A more loyal and terrible servant Boguslav could not have found.
But Sakovich gazed more and more tenderly at Anusia with his terrible, pale-blue eyes, and played to her on a lute. Life, therefore, in Taurogi passed for Anusia joyously and with amusement; for Olenka it was sore and monotonous. From one there went gleams of gladness, like that light which issues at night from the firefly; the face of the other grew paler and paler, more serious, sterner; her dark brows were contracted more resolutely on her white forehead, so that finally they called her a nun. And she had something in her of the nun; she began to accept the thought that she would become one,—that God himself would through suffering and disappointment lead her to peace behind the grating. She was no longer that maiden with beautiful bloom on her face and happiness in her eyes; not that Olenka who on a time while riding in a sleigh with her betrothed, Andrei Kmita, cried, “Hei! hei!” to the pine woods and forests.
Spring appeared in the world. A wind strong and warm shook the waters of the Baltic, now liberated from ice; later on, trees bloomed, flowers shot out from their harsh leafy enclosures; then the sun grew hot, and the poor girl was waiting in vain for the end of Taurogi captivity,—for Anusia did not wish to flee, and in the country it was ever more terrible.
Fire and sword were raging as though the pity of God were never to be manifest. Nay more, whoso had not seized the sabre or the lance in winter, seized it in spring; snow did not betray his tracks, the pine wood gave better concealment, and warmth made war the easier.
News flew swallow-like to Taurogi,—sometimes terrible, sometimes comforting; and to these and to those the maiden devoted her prayers, and shed tears of sorrow or joy.
Previous mention had been made of a terrible uprising of the whole people. As many as the trees in the forests of the Commonwealth, as many as the ears of grain waving on its fields, as many as the stars shining on it at night between the Carpathians and the Baltic, were the warriors who rose up against the Swedes. These men, being nobles, were born to the sword and to war by God’s will and nature’s order; those who cut furrows with the plough, sowed land with grain; those who were occupied with trade and handicraft in towns; those who lived in the wilderness, from bee-keeping, from pitch-making, who lived with the axe or by hunting; those who lived on the rivers and labored at fishing; those who were nomads in the steppes with their cattle,—all seized their weapons to drive out the invader.
The Swede was now drowning in that multitude as in a swollen river.
To the wonder of the whole world, the Commonwealth, powerless but a short time before, found more sabres in its defence than the Emperor of Germany or the King of France could have.
Then came news of Karl Gustav,—how he was marching ever deeper into the Commonwealth, his feet in blood, his head in smoke and flames, his lips blaspheming. It was hoped any moment to hear of his death and the destruction of all the Swedish armies.
The name of Charnyetski was heard with increasing force from boundary to boundary, transfixing the enemy with terror, pouring consolation into the hearts of the Poles.