The Knights of the Cross/Volume 2/Chapter 61

by Henryk Sienkiewicz

CHAPTER LXI.

The meeting at Ratsiondz, on an island of the Vistula, to which the king went about Corpus Christi, took place with bad omens, and did not lead to such agreement and settlement of various questions as those which took place two years later, and at which the king recovered the land of Dobryn, and with Dobryn Bobrovniki, which had been mortgaged treacherously by Opolchik.

At his arrival Yagello was greatly irritated by the calumny against him spread by the Knights of the Cross at the courts of western Europe, and in Rome even, and he was indignant at the dishonesty of the Order. The Grand Master would not discuss the affair of Dobryn; he refrained purposely; and both he and other dignitaries repeated to the Poles daily: "We wish no war with you, nor with Lithuania, but the Jmud land is ours, for Vitold himself gave it. Promise not to help Vitold, and war with him will be ended sooner; there will be leisure then to speak of Dobryn, and we will make great concessions." But the king's counsellors, having quick wit with much experience, and knowing the deceit of the Order, did not let themselves be tricked. "When ye increase in power, your insolence will increase also," said they to the Grand Master. "Ye say that ye have no concern with Lithuania, but ye wish to seat Skirgello on the throne in Vilno. By the dear God! that is Yagello's inheritance; he alone can decide whom he wishes to make prince in Lithuania. Therefore restrain yourselves, lest our great king punish you."

To this the Master replied that if the king was the real lord of Lithuania, let him command Vitold to abandon war and give Jmud back to the Order, otherwise the Order must strike Vitold wherever it could reach and wound him. In this manner the disputes dragged on from morning until evening, like a road winding round in a circle. The king, not wishing to bind himself to anything, grew more and more impatient; and told the Master that if Jmud were happy under the control of the Order, Vitold would not move a finger, for he would have neither excuse nor reason. The Grand Master, who was a man of peace, and knew Yagello's strength more clearly than did others, strove to pacify the king; and notwithstanding the muttering of some comturs who were proud and passionate, he spared no flattering words, and at moments showed humility. But since even in that humility veiled threats were heard frequently, all ended in failure. Discussions on important points were dropped quickly, and on the second day they spoke only of inferior questions. The king attacked the Order sharply for maintaining bands of ruffians and for attacks and robberies along the border, for the stealing of Yurand's daughter and of little Yasko, for murdering fishermen and land-tillers.

The Grand Master denied, evaded, swore that, that had been done without his knowledge, and in return he made reproaches, saying that not only Vitold, but Polish knights as well had assisted pagan Jmud men to war against the Order. To prove this he gave instance of Matsko of Bogdanets. Fortunately, the king knew through Povala what the knights of Bogdanets were seeking in the Jmud land, and was able to answer the reproach, all the more easily that in his retinue was Zbyshko, and in that of the Master the two Von Badens, who had come with the hope of fighting with Poles inside barriers.

But there was no meeting of that sort. The Knights of the Cross had wished, in case discussions went smoothly, to invite King Yagello to Torun, and have feasts there and spectacles for many days to do him honor; but as discussions had failed, producing only mutual dislike and anger, desire for amusements was lacking. Only privately, in the morning hours, knights tried one another a little in strength and dexterity, but as the gladsome Prince Yamont said, that went against the grain of the Knights of the Cross, for Povala proved stronger in the arm than Arnold von Baden, Dobek of Olesnitsa at the lance, and Lis of Targovisko in jumping over horses surpassed all men. On this occasion, Zbyshko arranged the ransom with Arnold. De Lorche, as a count and a man of great note, looked down on Arnold, opposed that arrangement, and affirmed that he took all on himself. But Zbyshko considered that knightly honor commanded him to pay the amount of ransom promised; therefore, though Arnold was ready to reduce the sum, he would not accept the reduction, or Pan de Lorche's interference.

Arnold von Baden was a simple soldier whose highest merit was the giant strength of his arm; he was dull enough, not loving money, and wellnigh honest. There was no cunning of the Order in that man, hence he did not hide from Zbyshko why he was willing to decrease the ransom. "It will not come," said he, "to negotiations between the great king and the Master, but it will to exchange of prisoners, and then thou wilt take thy uncle for nothing. I prefer to get a part rather than nothing, for my purse is ever slender, and often can stand hardly three tankards of beer a day, while I suffer when I have less than five or six of them."

Zbyshko was angered by these words. "I pay," said he, "because I gave my knightly word; I will pay no less than what I promised, so thou mayst know that we have that much value." Thereupon Arnold embraced him, while the Polish knights and those of the Order gave praise, saying: "Justly dost thou wear a belt and spurs while so young, for thou knowest dignity and honor."

Meanwhile the king and the Grand Master arranged indeed for exchanging prisoners, whereupon strange things came to light which caused bishops and dignitaries of the kingdom to write letters afterward to the Pope and to various courts in Europe. In the hands of the Poles there were, it is true, many prisoners, but these were grown men in the bloom of life, captured with armed hand in battles and engagements on the boundary; while in the hands of the Knights of the Cross were found mainly women and children seized during night attacks and held for ransom. The Pope himself turned attention to this; and despite the acuteness of Johann von Felde, the procurator of the Order at the Holy See, he gave in public expression to his indignation and his anger.

There were difficulties as to Matsko. The Master did not make them seriously, but only in appearance, so as to add weight to each concession. He declared, therefore, that a Christian knight, who had fought side by side with the Jmud men, should in justice suffer death. In vain did the king's counsellors bring up anew all that was known to them of Yurand and his daughter, and the terrible wrong inflicted on them and on the knights of Bogdanets by the servants of the Order. Through a strange chance the Master in his answer used words employed by the Princess Alexandra when speaking to the old knight of Bogdanets,—

"Ye call yourselves lambs and our people wolves, but of the four wolves who took part in carrying off Yurand's daughter not one is alive now, but the lambs are going safely through the world yet."

And this was true, but to this truth the lord of Tachev, who was present, answered with the following question,—

"True. But has any one of them been slain by treachery, or have those who fell not fallen sword in hand, every man of them?"

The Master had no answer to this; and when he saw also that the king had begun to frown and his eyes to flash, he yielded, not wishing to bring the dread sovereign to an outburst. It was agreed then that each side should send envoys to receive the captives. On the Polish side were appointed Zyndram, who wished to look from near by at the power of the Order, and Povala, also Zbyshko.

Prince Yamont rendered this service to Zbyshko. He spoke to the king on his behalf, with the idea that the young knight would thus see his uncle sooner, and bring him away the more surely, since he would go for him as an envoy of Yagello. The king did not refuse the prayer of the prince, who, because of his joyful nature, kindness, and unusual beauty, was the favorite of his Majesty and all the court officials; withal he never asked for himself any favor. Zbyshko thanked him from his whole soul, for now he felt convinced that Matsko would escape from the Knights of the Order.

"No man envies thee," said Zbyshko to Yamont, "thy place near the king; and thou art near him justly, since thy intimacy is used for the good of others, and a better heart than thine, I think, no one has."

"It is pleasant near the king," replied Yamont, "but I would rather be in the field against Knights of the Order, and this I envy thee, that thou hast fought against them."

After a while he added,—

"Von Wenden, the comtur of Torun, arrived here yesterday, and this evening ye will go to him for the night, with the Master and his retinue."

"And then to Malborg?"

"And then to Malborg."

Here Prince Yamont laughed,—

"That road is not long, but it will be unpleasant, since the Germans have won nothing from the king, with Vitold too they will have no pleasure. He has gathered all the power of Lithuania and is marching to the Jmud land."

"If the king assists, there will be a great war."

"All our knights are begging the Lord God for it. But even if the king, through regard for Christian blood, should not make a great war, he will help Vitold with grain and money; and it will not be without this, too, that Polish knights will go as volunteers to him."

"As I live they will go," answered Zbyshko. "And perhaps the Order will declare war against the king because of that."

"Oh, no! while the present Master lives there will be no war."

And he was right. Zbyshko had known the Master earlier; but now on the road to Malborg, being, with Zyndram and Povala, at his side nearly all the time, he could observe more closely and estimate the man more accurately. In fact, that journey only confirmed him in the conviction that the Grand Master, Conrad von Jungingen, was not depraved and wicked. He was forced often to act unjustly, for the whole Order was founded on injustice. He had to commit injustice, for the Order reposed on injustice to man. He had to utter calumny, for the practice of calumny had come to him, together with the insignia of his office, and from early years he had grown accustomed to consider calumny as diplomatic skill merely. But he was not a tyrant; he feared the judgment of God, and as far as he was able he restrained the pride and insolence of those dignitaries of the Order who were urging on to war against the power of Yagello. He was a weak man, however. The Order had been accustomed for generations to prey on the property of others, to plunder, to take adjoining lands by force or treachery; since Conrad not only was unable to restrain that predatory hunger, but in spite of himself, by force of acquired impetus, he yielded to it and strove to satisfy this craving. Distant were the days of Winrich von Kniprode, days of iron discipline, with which the Order astonished the whole world of that time. Even during the rule of Conrad Wallenrod, the Master who preceded Jungingen, the Order grew intoxicated with its own might, which was always growing, and which temporary defeats could not diminish, it became intoxicated with glory, with success, with human blood, so that the bonds which held it in union and in strength were loosened. In so far as he was able the Master maintained right and justice; in so far as he was able he lightened personally the iron hand of the Order, which weighed on peasants, on citizens, and even on the clergy and on nobles living by feudal right on lands of the Order; hence near Malborg this or that citizen or land-tiller might be not only well-to-do, but wealthy; while in more remote places the tyranny, cruelty, and disorder of the comturs trampled justice, spread oppression and extortion, squeezed out the last copper by means of taxes imposed without warrant and even without pretext, pressed out tears, and often blood, so that in whole extensive regions there was one groan, universal wretchedness, and universal complaint. If even the good of the Order commanded greater mildness, as at times in Jmud, those commands came to naught in view of the disorder of the comturs and their native cruelty. So Conrad von Jungingen felt like a charioteer who is driving maddened horses and has dropped the reins from his hands, abandoning his chariot to the will of fate. Hence evil forebodings mastered his soul frequently, and frequently those prophetic words occurred to him: "I established them as bees of usefulness; I settled them on the threshold of Christian lands; but they have risen against me. They care not for the souls, and they have no compassion for the bodies, of the people who turned from error to the Catholic faith, and to me. They have made slaves of those people, and by neglecting to teach them the commands of God, and by depriving them of the holy sacraments, they expose them to greater torments of hell than if they had continued Pagans, They make wars to satisfy their own greed, hence the hour will come when their teeth will be broken, and the right hand will be cut from them, and their right leg shall be lame, so that they will confess their offences."

The Master knew that those reproaches, which the mysterious Voice uttered against the Order in the vision to Saint Bridget, were true. He understood that, that edifice, reared on the land of another, and on wrong done another, that edifice, resting on calumny, treachery, and tyranny, could not endure. He feared that, undermined for whole years by blood and by tears, it would fall from one blow of the strong Polish hand; he felt that the chariot drawn by raging horses would end in the abyss, so he strove that at least the hour of judgment, defeat, wrath, and suffering should come as late as possible. In spite of his weakness, he presented therefore in one thing an invincible opposition to his insolent and haughty counsellors: he would not permit a war with Poland. In vain did they reproach him with fear and incompetence; in vain did the comturs of the border urge war with all their might. He, when the fire was just ready to burst forth, always withdrew at the last moment, and then gave thanks to God at Malborg that he had been able to arrest the sword raised above the Order.

But he knew that war must come. Hence that knowledge that the Order was built, not on the justice of God, but on injustice and calumny, and that feeling of an approaching day of destruction, made him one of the most unhappy men on earth. He would beyond doubt have given his life and blood could it have been otherwise, and were there time yet to turn to a way of justice; but he felt that it was late then. To turn would mean to give to the rightful owners all those rich and fertile lands seized by the Order, God knows how long since, and with them a multitude of cities as rich as Dantzig. And that was not all! It would mean to renounce the Jmud region; to renounce attacks on Lithuania; to put the sword in the scabbard; finally, to remove altogether from those regions in which there were no more people for the Order to Christianize, and settle in Palestine a second time, or on some of the Grecian islands, to defend the Cross there from real Saracens. But this was impossible, since it would have been equivalent to a sentence of destruction to the Order. Who would agree to that? What Grand Master would ask for it? The soul and life of Conrad were covered with a shadow, but if a man were to appear with an advice of this sort, the Master would be the first to condemn him to a dark chamber as one who had lost his senses. The Order had to go on and on till the day when God himself should fix the limit.

So Conrad advanced, but in gloom and in suffocating sorrow. The hair on his chin and temples had grown silvery, and his eyes, once quick, were half covered with their heavy drooping lids. Zbyshko did not note a smile even once on his countenance. The Master's face was not severe nor even overcast; it was only tortured, as if by silent suffering. In his armor, with a cross on his breast, in the centre of which was a black eagle on a quadrangular field, and in a great white mantle also adorned with the Cross, he produced the impression of dignity, of majesty and sorrow. Conrad had been a joyous man, he had loved jests, and even at that time he was not averse to splendid feasts, spectacles, and tournaments, nay, he even took part in them; but neither in the throng of brilliant knights, who came as guests to Malborg, nor in a joyous outcry, amid the sounds of trumpets and the clatter of weapons, or amid goblets filled with Malvoisie, was he ever gladsome. When all around seemed full of strength, splendor, inexhaustible wealth, invincible power; when the envoys of the emperor and of kings of the west shouted with enthusiasm that the Order could stand by itself for all kingdoms, and the strength of the world,—he alone was not deceived, he alone remembered the ominous words in the vision of the saint: "The time will come when their teeth will be broken, and their right hand cut from them, when their right leg will be lame, so that they will confess their offences."