out to conquer Poland with
the best Hungarian nobility, our Master Michael went with him. How
hard I tried to keep him back, and so did his noble lady; for they had
been married then but a short time; and the good master himself had no
wish to go, he had much rather sit in the house and read books or
build mills and take care of his trees, but honor bade him go.
However, I insisted that he should at least take my son Andy with him;
surely God ordained it wisely that he should go with him, otherwise we
never should have heard anything more of our gracious master. For when
the prince saw the beastly crowd of Tartars drawn up against him in
the field he hurried home, while all the nobility were taken prisoners
by the heathen Tartars and carried off to Tartary to bitter bondage.
My son Andy begged so hard that they finally let him come home,
especially as he had a wound that made him unfit for work. He brought
back the news that our Master Michael was pining away there in
imprisonment and that the Tartars, when they observed in what esteem
he was held by the other prisoners, took him for a duke and demanded
such a frightfully high ransom for him that all his estate turned into
money would not pay it. However, our noble lady was very happy when
she learned that her husband was still living, and went round trying
to raise the money. But neither relatives nor good friends would help
her, not even for security, for in war-times people do not like to
lend on real estate. So she sold all the valuables she had brought
with her from home; beautiful silver plates, bracelets set with
precious stones, gold cups that were heirlooms, beautiful garments
embroidered with silk and threads of gold, rings, buckles, clasps,
real pearls, in short everything that can be turned to gold. Yet as
all that was not half of what the Tartars demanded she leased the
estates of her sisters, and had the fallow ground ploughed and the
woods cleared away to make room for grain fields. She turned night
into day to find time for all the work. Nothing connected with farming
that would bring money did she leave undone; she had loam-pits made
and stone-quarries opened; she raised cattle that the Armenian cattle
drivers bought; she herself went to market, took her wine even into
Poland, her grain to Hermanstadt, her honey, wax and dried fruits to
Kronstadt; she even went as far as Debreczin to get a good price for
her wool; and how prudently she lived all that tim