per to collect the moneys bestowed on hospitals
into one fund. The system was a wise one. My cousin Trenck had
bequeathed thirty-six thousand florins to a hospital for the poor of
Bavaria. This act he had no right to do, having deducted the sum from
the family estate. I petitioned the Emperor that these thirty-six
thousand florins might be restored to me and my children, who were the
people whom Trenck had indeed made poor, nothing of the property of his
acquiring having been left to pay this legacy, but, on the contrary, the
money having been exacted from mine.

In a few days it was determined I should be answered in the same tone in
which, for six-and-thirty years past, all my petitions had been
answered:--

"THE REQUEST OF THE PETITIONER CANNOT BE GRANTED."

Fortune persecuted me in my retreat. Within six years two hailstorms
swept away my crops; one year was a misgrowth; there were seven floods; a
rot among my sheep: all possible calamities befell me and my manor.

The estate had been ruined, the ponds were to drain, three farms were to
be put into proper condition, and the whole newly stocked. This rendered
me poor, especially as my wife's fortune had been sunk in lawsuits at Aix-
la-Chapelle and Cologne.

The miserable peasants had nothing, therefore could not pay: I was
obliged to advance them money. My sons assisted me, and we laboured with
our own hands: my wife took care of eight children, without so much as
the help of a maid. We lived in poverty, obliged to earn our daily
bread.

The greatest of my misfortunes was my treatment in the military court,
when Zetto and Krugel were my referendaries. Zetto had clogged me with a
curator and when the cow had no more milk to give, they began to torture
me with deputations, sequestrations, administrations, and executions.
Nineteen times was I obliged to attend in Vienna within two years, at my
own expense. Every six years must I pay an attorney to dispute and
quarrel with the curator. I, in conclusion, was obliged to pay. If any
affair was to be expedited, I, by a third hand, was obliged to send the
referendary some ducats. Did he give judgment, still that judgment lay
fourteen months inefficient, and, when it then appeared, the copy was
false, and so was sent to the upper courts, the high referendary of which
said I "must be dislodged from Zwerbach."

They obliged me at last to purchase my naturalisation. I sent to Prussia
for my pedigree; the at