person, the thought never rose in the mind of Skshetuski
that the disturbance could endure long, that one Cossack
could shake the whole Commonwealth and break its terri-
ble power. "That wave will be broken at the threshold of
the Ukraine," thought the lieutenant. "How have all the
Cossack rebellions ended? They have burst out like a
flame and have been stifled at the first meeting with the
hetmans." Such had been the outcome up to that time. For
on one side there rose a crowd of bandits from the lower
country, and on the other the power whose shores were
washed by two seas. The end was easily foreseen the
storm could not be lasting; it would pass, and calm would
follow. This thought strengthened Skshetuski, and perhaps
kept him on his feet while he was weighted with such a
burden as he had never carried in his life before. The
storm, though it would pass, might desolate fields, wreck
houses, and inflict unspeakable harm. In this storm he had
almost lost his life, had lost his strength, and had fallen into
bitter captivity just at the time when freedom was worth
really as much to him as life itself. What, then must be the
suffering, in this uproar, of beings without power to defend
themselves? What was happening to Helena in Rozlogi?
But Helena must be in Lubni already. The lieutenant
in his sleep saw her surrounded by friendly faces, petted
by Princess Griselda and the prince himself, admired by
the knights,--and still grieving for her hussar, who had
disappeared somewhere in the Saitch. But the time would
come at last when he would return. Hmelnitski himself
had promised freedom; and besides, the Cossack wave
would flow on and on, to the threshold of the Common-
wealth, where it would be broken; then would come the
end of anxiety, affliction, and dread.

The wave flowed on, indeed. Hinelnitski moved forward
without delay, and marched to meet the son of the hetman.
His power was really formidable; for with the Cossacks
of Krechovski and the party of Tugai Bey, he led nearly
twenty-five thousand trained men eager for battle. There
was no reliable information concerning Pototski's numbers.
Deserters declared that he had two thousand heavy cavalry
and a number of field-pieces. A battle with that proportion
of forces might be doubtful; for one attack of the terrible
hussars was often sufficient to destroy ten times the number
of troops. Thus Pan Hodkyevich, the Lithuanian hetman,
in his time, with three thousand hussars at Kirchholm,