mself "a free gentleman of the Empire
and of the World, subject only to God"--an example of morbid and
misplaced fanaticism which, nevertheless, with the sound of his money
and the prospect of plunder, procured him a crowd of recruits from
among the rabble, whom the peace with Poland had deprived of a
livelihood. In fact, he had thirty-odd men when he crossed back to the
right side of the Elbe, bent upon reducing Wittenberg to ashes.

He encamped with horses and men in an old tumble-down brick-kiln, in
the solitude of a dense forest which surrounded the town at that time.
No sooner had Sternbald, whom he had sent in disguise into the city
with the mandate, brought him word that it was already known there,
than he set out with his troop on the eve of Whitsuntide; and while
the citizens lay sound asleep, he set the town on fire at several
points simultaneously. At the same time, while his men were plundering
the suburbs, he fastened a paper to the door-post of a church to the
effect that "he, Kohlhaas, had set the city on fire, and if the Squire
were not delivered to him he would burn down the city so completely
that," as he expressed it, "he would not need to look behind any wall
to find him."

The terror of the citizens at such an unheard-of outrage was
indescribable, though, as it was fortunately a rather calm summer
night, the flames had not destroyed more than nineteen buildings,
among which, however, was a church. Toward daybreak, as soon as the
fire had been partially extinguished, the aged Governor of the
province, Otto von Gorgas, sent out immediately a company of fifty men
to capture the bloodthirsty madman. The captain in command of the
company, Gerstenberg by name, bore himself so badly, however, that the
whole expedition, instead of subduing Kohlhaas, rather helped him to a
most dangerous military reputation. For the captain separated his men
into several divisions, with the intention of surrounding and crushing
Kohlhaas; but the latter, holding his troop together, attacked and
beat him at isolated points, so that by the evening of the following
day, not a single man of the whole company in which the hopes of the
country were centred, remained in the field against him. Kohlhaas, who
had lost some of his men in these fights, again set fire to the city
on the morning of the next day, and his murderous measures were so
well taken that once more a number of houses and almost all the barns
in the suburbs were bu