h Pomona, Flora, and Vertumnus over Dobrzynski's
house, stable, and barn. But to-day the goddesses must yield anew; Mars
returns.

At daybreak there had appeared in Dobrzyn a mounted messenger; he galloped
from cottage to cottage and awoke them as if to work for the manor: the
gentry arose and filled with a crowd the streets of the hamlet; cries were
heard in the tavern, candles seen in the priest's house. All were running
about, each asked the other what this meant; the old men took counsel
together, the young men saddled their horses while the women held them;
the boys scuffled about, in a hurry to run and fight, but did not know
with whom or about what! Willy-nilly, they had to stay behind. In the
priest's dwelling there was in progress a long, tumultuous, frightfully
confused debate; at last, not being able to agree, they finally decided to
lay the whole matter before Father Maciej.

Seventy-two years of age was Maciej, a hale old man, of low stature, a
former Confederate of Bar.118 Both his friends and his enemies remembered
his curved damascened sabre, with which he was wont to chop spears and
bayonets like fodder, and to which in jest he had given the modest name of
_switch_. From a Confederate he became a partisan of the King, and
supported Tyzenhaus,119 the Under-Treasurer of Lithuania; but when the
King joined the men of Targowica, Maciej once more deserted the royal
side. And hence, since he had passed through so many parties, he had long
been called Cock-on-the-Steeple, because like a cock he turned his
standard with the wind. You would in vain search for the cause of such
frequent changes; perhaps Maciej was too fond of war, and, when conquered
on one side, sought battle anew on the other; perhaps the shrewd
politician judged well the spirit of the times, and turned whither he
thought the good of his country called him.120 Who knows! This much is
sure, that never was he seduced either by desire for personal fame, or by
base greed, and that never had he supported the Muscovite party; for at
the very sight of a Muscovite he frothed and grimaced. In order not to
meet a Muscovite, after the partition of the country, he sat at home like
a bear that sucks its paw in the woods.

His last experience in war was when he went with Oginski121 to Wilno,
where they both served under Jasinski, and there with his switch he
performed prodigies of valour. Everybody knew how he had jumped down alone
from the ramparts of Pra