All that part of the road, which was not over great, he passed in quiet, for that region lay as it were under the hand of Radzivill.
Towns, and here and there even villages, were occupied by castle squadrons of the hetman, or by small detachments of Swedish cavalry which the hetman pushed forward thus far of purpose against the legions of Zolotarenko, which stood there beyond the Vilia, so that occasions for collisions and war might be more easily found.
Zolotarenko would have been glad too to have an “uproar” with the Swedes, according to the words of the hetman; but those whose ally he was did not wish war with them, or in every case wished to put it off as long as possible. Zolotarenko therefore received the strictest orders not to cross the river, and in case that Radzivill himself, together with the Swedes, moved on him, to retreat with all haste.
For these reasons the country on the right side of the Vilia was quiet; but since from one side Cossack pickets, from the other those of the Swedes and Radzivill were looking at one another, one musket-shot might at any moment let loose a terrible war.
In prevision of this, people took timely refuge in safe places. Therefore the whole country was quiet, but empty. Pan Andrei saw deserted towns, everywhere the windows of houses held up by sticks, and whole villages depopulated. The fields were also empty, for there was no crop that year. Common people secreted themselves in fathomless forests, to which they drove all their cattle; but the nobles fled to neighboring Electoral Prussia, at that time altogether safe from war. For this reason there was an uncommon movement over the roads and trails of the wilderness, and the number of fugitives was still more increased by those who from the left bank of the Vilia were able to escape the oppression of Zolotarenko.
The number of these was enormous, and especially of peasants; for the nobles who had not been able hitherto to flee from the left bank went into captivity or yielded their lives on their thresholds.
Pan Andrei, therefore, met every moment whole crowds of peasants with their wives and children, and driving before them flocks of sheep with horses and cattle. That part of the province of Trotsk touching upon Electoral Prussia was wealthy and productive; therefore the well-to-do people had something to save and guard. The approaching winter did not alarm fugitives, who preferred to await better days amid mosses of the forest, in snow covered huts, than to await death in their native villages at the hands of the enemy.
Kmita often approached the fleeing crowds, or fires gleaming at night in dense forest places. Wherever he met people from the left bank of the Vilia, from near Kovno, or from still remoter neighborhoods, he heard terrible tales of the cruelties of Zolotarenko and his allies, who exterminated people without regard to age or sex; they burned villages, cut down even trees in the gardens, leaving only land and water. Never had Tartar raids left such desolation behind.
Not death alone was inflicted on the inhabitants, but before death they were put to the most ingenious tortures. Many of those people fled with bewildered minds. These filled the forest depths at night with awful shrieks; others were ever in a species of continual fear and expectation of attack, though they had crossed the Nyemen and Vilia, though forests and morasses separated them from Zolotarenko’s bands. Many of these stretched their hands to Kmita and his horsemen of Orsha, imploring rescue and pity, as if the enemy were standing there over them.
Carriages belonging to nobles were moving toward Prussia; in them old men, women, and children; behind them, dragged on wagons with servants, effects, supplies of provisions, and other things. All these fleeing people were panic-stricken, terrified and grieved because they were going into exile.