Page:Henryk Sienkiewicz - Potop - The Deluge (1898 translation by Jeremiah Curtin) - Vol 1.djvu/254

224 it was not pale, but blue and twisted, as if in a convulsion, by a smile which he strove to call to his lips. His breathing, usually short, became still shorter; his broad breast welled up under the gold brocade, his eyes were half covered with their lids, and there was a species of terror and an iciness on that powerful face such as are usual on features stiffening in the moments before death.

"What troubles the prince? what is taking place here?" was whispered unquietly around ; and an ominous foreboding straitened all hearts, startled expectation was on every face.

He began to speak, with a short voice broken by asthma: "Gracious gentlemen! this toast will astonish many among you, — or simply it will terrify them, — but whoso trusts and believes in me, whoso really wishes the good of the country, whoso is a faithful friend of my house, will drink it with a will, and repeat after me, 'Vivat Carolus Gustavus Kex, from this day forth ruling over us graciously!'"

"Vivat!" repeated the two envoys, Löwenhaupt and Schitte; then some tens of officers of the foreign command.

But in the hall there reigned deep silence. The colonels and the nobles gazed at one another with astonishment, as if asking whether the prince had not lost his senses. A number of voices were heard at last at various parts of the table : "Do we hear aright? What is it?" Then there was silence again.

Unspeakable horror coupled with amazement was reflected on faces, and the eyes of all were turned again to Radzivill; but he continued to stand, and was breathing deeply, as if he had cast off some immense weight from his breast. The color came back by degrees to his face ; then he turned to Pan Komorovski, and said, —

"It is time to make public the compact which we have signed this day, so that those present may know what course to take. Read, your grace!"

Komorovski rose, unwound the parchment lying before him, and began to read the terrible compact, beginning with these words : —

"Not being able to act in a better and more proper way in this most stormy condition of affairs, after the loss of all hope of assistance from the Most Serene King, we the lords and estates of the Grand Principality of Lithuania, forced by extremity, yield ourselves to the protection of the Most Serene King of Sweden on these conditions: —