Classics Illustrated 146 With Fire and Sword

More than three hundred years ago, Poland was a vast power stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. This area included the Ukraine, home of the fierce, daring cavalry - the Cossacks.

The year 1647 in Poland was a year in which there were strange signs in the heavens and on the earth. First there was a great eclipse of the sun, and soon after a comet appeared in the sky. In Warsaw, a tomb was seen over the city and a fiery cross in the clouds. Wolves and vampires howled in the night and whole legions of ghosts marched. These were believed to be signs a great war was coming.