ties,
the Four Cantons, each every two years in succession, placed a
governor-general at Wyl, who was _ex-officio_ a member of the abbot's
privy council, and took rank immediately after him.

This position had been filled, from the beginning of the year 1529, by
Jacob Frei, a member of the Zurich Council. The abbot, Francis
Geissberg, now for a long time an invalid, found it entirely beyond his
power to make any effectual resistance to the attacks, by which he saw
himself and his monastery threatened from the city of St. Gall, his own
subjects and the Preformed Confederacy. Every day the doctrine of the
unscripturalness of clerical dominion gained ground, and penetrated
even among the brethren of the convent, a part of whom threw off their
monkish garments. The majority, however, remained firm to their vows.
The abbot, already far gone in dropsy, had himself conveyed to
Roschach, where, in a fortified castle, he was more secure than in a
cloister standing open to invasion from the burghers of St. Gall.
There, on the 21st of March, he died, and this was the moment that
Zurich and the city of St. Gall had waited for, to take measures
against the monastery itself, but principally against its political
rights. Meanwhile eleven of the monks, one month before, had pledged
themselves under a solemn oath, even on compulsory removal from the
cloister, to renounce none of the rights of the convent, but rather to
uphold them in every possible manner. For six days, the death of the
abbot was kept secret even in Roschach, and his food carried into him
as though he were yet alive, whilst the monks assembled in
Rapperschweil and there elected one of their number, Kilian German, in
his stead. The news of this action awakened the liveliest displeasure
among the Zurichers, who had relied on the power of the burghers of St.
Gall to prevent it. But priestly cunning triumphed, and German
afterward succeeded in obtaining an acknowledgment, first from two
cantons of the protectorate, Luzern and Schwyz, and then with much
trouble from Glarus also. Three months later, the election was ratified
by Pope Clement the VII., and proofs of consideration and offers of any
amount of help received from Austria.

The new abbot, a man of talent, descended from a branch of the
distinguished family of the Toggenburgers, as soon as the choice had
fallen on him, made known his purpose plainly, not to rest until he and
his convent had come again into full pos