CHAPTER LXXIX.
At dawn the wind not only did not cease, but it rose to such a degree that men could not pitch that tent in which from the beginning of the expedition the king had heard three holy masses each day. At last Vitold ran up with entreaties and the prayer to defer service to a more fitting time in forest quiet, and not to delay the advance. His wish was in fact gratified, for it could not be otherwise. At sunrise the armies moved in a body, and behind them an endless train of wagons.
After they had marched an hour the wind went down somewhat, so that the flags were unfurled. And then the fields to an immense extent were covered, as it were, with flowers of a hundred colors. No eye could embrace the legions, or that forest of various banners under which the regiments moved forward. The land of Cracow advanced under a red banner with a white, crowned eagle; that was the grand banner of the kingdom, the chief standard of all the troops. It was borne by Martsin of Vrotsimovitse, a knight mighty and famous. Behind it marched the household regiment; one body had the double cross of Lithuania above it, the other a knight with a sword raised to strike. Under the banner of Saint George marched a powerful division of mercenaries and foreign volunteers, formed mainly of Moravians and Bohemians. Many of these had volunteered for that war, since the 49th regiment was made up of them exclusively. Those men were properly infantry, which marched behind the lancers; they were wild, unruly, but so trained to battle, and so terrible in encounter, that all other infantry when they struck on these sprang away as quickly as possible, just as a dog starts back from a porcupine. Battle-axes, scythes, common axes, and especially iron flails formed their weapons, which they wielded in a manner that was simply terrible. They took service with any one who paid them, as their only element was war, plunder, and slaughter.
At the side of the Moravians and Bohemians marched under their own banner sixteen regiments of the Polish lands, among these one from Premysl, one from Lvov, one from Galicia, three from Podolia, and behind them infantry from
