hout assistance from Bohemia, was unable to check the progress of the
enemy. The most favourable circumstances combined to further the
progress of the Swedish arms in this quarter, when the operations of the
army were at once stopped by a mutiny among the officers.

All the previous successes in Germany were owing altogether to arms; the
greatness of Gustavus himself was the work of the army, the fruit of
their discipline, their bravery, and their persevering courage under
numberless dangers and privations. However wisely his plans were laid
in the cabinet, it was to the army ultimately that he was indebted for
their execution; and the expanding designs of the general did but
continually impose new burdens on the soldiers. All the decisive
advantages of the war, had been violently gained by a barbarous
sacrifice of the soldiers' lives in winter campaigns, forced marches,
stormings, and pitched battles; for it was Gustavus's maxim never to
decline a battle, so long as it cost him nothing but men. The soldiers
could not long be kept ignorant of their own importance, and they justly
demanded a share in the spoil which had been won by their own blood.
Yet, frequently, they hardly received their pay; and the rapacity of
individual generals, or the wants of the state, generally swallowed up
the greater part of the sums raised by contributions, or levied upon the
conquered provinces. For all the privations he endured, the soldier had
no other recompense than the doubtful chance either of plunder or
promotion, in both of which he was often disappointed. During the
lifetime of Gustavus Adolphus, the combined influence of fear and hope
had suppressed any open complaint, but after his death, the murmurs were
loud and universal; and the soldiery seized the most dangerous moment to
impress their superiors with a sense of their importance. Two officers,
Pfuhl and Mitschefal, notorious as restless characters, even during the
King's life, set the example in the camp on the Danube, which in a few
days was imitated by almost all the officers of the army. They solemnly
bound themselves to obey no orders, till these arrears, now outstanding
for months, and even years, should be paid up, and a gratuity, either in
money or lands, made to each man, according to his services. "Immense
sums," they said, "were daily raised by contributions, and all
dissipated by a few. They were called out to serve amidst frost and
snow, and no reward requited th