On the Field of Glory: An Historical Novel of the Time of King John SobieskiSienkiewicz, Henryk
History
On the Field of Glory: An Historical Novel of the Time of King John Sobieski
Sienkiewicz, Henryk
Poland -- History -- John III Sobieski, 1674-1696 -- Fiction
Pan Matchynski, a friend from of old, to Father Voynovski, and also a
friend of the king, promised to remind him of the young lady, but after
the war; for at that time when on the shoulders of Yan III the fate of
all Europe was resting, and of all Christianity, it was not permitted
to trouble him with private interests. Father Voynovski was comforted
with this promise as much as if Yatsek had then received a good "crown
estate," for all knew that word from Pan Matchynski was as sure of
fulfilment as had been the words of Zavisha. To speak strictly, he was
the author of all the good which had met Panna Sieninski in Cracow; he
mentioned Father Voynovski to the king and queen; finally he won for
the young lady the queen, who, though capricious in her likings, and
fickle, began from the first moment to show her special favor and
friendship, which seemed even almost too sudden.
A dispensation from banns was received easily through protection of the
court, and the favor of the bishop of Cracow. Even earlier, Pan Serafin
had obtained for the young couple handsome lodgings from a Cracow
merchant, whose ancestors and those of Pan Serafin had done business in
their day, when the latter were living in Lvoff, and importing brocades
from the Orient. That was a beautiful lodging, and, because of the
multitude of civil and military dignitaries in the city, so good a one
could not be obtained by many a voevoda. Stanislav had determined that
Yatsek should pass those few days before the campaign as it were in a
genuine heaven, and he ornamented those lodgings unusually with fresh
flowers and tapestry; other comrades helped him with zeal, each
lending, the best of what he had, rugs, tapestry, carpets, and such
like costly articles, which in wealthy hussar regiments were taken in
campaigns even.
In one word, all showed the young couple the greatest good-will, and
helped them as each one was able and with what he commanded, except the
four Bukoyemskis. They, in the first days after coming to Cracow, went
sometimes twice in a day to Stanislav and to Yatsek, and to merchants
at the inns with whom officers from the regiment of Prince Alexander
drank not infrequently, but afterward the four brothers vanished as if
they had fallen into water. Father Voynovski thought that they were
drinking in the suburbs, where servants had seen them one evening, and
where mead and wine were cheaper than in the city, but immediately
after that all report of them vanished. This angered the priest as well
as the Tsyprianovitches, for the brothers were bound to Pan Serafin in
gratitude; this they should not have forgotten. "They may be good
soldiers," said the priest, "but they are giddy heads in whose
sedateness we cannot put confidence. Of course they have found some
wild company in which they pass time more pleasantly than with any of
us."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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