They hoped to cut off his retreat and thus secure the entire destruction of their formidable foe.

The situation of Sviatoslaf was now desperate.

Nothing remained for him but death.

With the abandonment of despair he rushed into the thickest of the foe, and soon fell a mangled corpse.

How much more happy would have been his life, how much more happy his death, had he followed the counsels of his pious mother.