Page:Sienkiewicz - The knights of the cross.djvu/747

 Rh plates on their breasts and shoulders, and wore masks representing vampires, skeletons, or beasts; and farther on, Serbs, whose camp, asleep at that hour, sounded in the daytime at halts, as if it were one immense lute; so many flutes, balalaikas, moltankas, and various other musical instruments were there in it.

The fires flashed, and from the sky, amid clouds which the strong wind blew apart, shone the great clear moon, and by those gleams our knights reviewed the camp. Beyond the Serbs were situated the unfortunate Jmud men. The Germans had drawn torrents of blood from those people, and still they sprang up to new battles at every summons from Vitold. And now, as if with a prescience that their evil fate would end soon and forever, they had marched to that camp under lead of Skirvoillo, whose name alone filled the Germans with rage and with terror. The fires of the Jmud men touched directly on those of Lithuania, for they were the same people, they had the same customs, and almost the same language.

But at the entrance of the camp of Lithuania a gloomy picture struck the eyes of the knights. There on a gallows made of unhewn poles were hanging two bodies, which the wind swayed with such force that the gallows-frame squeaked complainingly. The horses snorted at sight of the bodies and rose on their haunches, while the knights made the sign of the cross with devotion, and when they had ridden farther Povala said,—

"Prince Vitold was with the king, and I was there when men brought in the criminals. Our bishops and lords had complained previously that Lithuanians are too savage in warfare, and do not even spare churches. So when these were brought in (they were considerable people, but the unfortunates had, as it seems, desecrated the Holy Sacrament) the prince was so filled with anger that it was a terror to look at him, and he commanded the two men to hang themselves. One of them urged on the other: 'Well, hurry! thou wilt make the prince still more angry!' And terror fell on all, for the men did not fear death, but the anger of the prince, just as much, or more, than God's anger."

"Yes, I remember," said Zbyshko, "when in Cracow the king was enraged at me about Lichtenstein, Prince Yamont, who was an attendant of the king, advised me immediately to hang myself. And he gave that advice out of friendship, though I should have challenged him to trampled earth had