CHAPTER XXVII.

KRIVINOS marched then from Belaya Tserkoff through
Skvira and Pogrebische to Makhnovka. Wherever he
passed, traces of human habitation vanished. Whoever did
not join him perished under the knife. Grain was burned
standing, with forests and gardens. At the same time the
prince carried annihilation in his hand. After the razing
of Pogrebische, and the baptism of blood which Pan Bara-
novski gave to Kyemiroff, the prince's army destroyed a
number of other considerable bands, and halted in camp at
Raigorod, where during a month they scarcely got off their
horses. They were weakened by toil, and death had de-
creased them notably. Rest was necessary, for the hands
of these reapers in the harvest of blood had relaxed. The
prince wavered, therefore, and thought whether it would
not be better to go for a time to a more peaceable region
to rest and recruit his forces, especially his horses, which
were more like skeletons of beasts than living creatures,
since they had not eaten grain for a month, subsisting only
on trampled grass.

But after they had halted a week tidings were brought
that reinforcements were coming. The prince went out to
meet them, and really met Pan Yanush Tishkyevich, the
voevoda of Kieff, who came with fifteen hundred good men,
and with him Pan Krishtof Tishkyevich, under-judge of
Bratslav; young Pan Aksak, quite a youth yet, but with a
well-armed company of his own: and many nobles, such
as the Senyuts, the Palubinskis, the Jitinskis, the Yelovit-
skis, the Kyerdcis, the Boguslavskis, -- some with escorts,
others without. The entire force formed nearly two thou-
sand horse, besides attendants.

The prince was greatly pleased, and invited thankfully to
his quarters the voevoda, who could not cease wondering at
the poverty and simplicity of the place. For the prince,
by so much as he lived like a king in Lubni, by that much
did he permit himself no comfort in the field, wishing to
give an example to the soldiers. He lived therefore in
one room, which the voevoda of Kieff, squeezing through
the narrow door, was hardly able to enter, by reason of his