Page:Sienkiewicz - The knights of the cross.djvu/753

 Rh lofty bank of Lake Luben, for the king was eager for divine service, so that he might hear his usual masses.

Yagello, Vitold, the Mazovian princes, and the military council betook themselves to the tent. Before it had assembled the foremost of the knights, both to commit themselves to God before the dreadful day and to look at the king. And they saw him as he went in coarse campaign clothing, with a serious countenance on which grievous care had settled visibly. Years had changed his form little, and had not covered his face with wrinkles or whitened his hair, which at that time he put behind his ears with the same quick movement as the first time when Zbyshko saw him in Cracow. But he walked as if bent beneath that tremendous responsibility which weighed on his shoulders, and as if he were sunk in great sorrow. In the army men said to one another that the king wept continually over the Christian blood which was to be shed, and it was so in reality. Yagello trembled in view of war, especially with men who bore the cross on their mantles and banners, and he desired peace with all his soul. In vain did the Polish lords, and even the Hungarian mediators and Gara represent to him the haughtiness and confidence of the Order, with which the Grand Master Ulrich was filled. Ulrich was ready to challenge the whole world to battle. It was in vain that the king's own envoy, Peter Korzbog, swore on the cross of the Lord, and on his own escutcheon that the Order would not hear of peace, and that Count von Wende, the comtur of Gniev, was the only man inclined toward it; other knights of the Order covered Count Wende with ridicule and insults, and still the king had hope that the enemy would recognize the justice of his demands, spare human blood, and end the terrible dispute with a just treaty.

He went, therefore, to pray for this object in the chapel; his simple and kindly soul was tormented with immense fear. In former days Yagello had visited with fire and sword the lands of the Order; that he had done, however, when he was a pagan prince of Lithuania, but now, when as a Polish king and a Christian he saw burning villages, ruins, blood, and tears, he was seized with the fear of God's anger, especially since that was only the beginning of war. If it might stop even there! But to-day or to-morrow nations would exterminate each other, and the earth would be steeped in blood. That enemy is unjust indeed, but still he carries the cross on his mantle, and he is defended by such great