For the Right

by Karl Emil Franzos

It would be a mistake, however, to imagine that all hajdamaks are criminals and cut-throats; a distinction must be made. There is no exact rendering for the word itself in any of the western tongues, and, fortunately, the thing also lies beyond the experience of happier nations. The Bulgarians only have a similar word, denoting a similar existence, the "hajdamak" of the Carpathians and the "hajduk" of the Balkan being akin, both revealing in strangest blending some of the best and some of the very worst impulses of a suffering people. It is not easy, therefore, to judge fairly.

There are three distinct types among these outlaws, or "free men" as they call themselves. Firstly, there are those who have escaped from the arm of justice, having committed some crime, and who are not only guilty in the sight of the law, but of ill repute even among their kind. These men never unite in great numbers, their own wickedness rendering them distrustful of one another. Singly, or at most by twos and threes, they will pursue their villainous trade of waylaying travellers, or perpetrating what robbery they can. They avoid open fight, being best protected by their cunning.

Secondly, and far more numerous, are those who are criminals indeed in the eye of the law, but are looked upon by the people as martyrs to their cause. Some may have fought the tax-gatherers in bitter despair when they were about to be sold up; they may have been good and peaceful men, who thus suddenly took up the evil life. But, terrible as existence may be in the forest wilds, it is better than prison, and the unhappy man flies thither from the wrong he has committed almost in spite of himself. "He is gone after the sun," say his neighbours, glad to know him safe when the constables seek him--gone westward, that is, from lowland Podolia into the Carpathians. And others there are, martyrs to the sad relation between the Polish landlord and the Ruthen peasant; the landlord oppressing, till at some dark moment of wrath or drunkenness the peasant snatches up his gun or hatchet. There are deserters, too, from the Emperor's colours, sympathised with cordially; for what right should the Emperor have, argue these people, to levy the life-tax among them!

"Come join us, ye men, for life here is sweet!" are the words of a hajdamak song. But in truth it is an awful existence, although the miserable fellows do their best to make it bearable to one another. They will gather in bands of a score or more, plighting their troth, each sharing with the other the good things which are of the fewest and the ill things that abound. The Huzul will leave them alone, and the Whitecoats they need scarcely fear. But it is nowise easy to be an "honest hajdamak" when hunger and cold pursue them--for they have notions of honesty of their own, as old Jemilian suggested in his report to Father Leo. It is "honest" in an outlaw not to commit mere vulgar robbery, or take life save in self-defence or for revenge. He may rob a Polish landlord or the men of the law, but he would be disgraced by robbing a peasant or a village pope. It is quite "honest" to stop a stage-coach, empty the postbags, and rob any Polish or Austrian passenger; but it would be disgraceful to inquire what money a pope might carry with him, travelling by the same coach. There was a time when no stage-coach in those parts could be safe from an attack of hajdamaks, unless accompanied by a strong escort of soldiers. "Great deeds," however, grew more and more impossible, and indeed they were never easy. It was always a miserable life in the dreary wilds, without shelter in the rigorous winter-time, and often without food. And it would entirely depend on what manner of man the 'hetman' (captain) was, as to how a band would bear up through such a season of distress; whether "dishonesty" would be had recourse to, when for the gaining of a mere livelihood they would sink to the level of the despised criminal, or whether their spirit would rise to some "great deed" of despair, even if it must bring them to close quarters with the Whitecoats. But this second alternative, as a rule, might only be looked for if the 'hetman' was a hajdamak by deliberate choice, driven to the life for an idea rather than as the outcome of some crime.

Men of this kind form the third class; they have always been rare, and the history of one adopting the awful trade of his own free will has ever made a stir. Mere love of pillage could never be an adequate reason; for a man of this description is aware that he can rob his neighbours with less trouble in the plain. No, there are nobler motives--a wild passionate manliness rising against oppression, or a yearning indignation and pitiful sympathy with the helpless despair of the people, will urge some few to "go after the sun." These few are the last representatives of the true hajdamak, who is fast becoming a legend of the past. The Ruthens, now the most peaceful and the most oppressed of Slavonic tribes, at one time were the boldest and most belligerent of the race, the terror of their neighbours, Poles, Russians, and Roumanians. But to-day one could only wonder why these people in song and story should always be designated as "falcon-faced," if indeed such a face were not met with among them occasionally even now--bold and clear-cut, full of energy and passion, with dark daring eyes. And as the type is found still, so are the old dauntless courage, and the ardent love of liberty. But he who preserves the true nature is lonely among his kind, and the misery about him will fill his soul with a bitter yearning for the times that are gone, the times surviving only in their songs--wild passionate outbursts, full of bravery and fortitude, sounding strangely enough on the lips of the humbled, labouring peasants. And such a one by his own inward necessity is driven forth from the plain; he takes to the mountains, and henceforth it is his one desire to make war upon the Polish oppressors, the murderers of his race. It is his one idea, his one resolve; and being a man of energy and power, he will naturally rise to the leadership of a band. He is an "honest hajdamak" at first, but does not always end so; for it is an evil trade, hurtful to body and soul. And whether they remain "honest," or fall away from the higher aspiration, they are sure to end ill--they and their followers.

Truly an evil trade, and few taking to it ever reach old age; the pitiless cold, or hunger and hardships of grimmest kind decimating the band, while the more hardy ones fall a prey to the wild beasts, if not brought to the gallows instead. And whatever their end may be, their people are anxious that their memory should be wiped out--anxious it should be forgotten that one of theirs took to the mountains. A hajdamak while he lives is held in some respect, inasmuch as he has gained the liberty sighed for by others--the dead man is nowhere.

But among the numbers living and dying thus sadly, there are three whose names are not forgotten, whose memory lives in song and tale, though dimmed with the haze of receding years; three who are famous, moreover, as being the only "hetmen" who moved the Huzuls to take part for or against them.

The first of these was one Alexander Dobosch, called the Black, or the Iron-framed, a Ruthen from the Bukowina who arose towards the end of the eighteenth century, and for several years was far more powerful throughout Pokutia than the Emperor. He had been a well-to-do peasant, and a boundless ambition only appears to have led him to his strange and fearful adventures. The Huzuls adored him, and he behaved like a king of the mountains, issuing manifestos to the "fellow at Vienna," making laws and levying taxes. But this was his ruin; the Huzuls were not going to condone in the iron-framed hajdamak what they had never approved of in the "fellow at Vienna." Their devotion gave way to wrath, but the man was so powerful that they dared not oppose him openly. He was poisoned by some of his followers at a drinking bout.

Of a different type was "Wild Wassilj," or, as song has it, the "great hajdamak," a Podolian peasant youth, lithe as a sapling pine, strong as a bear, and daring as a falcon. He had been in the personal service of a young noble, the brother-in-law of the lord of the manor, both of whom were the terror and detestation of every father and husband in the neighbourhood. But Wassilj suddenly set his face against the lawless life, growing strangely silent and anxious to be good; the fact was he loved an honest maiden of the village. But, unhappily, his master himself had set eyes upon the girl, and, finding her proof against his advances, he carried her off with the help of some menials. Wassilj thereupon waylaid and shot him, forming a band there and then, and becoming the scourge of the nobility for miles around, his thirst for revenge being unappeasable. It was found in those days how little it availed to send out soldiers with a hope of crushing the bandits in their mountains. The "great hajdamak" was not vanquished by anything the authorities could devise against him; but the innate spark of goodness in his wild and wayward heart overcame him in the end. For he was not a bad man by nature, and the remorse that would seize upon him was as poignant as it was true; but he quieted his conscience with the delusion that he was doing these terrible things for the sake of the suffering people. One day, however, when he had overpowered some nobles in the castle of his native village, and had called upon the judge to assist him in bringing them to their just doom, the latter refused, saying he was an honest man, and could not join in the evil work of a cut-throat. That word struck Wassilj to the heart, and the same night, with a bullet from his own gun, he stilled that misguided heart for ever.

But the third one, whom the Huzuls assisted--he whom in song they called "the good judge" and "the great avenger"--was Taras Barabola.