but were in great danger, and sent several
expresses to the king for help.

The king immediately detaches a strong body of horse and foot to
relieve Biberach, and would be the commander himself. I marched among
the horse, but the Imperialists saved us the labour; for the news
of the king's coming frighted away Osta, that he left Biberach,
and hardly looked behind him till he got up to the Bodensee, on the
confines of Switzerland.

At our return from this expedition the king had the first news of
Wallenstein's approach, who, on the death of Count Tilly, being
declared generalissimo of the emperor's forces, had played the tyrant
in Bohemia, and was now advancing with 60,000 men, as they reported,
to relieve the Duke of Bavaria.

The king, therefore, in order to be in a posture to receive this great
general, resolves to quit Bavaria, and to expect him on the frontiers
of Franconia. And because he knew the Nurembergers for their kindness
to him would be the first sacrifice, he resolved to defend that city
against him whatever it cost.

Nevertheless he did not leave Bavaria without a defence; but, on the
one hand, he left Sir John Baner with 10,000 men about Augsburg, and
the Duke of Saxe-Weimar with another like army about Ulm and Meningen,
with orders so to direct their march as that they might join him upon
any occasion in a few days.

We encamped about Nuremberg the middle of June. The army, after so
many detachments, was not above 19,000 men. The Imperial army, joined
with the Bavarian, were not so numerous as was reported, but were
really 60,000 men. The king, not strong enough to fight, yet, as he
used to say, was strong enough not to be forced to fight, formed his
camp so under the cannon of Nuremberg that there was no besieging the
town but they must besiege him too; and he fortified his camp in so
formidable a manner that Wallenstein never durst attack him. On the
30th of June Wallenstein's troops appeared, and on the 5th of July
encamped close by the king, and posted themselves not on the Bavarian
side, but between the king and his own friends of Schwaben and
Frankenland, in order to intercept his provisions, and, as they
thought, to starve him out of his camp.

Here they lay to see, as it were, who could subsist longest. The king
was strong in horse, for we had full 8000 horse and dragoons in the
army, and this gave us great advantage in the several skirmishes we
had with the enemy. The enemy had possessi