One little circumstance of the taking of Raab is too characteristic of the kind of enthusiasm which animates the Austrian troops, for me to pass it over in silence. When the Emperor arrived in the thick of the storming of the town, the troops that were the hottest engaged in action, greeted him, by one common inspiration, with the National Hymn; and, mingled with the roll of the drums, the clang of the trumpets, the deep baying of the guns, and all the monster din of strife, rose up from a thousand voices, the cry of fidelity, the prayer, the blessing, the "Gott erhalt den Kaiser!"

This has been beautifully described (and will, I am aware, be most imperfectly rendered in my translation) by Zedlitz, in the lines entitled "In Raab," where, after depicting the manner in which Franz Josef was foremost, wherever danger threatened most, he says:

"Then the troops-their chief beholding
On that fearful battle-plain,

O'er his head the death-smoke folding,
At his feet the mangled slain-

upon its utility, and upon the facts proving that it was the fruit of spontaneous inspiration. When the Chapter has pointed out the persons worthy to obtain the decoration of either first or second class (the difficulty of the former being really extreme) the Sovereign confers the Order.

VOL. II.

Shout-of all save him regardless-
Austria's old Imperial song:

'Oh! Great God, the Emperor bless! May his days be bright and long!"

"Even whilst the prayer pronouncing,
Still'd in death was many a tongue,
Clos'd the lips where, life-renouncing,
Yet the loyal accents hung.
Thus the Kaiser entered proudly
Into Raab's rebellious walls;
Whilst around were echoing loudly,

Hymns of love and foemen's balls!"

CHAPTER X.

PRAGUE AND THE TCHÈQUES-WINDISCHGRÄTZ

It is difficult for a foreigner in Prague to think, at first, of anything save Waldstein and the Thirty Years' War. The whole of this wonderful man's life was so wonderful, his plans so gigantic and so original, the services rendered by him so immense, that one is almost inclined to regard his falling off from his allegiance less as an act of rebellion, than as the indomitable yearning of a great spirit toward greatness. The native element of Waldstein was rule-command over his fellow-men, just as it was Napoleon's; and I have met but too few people who render to themselves a just account of the Duke of Friedland's greatness. To him, a comparatively obscure Bohemian nobleman, of exceedingly ancient

race and considerable fortune, but not otherwise distinguished, Austria owes her first step towards supremacy, towards that preponderance, which later caused the idea of empire, long before it was so in words, to be in fact embodied in the House of Hapsburg.

Until Waldstein enters upon the scene, the Emperor has no army serving exclusively under his orders, but he is dependant upon the Elector of Bavaria, and upon the combined forces of the German Catholic League; and Tilly, to whom Ferdinand owes so much, is a Bavarian. Austria may resist, may repress, but she cannot conquer; she is dependant, and acts only in the name of the Empire; she does not stand alone.

But Waldstein comes, and offers to take charge, between himself and his friends, of the maintenance of an independent army, provided the Emperor will authorize him to extend its numbers to fifty thousand men! The plan was called chimerical; but the permission was granted, and unlimited powers accorded to its inventor; and in a very few months, twenty thousand men were assembled, at the head of which force Waldstein crossed the Austrian frontier. Soon he reappeared with thirty thousand in Lower Saxony; and so the army grew and grew, till its numbers were far above a hundred thousand men. And now the Emperor had an army of his own, an army that

could defy the best; and Austria was no longer forced to accede to all the desires of the Elector of Bavaria.

Reigning Princes even now flocked round the Duke of Friedland's banner, and brought regiments to swell the force to which the Emperor gave only his name. The restless Condottier, Mansfeldt, and his romantic companion, Christian of Brunswick, were both defeated. Waldstein pursued Mansfeldt into Hungary, where, though he could not prevent his junction with the Transylvanian, Bethlen Gabor, his presence so impressed the latter, that a peace was concluded with the Emperor, and the eternal wanderer, Mansfeldt, was sent once more upon the "warpath," and told to address himself to the Venetian Republic. On his road thither he died, and his grave is in Dalmatia, the land whose love of war and of adventure defies to the last the inroads of the spirit of modern times.

Step by step uprose the Austrian name towards supremacy, and the eagle of Hapsburg spread its pinions as though to overshadow all around it and beneath; and that was Waldstein's plan. The greatness, the preponderance of Austria over the rest; the almost omnipotence of the Emperor, the Cæsar, the successor of Charlemagne. All the great minds of Germany have been pre-occupied by this idea, at different periods of history; but the giant who is to