With increasing astonishment, all ears, but not understanding a single word, did the maiden listen to the frank hearty speech which, like a mirror, reflected the young powerful soul, every word of which, spoken in a voice bounding straight from the bottom of the heart, was invested with power. She bent her beautiful face forward, threw over her back the troublesome locks, opened her lips, and remained looking at him a long time, then was about to speak; but she suddenly stopped, and recollected that another path had to be followed by the knight; that behind him stood his father and his kin, like so many harsh avengers; that terrible were the Zaporoghians who were besieging the city, every inhabitant of which was doomed to a cruel death —then suddenly her eyes filled with tears. She took her silk-embroidered handkerchief, threw it over her face, and in an instant it was moistened all over; and she remained a long time sitting with her beautiful head thrown back, with her pretty underlip compressed, as if she had felt the bite of some venomous reptile; and she kept her handkerchief over her face, so that he should not behold her overwhelming grief.
"Say but one word to me!" said Andrew, and he took hold of her satin-like arm. The touch made fire run through his veins, and he pressed her hand which lay insensible in his.
But she was silent; did not withdraw her handkerchief from her face, and remained motionless.
"Why art thou so sorrowful? tell me, why art thou so sorrowful?"
She flung away her handkerchief, threw back the locks which fell over her eyes and gave way to a burst of plaintive words, uttering them in a low voice. Thus, rising on a beautiful evening, does the breeze run through the dense stems of the water-weeds, and soft plaintive tones quiver, thrill, and melt away in the air, and the passing traveller, in unaccountable sadness, pauses without noticing either the evening which is fading away, or the gay songs of the people returning from the fields and their harvest labours.
"Do not I, then, deserve everlasting pity? Is not the mother who brought me into the world, unhappy? Is not the lot which has fallen to me sad? Art thou not merciless, my cruel fate? All men hast thou brought to my feet, the greatest of our nobility, the wealthiest lords, counts and foreign barons, and the very flower of our knighthood! All these sought my hand, and as a great boon, would any one of them have received my love. I had but to wave my hand, and the choicest of them all, the handsomest in person and the best in lineage, would have been my husband! But for none of them hast thou warmed my heart, merciless fate! in spite of the most accomplished knights of my country, thou hast given it to a foreigner, to one of our foes! Why, most holy Mother of God, for what sins of mine, for what heavy crimes dost thou subject me to such relentless, to such unsparing persecutions? My life was passed amidst affluence and luxury; the costliest viands, the richest wines were my food and my drink; and for what? to what result has it brought me? Is it, that I must die the most cruel death which even the poorest beggar in the kingdom is spared? Alas! it is not enough for me to be doomed to this most horrible fate; to see, before my end, how my father and my mother will die in insupportable sufferings—they, for whose welfare I would readily give up twenty times my own life—all this is not enough, but I must previously to my death hear words and see love such as I have never heard or seen before; my heart must be torn to pieces by his speech: that my bitter fate may be still bitterer to me: that I may regret still more my young life: that death may appear to me still more frightful: and that I may before dying still utter more reproaches to thee, my cruel fate, and thee (forgive my sin) most holy Mother of God!"
As she ceased speaking, an expression of hopelessness, of the most utter despair, spread over her features; every outline of them betokened sadness, and the brow bent down in sorrow, the downcast cast eyes, the tears which had remained and dried on her glowing cheeks, all appeared to tell that no happiness was there!
"Such a thing was never heard of: it cannot be: it shall not be," exclaimed Andrew, "that the loveliest and best of women should be doomed to so bitter a lot, when she was born to see all that is best in the world worship her like a goddess. No—thou shalt not die; it is not thy lot to die; I swear, by my birth and by all that I love in the world, thou shalt not die! And if it should happen, if nothing, neither strength, nor prayer, nor courage can avert the dreadful fate, we will die together, and I will die first; I will die beneath thine eyes, at thy dear feet, and only when dead will I part with thee!"
"Do not deceive me and thyself, knight!" answered she, slowly shaking her fine head; "I know, and to my greatest sorrow do I know but too well, that thou canst not love me; I know, what thy duty, what thy covenant is: thy father, thy comrades, thy country call thee—and we are thy foes!"
"And what to me, are father, comrades, country?" said Andrew, tossing his head, and drawing up his stature to his full height, straight as the black poplar growing on the banks of a river: "if so—not one of them will I know! not one! not one!" repeated he with that voice, and peculiar motion of the hand, with which the mighty dauntless Cossack expresses his decision about something unheard of, and impossible for any one but himself. "Who has told me that Ukraine is my country? Who gave it to me for my country? Our native country is that for which our soul longs, which is dear to us above all other tilings! My native country—thou art it! This is my country! And I will carry this country in my heart as long as I live, and I shall see who of all the Cossacks will ever tear it thence! And all that I have, will I sell, resign, destroy, for this, my native country!"