terror and despondency, he was compelled to submit to such terms as
the conqueror might dictate. The conqueror was inexorable in his
demands. Sweden was aggrandized, and Denmark humiliated.

Leopold was greatly chagrined by this sudden prostration of his faithful
ally. In the midst of these scenes of ambition and of conquest, the
"king of terrors" came with his summons to Charles Gustavus. The passage
of this blood-stained warrior to the world of spirits reminds us of the
sublime vision of Isaiah when the King of Babylon sank into the grave:

"Hell from beneath is moved for thee, to meet thee at thy coming; it
stirreth up the dead for thee, even all the chief ones of the earth; it
hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. All they
shall speak and say unto thee,

"'Art thou also become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us? Thy
pomp is brought down to the grave, and the noise of thy viols; the worm
is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee. How art thou fallen from
heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the
ground which didst weaken the nations!'

"They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee and consider thee,
saying, 'Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, and didst shake
kingdoms; that made the world as a wilderness and destroyed the cities
thereof, that opened not the house of his prisoners?'"

The death of Charles Gustavus was the signal for the strife of war to
cease, and the belligerent nations soon came to terms of accommodation.
But scarcely was peace proclaimed ere new troubles arose in Hungary. The
barbarian Turks, with their head-quarters at Constantinople, lived in a
state of continual anarchy. The cimeter was their only law. The palace
of the sultan was the scene of incessant assassinations. Nothing ever
prevented them from assailing their neighbors but incessant quarrels
among themselves. The life of the Turkish empire was composed of bloody
insurrections at home, and still more bloody wars abroad. Mahomet IV.
was now sultan. He was but twenty years of age. A quarrel for ascendency
among the beauties of his harem had involved the empire in a civil war.
The sultan, after a long conflict, crushed the insurrection with a
blood-red hand. Having restored internal tranquillity, he prepared as
usual for foreign war. By intrigue and the force of arms they took
possession of most of the fortresses of Transylvania, and crossing the
frontier, ent