"Pan Maciej, unkind neighbour, you come very late, when dinner is almost over."
"I eat early," replied Dobrzynski; "I did not come here for food, but only because I was overpowered by curiosity to see close at hand our national army. Of this much might be said; it is neither fish, flesh, nor fowl. These gentlemen caught sight of me and brought me here by force; and you, sir, are compelling me to seat myself at your table—I thank you, neighbour."
With these words he turned his plate bottom upwards, as a sign that he would not eat, and relapsed into glum silence.
"Pan Dobrzynski," said General Dombrowski to him, "are you that famous swordsman of the Kosciuszko times, that Maciej, called Switch! Your fame has reached me. And pray tell me, is it possible that you are still so hale, so vigorous! How many years have gone by! See, I have grown old; see, Kniaziewicz too has grizzled hair; but you might still enter the lists against young men. And your switch doubtless blooms as it did long ago; I have heard that recently you birched the Muscovites. But where are your brethren? I should beyond measure like to see those penknives and razors of yours, the last relics of ancient Lithuania."
"After that victory, General," said the Judge, "almost all the Dobrzynskis took refuge in the Grand Duchy, and must have entered one or other of the legions."
"Why certainly," answered a young squadron commander, "I have in the second company a mustachioed scarecrow, Sergeant-Major Dobrzynski, who calls himself Sprinkler, but whom the Masovians call the Lithuanian bear. If you bid me, General, we will have him brought in."
