For six days did the Cossacks escape by bye-ways from the pursuit. Their horses could hardly bear the rapidity of their flight and save them from their pursuers, but Potozki this time proved worthy of his charge; unweariedly did he pursue them, and he overtook them at last on the banks of the Dniester, where Boolba had paused for rest in an abandoned ruined fortress. The dismantled walls of this fortress and its crumbling keep, stood on a steep cliff above the Dniester. Its platform, paved with stones and fragments of bricks, seemed to be ready at any moment to tumble down and roll into the river. Here it was that the hetman Potozki, encamping on the two sides which were adjacent to fields, surrounded the Cossacks. For four days did the Cossacks keep their stand, fighting and rolling down stones and bricks on the assailants. At last, their strength and their provisions were exhausted, and Tarass resolved to cut his way through the ranks of the enemy. Already had the Cossacks traversed the ranks, and they might perhaps once more have owed their escape to the swiftness of their horses, when on a sudden, in the very heat of their flight, Tarass stopped and cried out, "Stay, I have dropped my pipe, not even my pipe shall the cursed Poles have!" and the old Ataman stooped and began to seek in the grass for his pipe, his never-failing companion over sea and land, in his campaigns and in his home. Meanwhile a whole crowd rushed at once upon him and took him by his shoulders. He endeavoured to shake all his limbs, but no longer as of old did the heydukes fall down around him. "Eh, old age, old age!" said he, and the stout old Cossack began to weep. But his age was not the cause of it, strength had got the better of strength. Nearly thirty soldiers hung about his arms and legs. "The crow is caught," shrieked the Poles, "let us find out the best mode of paying homage to the dog!" And with the hetman's assent they decided on burning him alive, in sight of all. There stood near at hand a dry tree, whose top had been struck by lightning. Tarass was bound with iron chains to the trunk of this tree, his hands were nailed to it, and he was raised on high, in order that from everywhere around the Cossack might be seen. Beneath they made a pile of faggots. But Tarass paid no attention to the pile, he did not think about the fire that was to burn him, he looked, poor old fellow, to where the Cossacks were seen fighting; from the height to which he had been lifted he could distinctly see everything. "Lads," cried he, "quick, reach the hill behind the wood, they will not overtake you there!" But the wind blew his words away. "They will perish, perish for nothing!" exclaimed he, in despair; and he gazed down on the Dniester, glittering below. Delight flashed in his eyes. He saw the prows of four boats, projecting out of the bushes, and gathering all the strength of his lungs, he shouted at the top of his voice, "To the shore, lads, to