460
lso a peasant, more than one hundred years old, who remembered the massacre of Lenczyca, which happened in 1331, and the complete destruction of the town by the "Knights of the Cross." Although Macko, the Bohemian, and the two girls, had already heard the narrative from the prior of Sieradz, nevertheless they listened with much interest to the tale of the old man who was sitting at the fireside scraping in the cinders. It seemed as if he discovered among them the events of his earlier days. At Lenczyca, as well as at Sieradz, they spared not even the churches and clergy, and the knives of the conquerors were covered with the blood of old men, women and children. Always the Knights of the Cross, the everlasting Knights of the Cross! The thoughts of Macko and Jagienka were constantly directed toward Zbyszko, who was living in the very jaws of the wolves, in the midst of a hardened clan who knew neither pity nor the laws of hospitality. Sieciechowa was faint at heart, because she feared that their hunt after the abbot might lead them among those terrible Knights of the Cross.
But the old man, to counteract the unfavorable impression which the stories made upon the women, told them of the battle near Plowce, which put an end to the incursions of the Knights of the Cross, and in which he took part as a soldier in the infantry raised by the peasants, and armed with an iron flail. In that battle perished almost the whole clan of the Gradys; Macko knew all the particulars of it, nevertheless he listened now as though it were a recital of a new terrible calamity caused by the Germans, when like cornfields before the storm they were mowed down by the sword in the hands of the Polish knighthood and the forces of King Lokietek....
"Ha! I just recollect," said the old man, "when they invaded this country, they burned the town and castles. Yes, they even massacred the infants in the cradles, but their terrible end came. Hey! It was a fine fight. I can see the battle now with my eyes closed...."
He closed h