, now quota troops of the Commonwealth, now squadrons of the king. The horses of these warriors advanced to their bellies in grass, and snorted as if swimming in water; captains managed the squadrons, as shepherd dogs tend their flocks; the Cossacks beat kettle-drums, blew their horn trumpets and fifes, or sang songs, making so tremendous an uproar that when they had passed and disappeared the wind brought back a sound, as it were, of some distant storm. At intervals moved also the wagons of bullock-drivers, which squeaked shrilly; from this squeaking our horses were frightened. Some of those bullock-drivers were bringing salt from the Liman at the Euxine; others were returning from among foul pagans at the Palus Maeotis, or from Moscow; others were taking Moldavian wine to the Saitch; and the wagons moved one after another in the order of storks, forming lines a mile long on the steppe.
We met also herds of oxen, all of one color, gray, with great curving horns. Crowding together, they moved so closely as to form a solid mass, their horned foreheads swaying from side to side.
Beyond the stanitsa Kiselova, one company of an important hussar regiment met us. The men were in full equipment, and a sound went from their wings, as from those of eagles. My attendant and I could not take our eyes from them, though it was difficult to look at the men, for the eye was struck by a terrible glare of sunlight reflected from their weapons; the gleams from their lance-points raised upward were like flames of burning candles suspended in the air. But the hearts rose in us, for those hussars seemed more like a company of kings than common warriors, such was the auctoritas (authority) in them, and the majesty of battle.
Beyond the stanitsa the country was wilder. Often in the steppe we saw at night fires of Cossack couriers sent to various stanitsas, or even of peasants who were fleeing to the steppe. We did not approach these, since we made our own fires.
At times strangers came to us, either hungry men, or men gone astray in the steppe; and once came a wonderful person with a face all grown over with hair, like a wolf's face. My attendant began to cry out with fear when he saw him; and I, thinking that I had to do with a werewolf (wolf man), was reaching for my sabre to slash him. When that monster did not howl, but praised God, I would not touch him. The unknown said that he was a Tartar by descent, but a Catholic. I wondered at that, for the Tartars in Lithuania adhere to the Koran. But this man changed his faith for his wife, and, serving later as a flag-bearer in his regiment, was sent by the Lithuanian hetmans with a letter to the horde, because he knew Tartar. Still it was hateful to my man to sleep at one fire with him. More frequently we spent the night sleeping in turns, or not sleeping at all, so as to keep watch of our horses. More than once I stretched on the grass and looked at the twinkling stars of the sky, thinking in my soul that the one which looked on me most lovingly was Marysia. In my grief I had the consolation of knowing that that little star would never shine for another, but would keep faith with me, since it had a heart that was honest, and a soul as pure as a tear dropped in prayer before God.
At times Marysia came to me in sleep, just as if living; and one night when she came she promised to pray for me and to fly after me through the air, like a swallow, and if she grew weary she would rest on my head, and twitter to heaven to obtain for me glory and happiness. Then she vanished like mist; and when I woke I thought that an angel had been near me, and what astonished me also was this, that the horses pricking their ears snorted loudly, as if they had felt some one near them. Considering such apparitions as a mark of God's favor and encouragement in my toil, I vowed to the most Holy Mary and to Saint Alexis, my patron, never to stain myself with mortal sin, so as to retain their favor in the future also. That night I prayed till daylight, or till the time of starting. Generally we were moving on the road before sunrise, which in those regions is altogether more beautiful than with us; for when the first rays shoot along the plain covered with dew from the night cold, the whole steppe, because of the myriads of flowers, looks like brocade interwoven with pearls. From this comes joy to all creatures. Partridges, quails, ptarmigans, and other birds of the steppe, shooting along through the grass, dash those pearls down to the earth.