The Deluge: An Historical Novel of Poland, Sweden, and Russia. Vol. 2 — John Shaqi
The Deluge: An Historical Novel of Poland, Sweden, and Russia. Vol. 2Sienkiewicz, Henryk
History
The Deluge: An Historical Novel of Poland, Sweden, and Russia. Vol. 2
Sienkiewicz, Henryk
Historical fiction; Poland -- History -- John II Casimir, 1648-1668 -- Fiction
But the quiet of night, once broken, did not return till white day.
From the walls cannon were playing; in the Swedish positions the
greatest confusion continued. The enemy not knowing well their own
losses, not knowing whence the aggressor might come, fled from the
trenches nearest the cloister. Whole regiments wandered in despairing
disorder till morning, mistaking frequently their own for the enemy,
and firing at one another. Even in the main camp were soldiers and
officers who abandoned their tents and remained under the open sky,
awaiting the end of that ghastly night. Alarming news flew from mouth
to mouth. Some said that succor had come to the fortress, others
asserted that all the nearer intrenchments were captured.
Miller, Sadovski, the Prince of Hesse, Count Veyhard, and other
superior officers, made superhuman exertions to bring the terrified
regiments to order. At the same time the cannonade of the cloister was
answered by balls of fire, to scatter the darkness and enable fugitives
to assemble. One of the balls struck the roof of the chapel, but
striking only the edge of it, returned with rattling and crackling
toward the camp, casting a flood of flame through the air.
At last the night of tumult was ended. The cloister and the Swedish
camp became still. Morning had begun to whiten the summits of the
church, the roofs took on gradually a ruddy light, and day came.
In that hour Miller, at the head of his staff, rode to the captured
trench. They could, it is true, see him from the cloister and open
fire; but the old general cared not for that. He wished to see with his
own eyes all the injury, and count the slain. The staff followed him;
all were disturbed,—they had sorrow and seriousness in their faces.
When they reached the intrenchment, they dismounted and began to
ascend. Traces of the struggle were visible everywhere; lower down than
the guns were the overthrown tents; some were still open, empty,
silent. There were piles of bodies, especially among the tents;
half-naked corpses, mangled, with staring eyes, and with terror
stiffened in their dead eyeballs, presented a dreadful sight. Evidently
all these men had been surprised in deep sleep; some of them were
barefoot; it was a rare one who grasped his rapier in his dead hand;
almost no one wore a helmet or a cap. Some were lying in tents,
especially at the side of the entrance; these, it was apparent, had
barely succeeded in waking; others, at the sides of tents, were caught
by death at the moment when they were seeking safety in flight.
Everywhere there were many bodies, and in places such piles that it
might be thought some cataclysm of nature had killed those soldiers;
but the deep wounds in their faces and breasts, some faces blackened by
shots, so near that all the powder had not been burned, testified but
too plainly that the hand of man had caused the destruction.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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