Page:Taras Bulba. A Tale of the Cossacks. 1916.djvu/31

Rh Borzói, or Russian Wolf-hounds. Here, in the beginning of 1550, Dmitry Vishnevetzky built a fortress, and assembled kazakdom around him. Vishnevetzky was a fairly wealthy magnate, owner of several villages in southern Volhynia. Instead of following the example of the men of his day and modestly increasing and rounding out his "fortune," he devoted himself to the fashionable sport of the period on the Border Marches—fighting the Tatárs. He entered the public arena in 1540, but, not content with defensive fighting, such as was carried on by the Border Chieftains, and magnates, he made up his mind to realise, in concrete form, the idea evidently cherished by many people of that epoch, but, so far, not put into execution, and built a castle on the islands of the Dnyeper, as a bulwark against the Tatárs. This idea of Vishnevetzky to found a permanent, strongly-fortified position on an island of the Dnyeper, did not fail to exercise an influence on the existing tendency to connect the winter camps of the hunters and fishermen into a chain of small fortresses defended by stockades, which, in turn, connected with a central kosh, or camp, whose ruler was the Koshevói—the chief of the camp—on the Lowlands. But Vishnevetzky's experiment with Khortitza Castle proved that no reliance could be placed on strong walls and cannon as defences against the