rful confederacy against the emperor. The pope, Clement VI., who had
always been inimical to Louis of Bavaria, influenced by John of Bohemia,
deposed and excommunicated Louis, and ordered a new meeting of the diet
of electors, which chose Charles, eldest son of the Bohemian monarch,
and heir to that crown, emperor.

The deposed Louis fought bravely for the crown thus torn from his brow.
Albert of Austria aided him with all his energies. Their united armies,
threading the defiles of the Bohemian mountains, penetrated the very
heart of the kingdom, when, in the midst of success, the deposed Emperor
Louis fell dead from a stroke of apoplexy, in the year 1347. This event
left Charles of Bohemia in undisputed possession of the imperial crown.
Albert immediately recognized his claim, effected reconciliation, and
becoming the friend and the ally of the emperor, pressed on cautiously
but securely, year after year, in his policy of annexation. But storms
of war incessantly howled around his domains until he died, a crippled
paralytic, on the 16th of August, 1358.

CHAPTER III.

RHODOLPH II., ALBERT IV. AND ALBERT V.

From 1339 to 1437.

Rhodolph II.--Marriage of John to Margaret.--Intriguing for the
Tyrol.--Death of Rhodolph.--Accession of Power to Austria.--Dividing the
Empire.--Delight of the Emperor Charles.--Leopold.--His Ambition and
Successes.--Hedwige, Queen of Poland.--"The Course of true Love never
did run smooth."--Unhappy Marriage of Hedwige.--Heroism of Arnold of
Winkelreid.--Death of Leopold.--Death of Albert IV.--Accession of Albert
V.--Attempts of Sigismond to bequeath to Albert V. Hungary and Bohemia.

Rhodolph II., the eldest son of Albert III., when but nineteen years of
age succeeded his father in the government of the Austrian States. He
had been very thoroughly educated in all the civil and military
knowledge of the times. He was closely allied with the Emperor Charles
IV. of Bohemia, having married his daughter Catherine. His character and
manhood had been very early developed. When he was in his seventeenth
year his father had found it necessary to visit his Swiss estates, then
embroiled in the fiercest war, and had left him in charge of the
Austrian provinces. He soon after was intrusted with the whole care of
the Hapsburg dominions in Switzerland. In this responsible post he
developed wonderful administrative skill, encouraging industry,
repressing disorder, and by constructing roads and br