mischief that must follow. Then
it was noised abroad that the Margrave Frederick of Meissen, who now
held the lands of the late departed Elector Albrecht of Saxony in
fief from the King, and whose country was a strong bulwark against
the Bohemians, was about to put an end to the abomination of heresy.
Howbeit, neither he nor Duke Albrecht of Austria did aught to any good
end against the foe; and matters went ill enough in all the Empire.
The Electors assembled at Bingen made great complaints of the King
tarrying so far away, and with reason; and when he presently bid them to
a Diet at Vienna they would not obey. The message of peace was laughed
to scorn; and how much blood was shed to feed the soil of the realm in
many and many a fight!
And what fate befell the army whereon so great hopes had been set? The
courage and skill of the leader were all in vain; the vast multitude
of which he was captain was made up of over many parts, all unlike, and
each with its own chief; and the fury of the heretics scattered
them abroad. Likewise among our peaceful citizens there was no small
complaining, and with good cause, that a King should rule the Empire
whose Realm of Hungary, with the perils that beset it from the Ottoman
Turks, the Bohemians, and other foes, so filled his thoughts that he
had neither time, nor mind, nor money to bestow due care on his German
States. His treasury was ever empty; and what sums had the luckless war
with Venice alone swallowed up! He had not even found the money
needful to go to Rome to be crowned Emperor. He had failed to bring
the contentious Princes of the Empire under one hat, so to speak; and
whereas his father, Charles IV., had been called the Arch-stepfather
of the German Empire, Sigismund, albeit a large-hearted, shrewd, and
unresting soul, deserved a scarce better name, inasmuch as that he, like
the former sovereign, when he fell heir to his Bohemian fatherland, knew
not how to deal even with that as a true father should.
Not a week passed after Herdegen's departing but a letter by his own
hand came to Ann, and all full of faithful love. I, likewise, had, not
so long since, had such letters from another, and so it fell that these,
which brought great joy to Ann, did but make my sore heart ache the
more. And when I would rise from table silent and with drooping head,
the Magister would full often beg leave to follow me to my chamber, and
comfort me after his own guise. In all good fait
|