wazy drew upon it various patterns with his finger;
it was evident that he was spinning warlike plans for future expeditions.
His heavy lids were more and more weighed down; his head nodded on his
powerless neck; he felt that sleep was overcoming him, and began according
to his wont his evening prayers. But between the Pater Noster and the Ave
Maria arose strange phantoms, wavering, and jostling each other: the
Warden sees the Horeszkos, his ancient lords; some carry sabres, and
others maces;100 each gazes menacingly and twirls his mustache,
flourishing his sabre or brandishing his mace--after them flashed one
silent, gloomy shadow, with a bloody spot upon its breast. Gerwazy
shuddered, he had recognised the Pantler; he began to cross himself, and,
the more surely to drive away his terrible visions, he recited the litany
for souls in Purgatory. Again his eyes closed fast and his ears rang--he
sees a throng of mounted gentry; their sabres glitter: "The foray, the
foray against Korelicze, and Rymsza at the head!" And he beholds himself,
how he flies on a grey horse, with his dreadful sword uplifted above his
head; his taratatka,101 opened wide, rustles in the breeze; his red plumed
hat has fallen backward from his left ear; he flies on, and upon the road
overthrows both horsemen and foot-travellers, and finally he burns the
Soplica in his barn. Then his head, heavy with its musings, drooped upon
his breast, and thus fell asleep the last Warden of the Horeszkos.

BOOK VI.--THE HAMLET102

ARGUMENT

Warlike preparations for the foray--Protazy's expedition--Robak and
the Judge consult on public affairs--Continuation of Protazy's
fruitless expedition--A digression on hemp--Dobrzyn, the hamlet of
gentry--Description of the person and the way of life of Maciek
Dobrzynski.

Imperceptibly there crept forth from the moist darkness a dawn with no red
glow, bringing on a day with no brightness in its eye. It was day long
since, and yet one could hardly see. The mist hung over the earth like a
straw thatch over the poor hut of a Lithuanian; towards the east one could
see from a somewhat whiter circle in the sky that the sun had risen, and
that thence it must once more descend to the earth; but it did not advance
gaily and it slumbered on the road.

Following the example of the sky, everything was late on earth; the cattle
started late