head of which were two colonels, Horotkyevich and Yakub Kmita, a cousin of Andrei, the most trusty assistant of Radzivill.
The name of the latter was repeated with horror by the soldiers. He mainly had caused the dispersion of Stankyevich's squadron and that of Mirski; he shot without mercy the captured officers. The hetman trusted him blindly, and just recently had sent him against Nyevyarovski's squadron, which, disregarding the example of its colonel, refused obedience.
Volodyovski heard the last account with great attention; then he turned to the officers summoned in counsel, and asked, —
"What would you say to this, — that we, instead of hurrying to the voevoda of Vityebsk, go to those squadrons which have formed a confederacy in Podlyasye?"
"You have taken that out of my mouth!" said Zagloba.
"It is nearer home there, and it is always pleasanter among one's own people."
"Fugitives mention too a report," added Pan Yan, "that the king has ordered some squadrons to return from the Ukraine, to oppose the Swedes on the Vistula. If this should prove true, we might be among old comrades instead of pounding from corner to corner."
"But who is going to command those squadrons? Does any one know?"
"They say that Charnyetski will," answered Volodyovski; "but people say this rather than know it, for positive intelligence could not come yet."
"However it may be," said Zagloba, "my advice is to hurry to Podlyasye. We can bring to our side those squadrons that have risen against Eadzivill, and take them to the king, and that certainly will not be without a reward."
"Let it be so!" said Oskyerko and Stankyevich.
"It is not easy," said the little knight, " to get to Podlyasye, for we shall have to slip through the fingers of the hetman. If fortune meanwhile should grant us to snap up Kmita somewhere on the road, I would speak a couple of words in his ear, from which his skin would grow green."
"He deserves it," said Mirski. "That some old soldiers who have served their whole lives under the Radzivills hold to the hetman, is less to be wondered at; but that swaggerer serves only for his own profit, and the pleasure which he finds in betrayal."
