the flaming vision of Poland, of a Poland which had broken its coffin, has arisen from the tomb and now arises in the purple pomp of triumph, in the ermine of a majestic potency; Poland, the bulwark of Christendom: Poland, the holy refuge of every freedom, the Poland of primates, magnates, senators, mighty dukes and of the choicest chivalry in the whole world.
And from their battle-graves have arisen those who fell at Grunwald in bitterest contest with the Knights of the Cross, and those who in a holy death-ride against the Turks rallied round Ladislaw Warnenczyk, that heroic scion of the Jagellons, and those whose bones rotted upon the Kahlenberg at the relief of Vienna . . . the kings broke the seal of sarcophagus, the cardinals, the Magnates, and the rulers arose from their vaults and grouped themselves in a huge procession, and at their head in triumphant majesty, the King of kings, the "King-Spirit,"[1] which had embodied itself in the Polish people.
And before our eyes is set astir like an unfettered storm-blast, like a shattering hurricane, the proud lion-brood of steel-armoured heroes, that chosen band of Polish hussars with silver wings drooping low from their arms,—but grievously blares forth the battle-trumpet which calls them to the heroic dance of death, and at the
