The merchants, for whom waste territories in Lithuania and in Russia had been opened, forseeing great losses, made pious vows, hoping that Jagiello might remain on the throne. But in that event, they predicted a war with the Order. It was known that the queen only could restrain his anger. The people recollected a previous occasion, when being indignant at the avidity and rapacity of the Knights of the Cross, she spoke to them in a prophetic vision: “As long as I live, I will restrain my husband’s hand and his righteous anger; but remember that after my death, there will fall upon you the punishment for your sins.”
In their pride and folly, they were not afraid of a war, calculating, that after the queen’s death, the charm of her piety would no longer restrain the wish for affluence of vo
