essed them with a spirit which could not fail of
inspiring them with courage, and gave at the same time the most
flattering testimony to their zeal and fidelity. "Remain," he said,
"one day at Vienna, and refresh yourselves after the fatigues of your
march, and we will then take the field. You shall be the guard of my
person, and I trust that God, who has advanced me to this dignity,
will not forsake me in the hour of danger."

Three days after the arrival of the Bishop of Basel Rudolph quitted
Vienna, marched along the southern bank of the Danube, to Hainburg,
crossed that river, and advanced to Marcheck, on the banks of the
March or Morava, where he was joined by the Styrians and Carinthians,
and the forces led by the King of Hungary. He instantly despatched two
thousand of his Hungarian auxiliaries to reconnoitre and interrupt the
operations of his adversary. They fulfilled their orders with spirit
and address, for Ottocar, roused by their insults, broke up his camp,
and marched to Jedensberg, within a short distance of Weidendorf,
whither Rudolph had advanced.

While the two armies continued in this situation, some traitors
repaired to the camp of-Rudolph and proposed to assassinate Ottocar,
but Rudolph, with his characteristic magnanimity, rejecting this
offer, apprised Ottocar of the danger with which he was threatened,
and made overtures of reconciliation. The King of Bohemia, confident
in the superiority of his force, deemed the intelligence a fabrication
and the proposals of Rudolph a proof of weakness, and disdainfully
refused to listen to any negotiation.

Finding all hopes of accommodation frustrated, Rudolph prepared for a
conflict, in which, like Caesar, he was not to fight for victory alone,
but for life. At the dawn of day, August 26, 1278, his army was drawn
up, crossed the rivulet which gives name to Weidendorf, and approached
the camp of Ottocar. He ordered his troops to advance in a crescent,
and attack at the same time both flanks and the front of the enemy,
and then, turning to his soldiers, exhorted them to avenge the
violation of the most solemn compacts and the insulted majesty of the
empire, and by the efforts of that day to put an end to the tyranny,
the horrors, and the massacres to which they had been so long exposed.
He had scarcely finished before the troops rushed to the charge, and a
bloody conflict ensued, in which both parties fought with all the fury
that the presence and exertions