service they could render the country. They would not
listen, declaring that obedience was the first law and obliga-
tion for military men. They said they could join the prince
only in case the safety of their regiments demanded it.

Pan Yan went away deeply grieved, for he knew how
painful this fresh disappointment would be to the prince,
and how greatly his forces were wearied and worn by
campaigning, by continual struggling with the enemy, scat-
tering isolated detachments, and finally by continual wake-
fulness, hunger, and bad weather. To measure himself in
these conditions with an enemy tenfold superior in number
would be impossible. Skshetuski saw clearly, therefore,
that there must be delay in acting against Krivonos, for it
was necessary to give a longer rest to the army and to wait
for a new accession of nobles to the camp.

Occupied with these thoughts, Skshetuski went back to
the prince at the head of his Cossacks. He was obliged to
go cautiously and at night, so as to escape the scouts of
Krivonos and the numerous independent bands, made up of
Cossacks and peasants, -- sometimes very strong, -- which
raged in that neighborhood, burning dwellings, cutting
down nobles, and hunting fugitives along the highroads.
He passed Baklai and entered the forests of Mshyna, --
dense, full of treacherous ravines and valleys. Happily he
was favored on the road by good weather after the recent
rains. It was a glorious night in July, moonless, but
crowded with stars. The Cossacks went along in a narrow
trail, guided by the foresters of Mshyna, -- very trusty
men, knowing the forests perfectly. Deep silence reigned
among the trees, broken only by the cracking of dry twigs
under the horses' hoofs, -- when suddenly there came to
the ears of Pan Yan and the Cossacks a kind of distant
murmur, like singing interrupted by cries.

"Listen!" said the lieutenant, in a low voice; and he
stopped the line of Cossacks. "What is that?"

The old forester bent forward to him. "Those are crazy
people who go through the woods now and scream. Their
heads are turned from cruelty. Yesterday we met a noble-
woman who was going around looking at the pines and cry-
ing, ' Children! children! ' It is evident that the peasants
had killed her children. She stared at us and whined so
that our legs trembled under us. They say that in all the
forests there are many such."

Though Pan Yan was a fearless man, a shudder passed