Pan Michael by Henryk Sienkiewicz — Read

Independent detachments, occupied in robbery on both banks of the Dniester, were made up of men of all nationalities inhabiting the neighboring countries. Runaway Tartars from the Dobrudja and Belgrod hordes, wilder still and braver than their Crimean brethren, always preponderated in them; but there were not lacking either Wallachians, Cossacks, Hungarians, Polish domestics escaped from stanitsas on the banks of the Dniester. They ravaged now on the Polish, now on the Moldavian side, crossing and recrossing the boundary river, as they were hunted by the perkulab's forces or by the commandants of the Commonwealth. They had their almost inaccessible hiding-places in ravines, forests, and caves. The main object of their attacks was the herds of cattle and horses belonging to the stanitsas; these herds did not leave the steppes even in winter, seeking sustenance for themselves under the snow. But, besides, the robbers attacked villages, hamlets, settlements, smaller commands, Polish and even Turkish merchants, intermediaries going with ransom to the Crimea. These bands had their own order and their leaders, but they joined forces rarely. It happened often even that larger bands cut down smaller ones. They had increased greatly everywhere in the Russian regions, especially since the time of the Cossack wars, when safety of every kind vanished in those parts. The bands on the Dniester, reinforced by fugitives from the horde, were peculiarly terrible. Some appeared numbering five hundred. Their leaders took the title of "bey. " They ravaged the country in a manner thoroughly Tartar, and more than once the commandants themselves did not know whether they had to do with bandits or with advance chambuls of the whole horde. Against mounted troops, especially the cavalry of the Commonwealth, these bands could not stand in the open field; but, caught in a trap, they fought desperately, knowing well that if taken captive the halter was waiting for them. Their arms were various. Bows and guns were lacking them, which, however, were of little use in night attacks. The greater part were armed with daggers and Turkish yataghans, slingshots, Tartar sabres, and with horse-skulls fastened to oak clubs with cords. This last weapon, in strong hands, did terrible service, for it smashed every sabre. Some had very long forks pointed with iron, some spears; these in sudden emergencies they used against cavalry.

The band which had halted at Sirotski Brod must have been numerous or must have been in extreme peril on the Moldavian side, since it had ventured to approach the command at Hreptyoff, in spite of the terror which the name alone of Pan Volodyovski roused in the robbers on both sides of the boundary. In fact, another party brought intelligence that it was composed of more than four hundred men, under the leadership of Azba Bey, a famous ravager, who for a number of years had filled the Polish and Moldavian banks with terror.