retreat was
intolerable to him, so he determined to march southwards instead of
northwards as suggested by his generals, and join his forces with those
of the hetman of the Dnieperian Cossacks, Ivan Mazepa, who had 100,000
horsemen and a fresh and fruitful land at his disposal. Short of falling
back upon Livonia, it was the best plan adoptable in the circumstances,
but it was rendered abortive by Peter's destruction of Mazepa's capital
Baturin, so that when Mazepa joined Charles at Horki, on the 8th of
November 1708, it was as a ruined man with little more than 1300
personal attendants (see MAZEPA-KOLEDINSKY). A still more serious blow
was the destruction of the relief army which Levenhaupt was bringing to
Charles from Livonia, and which, hampered by hundreds of loaded wagons,
was overtaken and almost destroyed by Peter at Lyesna after a two days'
battle against fourfold odds (October). The very elements now began to
fight against the perishing but still unconquered host. The winter of
1708 was the severest that Europe had known for a century. By the 1st of
November firewood would not ignite in the open air, and the soldiers
warmed themselves over big bonfires of straw. By the time the army
reached the little Ukrainian fortress of Hadjacz in January 1709, wine
and spirits froze into solid masses of ice; birds on the wing fell dead;
saliva congealed on its passage from the mouth to the ground.
"Nevertheless," says an eye-witness, "though earth, sea and sky were
against us, the king's orders had to be obeyed and the daily march
made."

Never had Charles XII. seemed so superhuman as during these awful days.
It is not too much to say that his imperturbable equanimity, his serene
_bonhomie_ kept the host together. The frost broke at the end of
February 1709, and then the spring floods put an end to all active
operations till May, when Charles began the siege of the fortress of
Poltava, which he wished to make a base for subsequent operations while
awaiting reinforcements from Sweden and Poland. On the 7th of June a
bullet wound put Charles _hors de combat_, whereupon Peter threw the
greater part of his forces over the river Vorskla, which separated the
two armies (June 19-25). On the 26th of June Charles held a council of
war, at which it was resolved to attack the Russians in their
entrenchments on the following day. The Swedes joyfully accepted the
chances of battle and, advancing with irresistible _elan_, were, at
first,