The allies were quite willing to provoke a war with the emperor; but as he received their insults so meekly, and made no movement against them, they were rather disposed to march against him. Spain wanted Parma and Tuscany, but France was not willing to have Spain make so great an accession to her Italian power. France wished to extend her area north, through the States of the Netherlands. But England was unwilling to see the French power thus aggrandized. England had her aspirations, to which both France and Spain were opposed. Thus the allies operated as a check upon each other.

The emperor found some little consolation in this growing disunion, and did all in his power to foment it. Wishing to humble the Bourbons of France and Spain, he made secret overtures to England. The offers of the emperor were of such a nature, that England eagerly accepted them, returned to friendly relations with the emperor, and, to his extreme joy, pledged herself to support the Pragmatic Sanction.

It seems to have been the great object of the emperor's life to secure the crown of Austria for his daughters. It was an exceedingly disgraceful act. There was no single respectable reason to be brought forward why his daughters should crowd from the throne the daughters of his elder deceased brother, the Emperor Joseph. Charles was so aware of the gross injustice of the deed, and that the ordinary integrity of humanity would rise against him, that he felt the necessity of exhausting all the arts of diplomacy to secure for his daughters the pledged support of the surrounding thrones. He had now by intrigues of many years obtained the guarantee of the Pragmatic Sanction from Russia, Prussia, Holland, Spain and England. France still refused her pledge, as did also many of the minor States of the empire. The emperor, encouraged by the success he had thus far met with, pushed his efforts with renewed vigor, and in January, 1732, exulted that he had gained the guarantee of the Pragmatic Sanction from all the Germanic body, with the exception of Bavaria, Palatine and Saxony.

And now a new difficulty arose to embroil Europe in trouble. When Charles XII., like a thunderbolt of war, burst upon Poland, he drove Augustus II. from the throne, and placed upon it Stanislaus Leczinski, a Polish noble, whom he had picked up by the way, and whose heroic character secured the admiration of this semi-insane monarch. Augustus, utterly crushed, was compelled by his eccentric victor to send the crown jewels and the archives, with a letter of congratulation, to Stanislaus. This was in the year 1706. Three years after this, in 1709, Charles XII. suffered a memorable defeat at Pultowa. Augustus II., then at the head of an army, regained his kingdom, and Stanislaus fled in disguise. After numerous adventures and fearful afflictions, the court of France offered him a retreat in Wissembourg in Alsace. Here the ex-king remained for six years, when his beautiful daughter Mary was selected to take the place of the rejected Mary of Spain, as the wife of the young dauphin, Louis XV.

In the year 1733 Augustus II. died. In anticipation of this event Austria had been very busy, hoping to secure the elective crown of Poland for the son of Augustus who had inherited his father's name, and who had promised to support the Pragmatic Sanction. France was equally busy in the endeavor to place the scepter of Poland in the hand of Stanislaus, father of the queen. From the time of the marriage of his daughter with Louis XV., Stanislaus received a handsome pension from the French treasury, maintained a court of regal splendor, and received all the honors due to a sovereign. All the energies of the French court were now aroused to secure the crown for Stanislaus. Russia, Prussia and Austria were in natural sympathy. They wished to secure the alliance of Poland, and were also both anxious to destroy the republican principle of electing rulers, and to introduce hereditary descent of the crown in all the kingdoms of Europe. But an election by the nobles was now indispensable, and the rival powers were, with all the arts known in courts, pushing the claims of their several candidates. It was an important question, for upon it depended whether warlike Poland was to be the ally of the Austrian or of the French party. Poland was also becoming quite republican in its tendencies, and had adopted a constitution which greatly limited the power of the crown. Augustus would be but a tool in the hands of Russia, Prussia and Austria, and would cooperate with them in crushing the spirit of liberty in Poland. These three great northern powers became so roused upon the subject, that they put their troops in motion, threatening to exclude Stanislaus by force.

This language of menace and display of arms roused France. The king, while inundating Poland with agents, and lavishing the treasure of France in bribes to secure the election of Stanislaus, assumed an air of virtuous indignation in view of the interference of the Austrian party, and declared that no foreign power should interfere in any way with the freedom of the election. This led the emperor to issue a counter-memorial inveighing against the intermeddling of France.

In the midst of these turmoils the congress of Polish nobles met to choose their king. It was immediately apparent that there was a very powerful party organized in favor of Stanislaus. The emperor was for marching directly into the kingdom with an army which he had already assembled in Silesia for this purpose, and with the bayonet make up for any deficiency which his party might want in votes. Though Prussia demurred, he put his troops in motion, and the imperial and Russian ambassadors at Warsaw informed the marshal of the diet that Catharine, who was now Empress of Russia, and Charles, had decided to exclude Stanislaus from Poland by force.

These threats produced their natural effect upon the bold warrior barons of Poland. Exasperated rather than intimidated, they assembled, many thousands in number, on the great plain of Wola, but a few miles from Warsaw, and with great unanimity chose Stanislaus their king. This was the 12th of September, 1733. Stanislaus, anticipating the result, had left France in disguise, accompanied by a single attendant, to undertake the bold enterprise of traversing the heart of Germany, eluding all the vigilance of the emperor, and of entering Poland notwithstanding all the efforts of Austria, Russia and Prussia to keep him away. It was a very hazardous adventure, for his arrest would have proved his ruin. Though he encountered innumerable dangers, with marvelous sagacity and heroism he succeeded, and reached Warsaw on the 9th of September, just three days before the election. In regal splendor he rode, as soon as informed of his election, to the tented field where the nobles were convened. He was received with the clashing of weapons, the explosions of artillery, and the acclamations of thousands.

But the Poles were not sufficiently enlightened fully to comprehend the virtue and the sacredness of the ballot-box. The Russian army was now hastening to the gates of Warsaw. The small minority of Polish nobles opposed to the election of Stanislaus seceded from the diet, mounted their horses, crossed the Vistula, and joined the invading array to make war upon the sovereign whom the majority had chosen. The retribution for such folly and wickedness has come. There is no longer any Poland. They who despise the authority of the ballot-box inevitably usher in the bayonets of despotism. Under the protection of this army the minority held another diet at Kamien (on the 5th of October), a village just outside the suburbs of Warsaw, and chose as the sovereign of Poland Augustus, son of the deceased king. The minority, aided by the Russian and imperial armies, were too strong for the majority. They took possession of Warsaw, and crowned their candidate king, with the title of Augustus III. Stanislaus, pressed by an overpowering force, retreated to Dantzic, at the mouth of the Vistula, about two hundred miles from Warsaw. Here he was surrounded by the Russian troops and held in close siege, while Augustus III. took possession of Poland. France could do nothing. A weary march of more than a thousand miles separated Paris from Warsaw, and the French troops would be compelled to fight their way through the very heart of the German empire, and at the end of the journey to meet the united armies of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Poland under her king, now in possession of all the fortresses.

Though Louis XV. could make no effectual resistance, it was not in human nature but that he should seek revenge. When shepherds quarrel, they kill each other's flocks. When kings quarrel, they kill the poor peasants in each other's territories, and burn their homes. France succeeded in enlisting in her behalf Spain and Sardinia. Austria and Russia were upon the other side. Prussia, jealous of the emperor's greatness, declined any active participation. Most of the other powers of Europe also remained neutral. France had now no hope of placing Stanislaus upon the throne; she only sought revenge, determined to humble the house of Austria. The mercenary King of Sardinia, Charles Emanuel, was willing to serve the one who would pay the most. He first offered himself to the emperor, but upon terms too exorbitant to be accepted. France and Spain immediately offered him terms even more advantageous than those he had demanded of the emperor. The contract was settled, and the Sardinian army marched into the allied camp.

The King of Sardinia, who was as ready to employ guile as force in warfare, so thoroughly deceived the emperor as to lead him to believe that he had accepted the emperor's terms, and that Sardinia was to be allied with Austria, even when the whole contract was settled with France and Spain, and the plan of the campaign was matured. So utterly was the emperor deluded by a fraud so contemptible, in the view of every honorable mind, that he sent great convoys of grain, and a large supply of shot, shells and artillery from the arsenals of Milan into the Sardinian camp. Charles Emanuel, dead to all sense of magnanimity, rubbed his hands with delight in the successful perpetration of such fraud, exclaiming, "An virtus an dolos, quis ab hoste requirat."

So cunningly was this stratagem carried on, that the emperor was not undeceived until his own artillery, which he had sent to Charles Emanuel, were thundering at the gates of the city of Milan, and the shot and shells which he had so unsuspectingly furnished were mowing down the imperial troops. So sudden was the attack, so unprepared was Austrian Lombardy to meet it, that in twelve weeks the Sardinian troops overran the whole territory, seized every city and magazine, with all their treasures, leaving the fortress of Mantua alone in the possession of the imperial troops. It was the policy of Louis XV. to attack Austria in the remote portions of her widely-extended dominions, and to cut off province by province. He also made special and successful efforts to detach the interests of the German empire from those of Austria, so that the princes of the empire might claim neutrality. It was against the possessions of Charles VI., not against the independent States of the empire, that Louis XV. urged war.

The storms of winter were now at hand, and both parties were compelled to abandon the field until spring. But during the winter every nerve was strained by the combatants in preparation for the strife which the returning sun would introduce. The emperor established strong defenses along the banks of the Rhine to prevent the passage of the French; he also sent agents to all the princes of the empire to enlist them in his cause, and succeeded, notwithstanding the remonstrances of many who claimed neutrality, in obtaining a vote from a diet which he assembled, for a large sum of money, and for an army of one hundred and twenty thousand men.

The loss of Lombardy troubled Charles exceedingly, for it threatened the loss of all his Italian possessions. Notwithstanding the severity of the winter he sent to Mantua all the troops he could raise from his hereditary domains; and ordered every possible effort to be made to be prepared to undertake the offensive in the spring, and to drive the Sardinians from Lombardy. In the beginning of May the emperor had assembled within and around Mantua, sixty thousand men, under the command of Count Merci. The hostile forces soon met, and battle after battle thundered over the Italian plains. On the 29th of June the two armies encountered each other in the vicinity of Parma, in such numbers as to give promise of a decisive battle. For ten hours the demoniac storm raged unintermitted. Ten thousand of the dead covered the ground. Neither party had taken a single standard or a single prisoner, an event almost unparalleled in the history of battles. From the utter exhaustion of both parties the strife ceased. The Sardinians and French, mangled and bleeding, retired within the walls of Parma. The Austrians, equally bruised and bloody, having lost their leader, retired to Reggio. Three hundred and forty of the Austrian officers were either killed or wounded.

The King of Sardinia was absent during this engagement, having gone to Turin to visit his wife, who was sick. The morning after the battle, however, he joined the army, and succeeded in cutting off an Austrian division of twelve hundred men, whom he took prisoners. Both parties now waited for a time to heal their wounds, repair their shattered weapons, get rested and receive reinforcements. Ten thousand poor peasants, who had not the slightest interest in the quarrel, had now met with a bloody death, and other thousands were now to be brought forward and offered as victims on this altar of kingly ambition. By the middle of July they were again prepared to take the field. Both parties struggled with almost superhuman energies in the work of mutual destruction; villages were burned, cities stormed, fields crimsoned with blood and strewn with the slain, while no decisive advantage was gained. In the desperation of the strife the hostile battalions were hurled against each other until the beginning of January. They waded morasses, slept in drenching storms, and were swept by freezing blasts. Sickness entered the camp, and was even more fatal than the bullet of the foe. Thousands moaned and died in their misery, upon pallets of straw, where no sister, wife or mother could soothe the dying anguish. Another winter only afforded the combatants opportunity to nurse their strength that they might deal still heavier blows in another campaign.

While the imperial troops were struggling against Sardinia and France on the plains of Lombardy, a Spanish squadron landed a strong military force of French and Spaniards upon the peninsula of southern Italy, and meeting with no force sufficiently powerful to oppose them, speedily overran Naples and Sicily. The Spanish troops silenced the forts which defended the city of Naples, and taking the garrison prisoners, entered the metropolis in triumphal array, greeted by the acclamations of the populace, who hated the Austrians. After many battles, in which thousands were slain, the Austrians were driven out of all the Neapolitan States, and Carlos, the oldest son of Philip V. of Spain, was crowned King of Naples, with the title of Charles III. The island of Sicily was speedily subjugated and also attached to the Neapolitan crown.

These losses the emperor felt most keenly. Upon the Rhine he had made great preparations, strengthening fortresses and collecting troops, which he placed under the command of his veteran general, Prince Eugene. He was quite sanguine that here he would be abundantly able to repel the assaults of his foes. But here again he was doomed to bitter disappointment. The emperor found a vast disproportion between promise and performance. The diet had voted him one hundred and twenty thousand troops; they furnished twelve thousand. They voted abundant supplies; they furnished almost none at all.

The campaign opened the 9th of April, 1734, the French crossing the Rhine near Truerbuch, in three strong columns, notwithstanding all the efforts of the Austrians to resist them. Prince Eugene, by birth a Frenchman, reluctantly assumed the command. He had remonstrated with the emperor against any forcible interference in the Polish election, assuring him that he would thus expose himself, almost without allies, to all the power of France. Eugene did not hesitate openly to express his disapprobation of the war. "I can take no interest in this war," he said; "the question at issue is not important enough to authorize the death of a chicken."

Eugene, upon his arrival from Vienna, at the Austrian camp, found but twenty-five thousand men. They were composed of a motley assemblage from different States, undisciplined, unaccustomed to act together and with no confidence in each other. The commanders of the various corps were quarreling for the precedence in rank, and there was no unity or subordination in the army. They were retreating before the French, who, in numbers, in discipline, and in the materiel of war, were vastly in the superiority. Eugene saw at once that it would be folly to risk a battle, and that all he could hope to accomplish was to throw such embarrassments as he might in the path of the victors.

The young officers, ignorant, impetuous and reckless, were for giving battle, which would inevitably have resulted in the destruction of the army. They were so vexed by the wise caution of Eugene, which they regarded as pusillanimity, that they complained to the emperor that the veteran general was in his dotage, that he was broken both in body and mind, and quite unfit to command the army. These representations induced the emperor to send a spy to watch the conduct of Eugene. Though deeply wounded by these suspicions, the experienced general could not be provoked to hazard an engagement. He retreated from post to post, merely checking the progress of the enemy, till the campaign was over, and the ice and snow of a German winter drove all to winter quarters.

While recruiting for the campaign of 1735, Prince Eugene wrote a series of most earnest letters to his confidential agent in London, which letters were laid before George II., urging England to come to the help of the emperor in his great extremity. Though George was eager to put the fleet and army of England in motion, the British cabinet wisely refused to plunge the nation into war for such a cause, and the emperor was left to reap the bitter fruit of his despotism and folly. The emperor endeavored to frighten England by saying that he was reduced to such an extremity that if the British cabinet did not give him aid, he should be compelled to seek peace by giving his daughter, with Austria in her hand as her dowry, to Carlos, now King of Naples and heir apparent to the crown of Spain. He well knew that to prevent such an acquisition of power on the part of the Spanish monarch, who was also in intimate alliance with France, England would be ready to expend any amount of blood and treasure.

Charles VI. waited with great impatience to see the result of this menace, hardly doubting that it would bring England immediately to terms. Bitter was his disappointment and his despair when he received from the court of St. James the calm reply, that England could not possibly take a part in this war, and that in view of the great embarrassments in which the emperor was involved, England would take no offense in case of the marriage of the emperor's second daughter to Carlos. England then advised the emperor to make peace by surrendering the Netherlands.

The emperor was now greatly enraged, and inveighed bitterly against England as guilty of the grossest perfidy. He declared that England had been as deeply interested as he was in excluding Stanislaus from the throne of Poland; that it was more important for England than for Austria to curb the exorbitant power of France; that in every step he had taken against Stanislaus, he had consulted England, and had acted in accordance with her counsel; that England was reaping the benefit of having the father-in-law of the French king expelled from the Polish throne; that England had solemnly promised to support him in these measures, and now having derived all the advantage, basely abandoned him. There were bitter charges, and it has never been denied that they were mainly true. The emperor, in his indignation, threatened to tell the whole story to the people of England. It is strange that the emperor had found out that there were people in England. In no other part of Europe was there any thing but nobles and peasants.

In this extraordinary letter, addressed to Count Kinsky, the imperial ambassador in London, the emperor wrote:

"On the death of Augustus II., King of Poland, my first care was to communicate to the King of England the principles on which I acted. I followed, in every instance, his advice.... England has never failed to give me promises, both before and since the commencement of the war, but instead of fulfilling those promises, she has even favored my enemies.... Let the king know that I never will consent to the plan of pacification now in agitation; that I had rather suffer the worst of extremities than accede to such disadvantageous proposals, and that even if I should not be able to prevent them, I will justify my honor and my dignity, by publishing a circumstantial account of all the transaction, together with all the documents which I have now in possession.... If these representations fail, means must be taken to publish and circulate throughout England our answer to the proposal of good offices which was not made till after the expiration of nine months. Should the court of London proceed so far as to make such propositions of peace as are supposed to be in agitation, you will not delay a moment to circulate throughout England a memorial, containing a recapitulation of all negotiations which have taken place since 1710, together with the authentic documents, detailing my just complaints, and reclaiming, in the most solemn manner, the execution of the guaranties."

One more effort the emperor made, and it was indeed a desperate one. He dispatched a secret agent, an English Roman Catholic, by the name of Strickland, to London, to endeavor to overthrow the ministry and bring in a cabinet in favor of him. In this, of course, he failed entirely. Nothing now remained for him but to submit, with the best grace he could, to the terms exacted by his foes. In the general pacification great interests were at stake, and all the leading powers of Europe demanded a voice in the proceedings. For many months the negotiations were protracted. England and France became involved in an angry dispute. Each power was endeavoring to grasp all it could, while at the same time it was striving to check the rapacity of every other power. There was a general armistice while these negotiations were pending. It was, however, found exceedingly difficult to reconcile all conflicting interests. New parties were formed; new combinations entered into, and all parties began to aim for a renewal of the strife. England, exasperated against France, in menace made an imposing display of her fleet and navy. The emperor was delighted, and, trusting to gain new allies, exerted his skill of diplomacy to involve the contracting parties in confusion and discord.

Thus encouraged, the emperor refused to accede to the terms demanded. He was required to give up the Netherlands, and all his foreign possessions, and to retire to his hereditary dominions. "What a severe sentence," exclaimed Count Zinzendorf, the emperor's ambassador, "have you passed on the emperor. No malefactor was ever carried with so hard a doom to the gibbet."

The armies again took the field. Eugene, again, though with great reluctance, assumed the command of the imperial forces. France had assembled one hundred thousand men upon the Rhine. Eugene had but thirty thousand men to meet them. He assured the emperor that with such a force he could not successfully carry on the war. Jealous of his reputation, he said, sadly, "to find myself in the same condition as last year, will be only exposing myself to the censure of the world, which judges by appearance, as if I were less capable, in my old age, to support the reputation of my former successes." With consummate generalship, this small force held the whole French army in check.



CHAPTER XXV.

CHARLES VI. AND THE TURKISH WAR RENEWED.

From 1735 to 1730.

Anxiety Of Austrian Office-Holders.—Maria Theresa.—The Duke Of Lorraine.—Distraction Of The Emperor.—Tuscany Assigned To The Duke Of Lorraine.—Death Of Eugene.—Rising Greatness Of Russia.—New War With The Turks.—Condition Of The Army.—Commencement Of Hostilities.— Capture Of Nissa.—Inefficient Campaign.—Disgrace Of Seckendorf.—The Duke Of Lorraine Placed In Command.—Siege Of Orsova.—Belgrade Besieged By The Turks.—The Third Campaign.—Battle Of Crotzka.—Defeat Of The Austrians.—Consternation In Vienna.—Barbarism Of The Turks.—The Surrender Of Belgrade.

The emperor being quite unable, either on the Rhine or in Italy, successfully to compete with his foes, received blow after blow, which exceedingly disheartened him. His affairs were in a desperate condition, and, to add to his grief, dissensions filled his cabinet; his counsellors mutually accusing each other of being the cause of the impending ruin. The Italian possessions of the emperor had been thronged with Austrian nobles, filling all the posts of office and of honor, and receiving rich salaries. A change of administration, in the transference of these States to the dominion of Spain and Sardinia, "reformed" all these Austrian office-holders out of their places, and conferred these posts upon Spaniards and Sardinians. The ejected Austrian nobles crowded the court of the emperor, with the most passionate importunities that he would enter into a separate accommodation with Spain, and secure the restoration of the Italian provinces by giving his eldest daughter, Maria Theresa, to the Spanish prince, Carlos. This would seem to be a very simple arrangement, especially since the Queen of Spain so earnestly desired this match, that she was willing to make almost any sacrifice for its accomplishment. But there was an inseparable obstacle in the way of any such arrangement.

Maria Theresa had just attained her eighteenth year. She was a young lady of extraordinary force of character, and of an imperial spirit; and she had not the slightest idea of having her person disposed of as a mere make-weight in the diplomacy of Europe. She knew that the crown of Austria was soon to be hers; she understood the weakness of her father, and was well aware that she was far more capable of wearing that crown than he had ever been; and she was already far more disposed to take the reins of government from her father's hand, than she was to submit herself to his control. With such a character, and such anticipations, she had become passionately attached to the young Duke of Lorraine, who was eight years her senior, and who had for some years been one of the most brilliant ornaments of her father's court.

The duchy of Lorraine was one of the most extensive and opulent of the minor States of the German empire. Admirably situated upon the Rhine and the Meuse, and extending to the sea, it embraced over ten thousand square miles, and contained a population of over a million and a half. The duke, Francis Stephen, was the heir of an illustrious line, whose lineage could be traced for many centuries. Germany, France and Spain, united, had not sufficient power to induce Maria Theresa to reject Francis Stephen, the grandson of her father's sister, the playmate of her childhood, and now her devoted lover, heroic and fascinating, for the Spanish Carlos, of whom she knew little, and for whom she cared less. Ambition also powerfully operated on the very peculiar mind of Maria Theresa. She had much of the exacting spirit of Elizabeth, England's maiden queen, and was emulous of supremacy which no one would share. She, in her own right, was to inherit the crown of Austria, and Francis Stephen, high-born and noble as he was, and her recognized husband, would still be her subject. She could confer upon him dignity and power, retaining a supremacy which even he could never reach.

The emperor was fully aware of the attachment of his daughter to Francis, of her inflexible character; and even when pretending to negotiate for her marriage with Carlos, he was conscious that it was all a mere pretense, and that the union could never be effected. The British minister at Vienna saw very clearly the true state of affairs, and when the emperor was endeavoring to intimidate England by the menace that he would unite the crowns of Spain and Austria by uniting Maria and Carlos, the minister wrote to his home government as follows:

"Maria Theresa is a princess of the highest spirit; her father's losses are her own. She reasons already; she enters into affairs; she admires his virtues, but condemns his mismanagement; and is of a temper so formed for rule and ambition, as to look upon him as little more than her administrator. Notwithstanding this lofty humor by day, she sighs and pines all night for her Duke of Lorraine. If she sleeps, it is only to dream of him; if she wakes, it is but to talk of him to the lady in waiting; so that there is no more probability of her forgetting the very individual government, and the very individual husband which she thinks herself born to, than of her forgiving the authors of her losing either."

The empress was cordially cooeperating with her daughter. The emperor was in a state of utter distraction. His affairs were fast going to ruin; he was harassed by counter intreaties; he knew not which way to turn, or what to do. Insupportable gloom oppressed his spirit. Pale and haggard, he wandered through the rooms of his palace, the image of woe. At night he tossed sleepless upon his bed, moaning in anguish which he then did not attempt to conceal, and giving free utterance to all the mental tortures which were goading him to madness. The queen became seriously alarmed lest his reason should break down beneath such a weight of woe. It was clear that neither reason nor life could long withstand such a struggle.

Thus in despair, the emperor made proposals for a secret and separate accommodation with France. Louis XV. promptly listened, and offered terms, appallingly definite, and cruel enough to extort the last drop of blood from the emperor's sinking heart. "Give me," said the French king, "the duchy of Lorraine, and I will withdraw my armies, and leave Austria to make the best terms she can with Spain."

How could the emperor wrest from his prospective son-in-law his magnificent ancestral inheritance? The duke could not hold his realms for an hour against the armies of France, should the emperor consent to their surrender; and conscious of the desperation to which the emperor was driven, and of his helplessness, he was himself plunged into the deepest dismay and anguish. He held an interview with the British minister to see if it were not possible that England might interpose her aid in his behalf. In frantic grief he lost his self control, and, throwing himself into a chair, pressed his brow convulsively, and exclaimed, "Great God! will not England help me? Has not his majesty with his own lips, over and over again, promised to stand by me?"

The French armies were advancing; shot and shell were falling upon village and city; fortress after fortress was surrendering. "Give me Lorraine," repeated Louis XV., persistently, "or I will take all Austria." There was no alternative but for the emperor to drink to the dregs the bitter cup which his own hand had mingled. He surrendered Lorraine to France. He, however, succeeded in obtaining some slight compensation for the defrauded duke. The French court allowed him a pension of ninety thousand dollars a year, until the death of the aged Duke of Tuscany, who was the last of the Medici line, promising that then Tuscany, one of the most important duchies of central Italy, should pass into the hands of Francis. Should Sardinia offer any opposition, the King of France promised to unite with the emperor in maintaining Francis in his possession by force of arms. Peace was thus obtained with France. Peace was then made with Spain and Sardinia, by surrendering to Spain Naples and Sicily, and to Sardinia most of the other Austrian provinces in Italy. Thus scourged and despoiled, the emperor, a humbled, woe-stricken man, retreated to the seclusion of his palace.

While these affairs were in progress, Francis Stephen derived very considerable solace by his marriage with Maria Theresa. Their nuptials took place at Vienna on the 12th of February, 1736. The emperor made the consent of the duke to the cession of Lorraine to France, a condition of the marriage. As the duke struggled against the surrender of his paternal domains, Cartenstein, the emperor's confidential minister, insultingly said to him, "Monseigneur, point de cession, point d'archiduchesse." My lord, no cession, no archduchess. Fortunately for Francis, in about a year after his marriage the Duke of Tuscany died, and Francis, with his bride, hastened to his new home in the palaces of Leghorn. Though the duke mourned bitterly over the loss of his ancestral domains, Tuscany was no mean inheritance. The duke was absolute monarch of the duchy, which contained about eight thousand square miles and a population of a million. The revenues of the archduchy were some four millions of dollars. The army consisted of six thousand troops.

Two months after the marriage of Maria Theresa, Prince Eugene died quietly in his bed at the age of seventy-three. He had passed his whole lifetime riding over fields of battle swept by bullets and plowed by shot. He had always exposed his own person with utter recklessness, leading the charge, and being the first to enter the breach or climb the rampart. Though often wounded, he escaped all these perils, and breathed his last in peace upon his pillow in Vienna.

His funeral was attended with regal honors. For three days the corpse lay in state, with the coat of mail, the helmet and the gauntlets which the warrior had worn in so many fierce battles, suspended over his lifeless remains. His heart was sent in an urn to be deposited in the royal tomb where his ancestors slumbered. His embalmed body was interred in the metropolitan church in Vienna. The emperor and all the court attended the funeral, and his remains were borne to the grave with honors rarely conferred upon any but crowned heads.

The Ottoman power had now passed its culminating point, and was evidently on the wane. The Russian empire was beginning to arrest the attention of Europe, and was ambitious of making its voice heard in the diplomacy of the European monarchies. Being destitute of any sea coast, it was excluded from all commercial intercourse with foreign nations, and in its cold, northern realm, "leaning," as Napoleon once said, "against the North Pole," seemed to be shut up to barbarism. It had been a leading object of the ambition of Peter the Great to secure a maritime port for his kingdom. He at first attempted a naval depot on his extreme southern border, at the mouth of the Don, on the sea of Azof. This would open to him the commerce of the Mediterranean through the Azof, the Euxine and the Marmora. But the assailing Turks drove him from these shores, and he was compelled to surrender the fortresses he had commenced to their arms. He then turned to his western frontier, and, with an incredible expenditure of money and sacrifice of life, reared upon the marshes of the Baltic the imperial city of St. Petersburg. Peter I. died in 1725, leaving the crown to his wife Catharine. She, however, survived him but two years, when she died, in 1727, leaving two daughters. The crown then passed to the grandson of Peter I., a boy of thirteen. In three years he died of the small-pox. Anna, the daughter of the oldest brother of Peter I., now ascended the throne, and reigned, through her favorites, with relentless rigor.

It was one of the first objects of Anna's ambition to secure a harbor for maritime commerce in the more sunny climes of southern Europe. St. Petersburg, far away upon the frozen shores of the Baltic, where the harbor was shut up with ice for five months in the year, presented but a cheerless prospect for the formation of a merchant marine. She accordingly revived the original project of Peter the Great, and waged war with the Turks to recover the lost province on the shores of the Euxine. Russia had been mainly instrumental in placing Augustus II. on the throne of Poland; Anna was consequently sure of his sympathy and cooeperation. She also sent to Austria to secure the alliance of the emperor. Charles VI., though his army was in a state of decay and his treasury empty, eagerly embarked in the enterprise. He was in a continued state of apprehension from the threatened invasion of the Turks. He hoped also, aided by the powerful arm of Russia, to be able to gain territories in the east which would afford some compensation for his enormous losses in the south and in the west.

While negotiations were pending, the Russian armies were already on the march. They took Azof after a siege of but a fortnight, and then overran and took possession of the whole Crimea, driving the Turks before them. Charles VI. was a very scrupulous Roman Catholic, and was animated to the strife by the declaration of his confessor that it was his duty, as a Christian prince, to aid in extirpating the enemies of the Church of Christ. The Turks were greatly alarmed by these successes of the Russians, and by the formidable preparations of the other powers allied against them.

The emperor hoped that fortune, so long adverse, was now turning in his favor. He collected a large force on the frontiers of Turkey, and intrusted the command to General Seckendorf. The general hastened into Hungary to the rendezvous of the troops. He found the army in a deplorable condition. The treasury being exhausted, they were but poorly supplied with the necessaries of war, and the generals and contractors had contrived to appropriate to themselves most of the funds which had been furnished. The general wrote to the emperor, presenting a lamentable picture of the destitution of the army.

"I can not," he said, "consistently with my duty to God and the emperor, conceal the miserable condition of the barracks and the hospitals. The troops, crowded together without sufficient bedding to cover them, are a prey to innumerable disorders, and are exposed to the rain, and other inclemencies of the weather, from the dilapidated state of the caserns, the roofs of which are in perpetual danger of being overthrown by the wind. All the frontier fortresses, and even Belgrade, are incapable of the smallest resistance, as well from the dilapidated state of the fortifications as from a total want of artillery, ammunition and other requisites. The naval armament is in a state of irreparable disorder. Some companies of my regiment of Belgrade are thrust into holes where a man would not put even his favorite hounds; and I can not see the situation of these miserable and half-starved wretches without tears. These melancholy circumstances portend the loss of these fine kingdoms with the same rapidity as that of the States of Italy."

The bold Commander-in-chief also declared that many of the generals were so utterly incapable of discharging their duties, that nothing could be anticipated, under their guidance, but defeat and ruin. He complained that the governors of those distant provinces, quite neglecting the responsibilities of their offices, were spending their time in hunting and other trivial amusements. These remonstrances roused the emperor, and decisive reforms were undertaken. The main plan of the campaign was for the Russians, who were already on the shores of the Black sea, to press on to the mouth of the Danube, and then to march up the stream. The Austrians were to follow down the Danube to the Turkish province of Wallachia, and then, marching through the heart of that province, either effect a junction with the Russians, or inclose the Turks between the two armies. At the same time a large Austrian force, marching through Bosnia and Servia, and driving the Turks out, were to take military possession of those countries and join the main army in its union on the lower Danube.

Matters being thus arranged, General Seckendorf took the command of the Austrian troops, with the assurance that he should be furnished with one hundred and twenty-six thousand men, provided with all the implements of war, and that he should receive a monthly remittance of one million two hundred thousand dollars for the pay of the troops. The emperor, however, found it much easier to make promises than to fulfill them. The month of August had already arrived and Seckendorf, notwithstanding his most strenuous exertions, had assembled at Belgrade but thirty thousand infantry and fifteen thousand cavalry. The Turks, with extraordinary energy, had raised a much more formidable and a better equipped army. Just as Seckendorf was commencing his march, having minutely arranged all the stages of the campaign, to his surprise and indignation he received orders to leave the valley of the Danube and march directly south about one hundred and fifty miles into the heart of Servia, and lay siege to the fortress of Nissa. The whole plan of the campaign was thus frustrated. Magazines, at great expense, had been established, and arrangements made for floating the heavy baggage down the stream. Now the troops were to march through morasses and over mountains, without suitable baggage wagons, and with no means of supplying themselves with provisions in so hostile and inhospitable a country.

But the command of the emperor was not to be disobeyed. For twenty-eight days they toiled along, encountering innumerable impediments, many perishing by the way, until they arrived, in a state of extreme exhaustion and destitution, before the walls of Nissa. Fortunately the city was entirely unprepared for an attack, which had not been at all anticipated, and the garrison speedily surrendered. Here Seckendorf, having dispatched parties to seize the neighboring fortress, and the passes of the mountains, waited for further orders from Vienna. The army were so dissatisfied with their position and their hardships, that they at last almost rose in mutiny, and Seckendorf, having accomplished nothing of any moment, was compelled to retrace his steps to the banks of the Danube, where he arrived on the 16th of October. Thus the campaign was a total failure.

Bitter complaints were uttered both by the army and the nation. The emperor, with the characteristic injustice of an ignoble mind, attributed the unfortunate campaign to the incapacity of Seckendorf, whose judicious plans he had so ruthlessly thwarted. The heroic general was immediately disgraced and recalled, and the command of the army given to General Philippi. The friends of General Seckendorf, aware of his peril, urged him to seek safety in flight. But he, emboldened by conscious innocence, obeyed the imperial commands and repaired to Vienna. Seckendorf was a Protestant. His appointment to the supreme command gave great offense to the Catholics, and the priests, from their pulpits, inveighed loudly against him as a heretic, whom God could not bless. They arraigned his appointment as impious, and declared that, in consequence, nothing was to be expected but divine indignation. Immediately upon his arrival in Vienna the emperor ordered his arrest. A strong guard was placed over him, in his own house, and articles of impeachment were drawn up against him. His doom was sealed. Every misadventure was attributed to negligence, cupidity or treachery. He could offer no defense which would be of any avail, for he was not permitted to exhibit the orders he had received from the emperor, lest the emperor himself should be proved guilty of those disasters which he was thus dishonorably endeavoring to throw upon another. The unhappy Seckendorf, thus made the victim of the faults of others, was condemned to the dungeon. He was sent to imprisonment in the castle of Glatz, where he lingered in captivity for many years until the death of the emperor.

Charles now, in accordance with the clamor of the priests, removed all Protestants from command in the army and supplied their places with Catholics. The Duke of Lorraine, who had recently married Maria Theresa, was appointed generalissimo. But as the duke was young, inexperienced in war, and, as yet, had displayed none of that peculiar talent requisite for the guidance of armies, the emperor placed next to him, as the acting commander, Marshal Konigsegg. The emperor also gave orders that every important movement should be directed by a council of war, and that in case of a tie the casting vote should be given, not by the Duke of Lorraine, but by the veteran commander Konigsegg. The duke was an exceedingly amiable man, of very courtly manners and winning address. He was scholarly in his tastes, and not at all fond of the hardships of war, with its exposure, fatigue and butchery. Though a man of perhaps more than ordinary intellectual power, he was easily depressed by adversity, and not calculated to brave the fierce storms of disaster.

Early in March the Turks opened the campaign by sending an army of twenty thousand men to besiege Orsova, an important fortress on an island of the Danube, about one hundred miles below Belgrade. They planted their batteries upon both the northern and the southern banks of the Danube, and opened a storm of shot and shell upon the fortress. The Duke of Lorraine hastened to the relief of the important post, which quite commanded that portion of the stream. The imperial troops pressed on until they arrived within a few miles of the fortress. The Turks marched to meet them, and plunged into their camp with great fierceness. After a short but desperate conflict, the Turks were repulsed, and retreating in a panic, they broke up their camp before the walls of Orsova and retired.

This slight success, after so many disasters, caused immense exultation. The Duke of Lorraine was lauded as one of the greatest generals of the age. The pulpits rang with his praises, and it was announced that now, that the troops were placed under a true child of the Church, Providence might be expected to smile. Soon, however, the imperial army, while incautiously passing through a defile, was assailed by a strong force of the Turks, and compelled to retreat, having lost three thousand men. The Turks resumed the siege of Orsova; and the Duke of Lorraine, quite disheartened, returned to Vienna, leaving the command of the army to Konigsegg. The Turks soon captured the fortress, and then, ascending the river, drove the imperial troops before them to Belgrade. The Turks invested the city, and the beleaguered troops were rapidly swept away by famine and pestilence. The imperial cavalry, crossing the Save, rapidly continued their retreat. Konigsegg was now recalled in disgrace, as incapable of conducting the war, and the command was given to General Kevenhuller. He was equally unsuccessful in resisting the foe; and, after a series of indecisive battles, the storms of November drove both parties to winter quarters, and another campaign was finished. The Russians had also fought some fierce battles; but their campaign was as ineffective as that of the Austrians.

The court of Vienna was now in a state of utter confusion. There was no leading mind to assume any authority, and there was irremediable discordance of counsel. The Duke of Lorraine was in hopeless disgrace; even the emperor assenting to the universal cry against him. In a state almost of distraction the emperor exclaimed, "Is the fortune of my empire departed with Eugene?" The disgraceful retreat to Belgrade seemed to haunt him day and night; and he repeated again and again to himself, as he paced the floor of his apartment, "that unfortunate, that fatal retreat." Disasters had been so rapidly accumulating upon him, that he feared for every thing. He expressed the greatest anxiety lest his daughter, Maria Theresa, who was to succeed him upon the throne, might be intercepted, in the case of his sudden death, from returning to Austria, and excluded from the throne. The emperor was in a state of mind nearly bordering upon insanity.

At length the sun of another spring returned, the spring of 1739, and the recruited armies were prepared again to take the field. The emperor placed a new commander, Marshal Wallis, in command of the Austrian troops. He was a man of ability, but overbearing and morose, being described by a contemporary as one who hated everybody, and who was hated by everybody in return. Fifty miles north of Belgrade, on the south bank of the Danube, is the fortified town of Peterwardein, so called as the rendezvous where Peter the Hermit marshaled the soldiers of the first crusade. This fortress had long been esteemed one of the strongest of the Austrian empire. It was appointed as the rendezvous of the imperial troops, and all the energies of the now exhausted empire were expended in gathering there as large a force as possible. But, notwithstanding the utmost efforts, in May but thirty thousand men were assembled, and these but very poorly provided with the costly necessaries of war. Another auxiliary force of ten thousand men was collected at Temeswar, a strong fortress twenty-five miles north of Peterwardein. With these forces Wallis was making preparations to attempt to recover Orsova from the Turks, when he received positive orders to engage the enemy with his whole force on the first opportunity.

The army marched down the banks of the river, conveying its baggage and heavy artillery in a flotilla to Belgrade, where it arrived on the 11th of June. Here they were informed that the Turkish army was about twenty miles below on the river at Crotzka. The imperial army was immediately pressed forward, in accordance with the emperor's orders, to attack the foe. The Turks were strongly posted, and far exceeded the Austrians in number. At five o'clock on the morning of the 21st of July the battle commenced, and blazed fiercely through all the hours of the day until the sun went down. Seven thousand Austrians were then dead upon the plain. The Turks were preparing to renew the conflict in the morning, when Wallis ordered a retreat, which was securely effected during the darkness of the night. On the ensuing day the Turks pursued them to the walls of Belgrade, and, driving them across the river, opened the fire of their batteries upon the city. The Turks commenced the siege in form, and were so powerful, that Wallis could do nothing to retard their operations. A breach was ere long made in one of the bastions; an assault was hourly expected which the garrison was in no condition to repel. Wallis sent word to the emperor that the surrender of Belgrade was inevitable; that it was necessary immediately to retreat to Peterwardein, and that the Turks, flushed with victory, might soon be at the gates of Vienna.

Great was the consternation which pervaded the court and the capital upon the reception of these tidings. The ministers all began to criminate each other. The general voice clamored for peace upon almost any terms. The emperor alone remained firm. He dispatched another officer, General Schmettan, to hasten with all expedition to the imperial camp, and prevent, if possible, the impending disaster. He earnestly pressed the hand of the general as he took his leave, and said—

"Use the utmost diligence to arrive before the retreat of the army; assume the defense of Belgrade, and save it, if not too late, from falling into the hands of the enemy."

The energy of Schmettan arrested the retreat of Wallis, and revived the desponding hopes of the garrison of Belgrade. Bastion after bastion was recovered. The Turks were driven back from the advance posts they had occupied. A new spirit animated the whole Austrian army, and from the depths of despair they were rising to sanguine hopes of victory, when the stunning news arrived that the emperor had sent an envoy to the Turkish camp, and had obtained peace by the surrender of Belgrade. Count Neuperg having received full powers from the emperor to treat, very imprudently entered the camp of the barbaric Turk, without requiring any hostages for his safety. The barbarians, regardless of the flag of truce, and of all the rules of civilized warfare, arrested Count Neuperg, and put him under guard. He was then conducted into the presence of the grand vizier, who was arrayed in state, surrounded by his bashaws. The grand vizier haughtily demanded the terms Neuperg was authorized to offer.

"The emperor, my master," said Neuperg, "has intrusted me with full powers to negotiate a peace, and is willing, for the sake of peace, to cede the province of Wallachia to Turkey provided the fortress of Orsova be dismantled."

The grand vizier rose, came forward, and deliberately spit in the face of the Count Neuperg, and exclaimed,

"Infidel dog! thou provest thyself a spy, with all thy powers. Since thou hast brought no letter from the Vizier Wallis, and hast concealed his offer to surrender Belgrade, thou shalt be sent to Constantinople to receive the punishment thou deservest."

Count Neuperg, after this insult, was conducted into close confinement. The French ambassador, Villeneuve, now arrived. He had adopted the precaution of obtaining hostages before intrusting himself in the hands of the Turks. The grand vizier would not listen to any terms of accommodation but upon the basis of the surrender of Belgrade. The Turks carried their point in every thing. The emperor surrendered Belgrade, relinquished to them Orsova, agreed to demolish all the fortresses of his own province of Media, and ceded to Turkey Servia and various other contiguous districts. It was a humiliating treaty for Austria. Already despoiled in Italy and on the Rhine, the emperor was now compelled to abandon to the Turks extensive territories and important fortresses upon the lower Danube.

General Schmettan, totally unconscious of these proceedings, was conducting the defense of Belgrade with great vigor and with great success, when he was astounded by the arrival of a courier in his camp, presenting to him the following laconic note from Count Neuperg:

"Peace was signed this morning between the emperor, our master, and the Porte. Let hostilities cease, therefore, on the receipt of this. In half an hour I shall follow, and announce the particulars myself."

General Schmettan could hardly repress his indignation, and, when Count Neuperg arrived, intreated that the surrender of Belgrade might be postponed until the terms had been sent to the emperor for his ratification. But Neuperg would listen to no such suggestions, and, indignant that any obstacle should be thrown in the way of the fulfillment of the treaty, menacingly said,

"If you choose to disobey the orders of the emperor, and to delay the execution of the article relative to Belgrade, I will instantly dispatch a courier to Vienna, and charge you with all the misfortunes which may result. I had great difficulty in diverting the grand vizier from the demand of Sirmia, Sclavonia and the bannat of Temeswar; and when I have dispatched a courier, I will return into the Turkish camp and protest against this violation of the treaty."

General Schmettan was compelled to yield. Eight hundred janissaries took possession of one of the gates of the city; and the Turkish officers rode triumphantly into the streets, waving before them in defiance the banners they had taken at Crotzka. The new fortifications were blown up, and the imperial army, in grief and shame, retired up the river to Peterwardein. They had hardly evacuated the city ere Count Neuperg, to his inexpressible mortification, received a letter from the emperor stating that nothing could reconcile him to the idea of surrendering Belgrade but the conviction that its defense was utterly hopeless; but that learning that this was by no means the case, he intreated him on no account to think of the surrender of the city. To add to the chagrin of the count, he also ascertained, at the same time, that the Turks were in such a deplorable condition that they were just on the point of retreating, and would gladly have purchased peace at almost any sacrifice. A little more diplomatic skill might have wrested from the Turks even a larger extent of territory than the emperor had so foolishly surrendered to them.



CHAPTER XXVI.

MARIA THERESA.

From 1739 to 1741.

Anguish of the King.—Letter to the Queen of Russia.—The imperial Circular.—Deplorable Condition of Austria.—Death of Charles VI.—Accession of Maria Theresa.—Vigorous Measures of the Queen.—Claim of the Duke of Bavaria.—Responses from the Courts.—Coldness of the French Court.—Frederic of Russia.—His Invasion of Silesia.—March of the Austrians.—Battle of Molnitz.—Firmness of Maria Theresa.—Proposed Division of Plunder.—Villainy of Frederic.—Interview with the King.—Character of Frederic.—Commencement of the General Invasion.

Every intelligent man in Austria felt degraded by the peace which had been made with the Turks. The tidings were received throughout the ranks of the army with a general outburst of grief and indignation. The troops intreated their officers to lead them against the foe, declaring that they would speedily drive the Turks from Belgrade, which had been so ignominiously surrendered. The populace of Vienna rose in insurrection, and would have torn down the houses of the ministers who had recommended the peace but for the interposition of the military. The emperor was almost beside himself with anguish. He could not appease the clamors of the nation. He was also in alliance with Russia, and knew not how to meet the reproaches of the court of St. Petersburg for having so needlessly surrendered the most important fortress on the Turkish frontier. In an interview which he held with the Russian ambassador his embarrassment was painful to witness. To the Queen of Russia he wrote in terms expressive of the extreme agony of his mind, and, with characteristic want of magnanimity cast the blame of the very measures he had ordered upon the agents who had merely executed his will.

"While I am writing this letter," he said, "to your imperial majesty, my heart is filled with the most excessive grief. I was much less touched with the advantages gained by the enemy and the news of the siege of Belgrade, than with the advice I have received concerning the shameful preliminary articles concluded by Count Neuperg.

"The history of past ages exhibits no vestiges of such an event. I was on the point of preventing the fatal and too hasty execution of these preliminaries, when I heard that they were already partly executed, even before the design had been communicated to me. Thus I see my hands tied by those who ought to glory in obeying me. All who have approached me since that fatal day, are so many witnesses of the excess of my grief. Although I have many times experienced adversity, I never was so much afflicted as by this event. Your majesty has a right to complain of some who ought to have obeyed my orders; but I had no part in what they have done. Though all the forces of the Ottoman empire were turned against me I was not disheartened, but still did all in my power for the common cause. I shall not, however, fail to perform in due time what avenging justice requires. In this dismal series of misfortunes I have still one comfort left, which is that the fault can not be thrown upon me. It lies entirely on such of my officers as ratified the disgraceful preliminaries without my knowledge, against my consent, and even contrary to my express orders."

This apologetic letter was followed by a circular to all the imperial ambassadors in the various courts of Europe, which circular was filled with the bitterest denunciation of Count Neuperg and Marshal Wallis. It declared that the emperor was not in any way implicated in the shameful surrender of Belgrade. The marshal and the count, thus assailed and held up to the scorn and execration of Europe, ventured to reply that they had strictly conformed to their instructions. The common sense of the community taught them that, in so rigorous and punctilious a court as that of Vienna, no agent of the emperor would dare to act contrary to his received instructions. Thus the infamous attempts of Charles to brand his officers with ignominy did but rebound upon himself. The almost universal voice condemned the emperor and acquitted the plenipotentiaries.

While the emperor was thus filling all the courts of Europe with his clamor against Count Neuperg, declaring that he had exceeded his powers and that he deserved to be hung, he at the same time, with almost idiotic fatuity, sent the same Count Neuperg back to the Turkish camp to settle some items which yet required adjustment. This proved, to every mind, the insincerity of Charles. The Russians, thus forsaken by Austria, also made peace with the Turks. They consented to demolish their fortress of Azof, to relinquish all pretensions to the right of navigating the Black sea, and to allow a vast extent of territory upon its northern shores to remain an uninhabited desert, as a barrier between Russia and Turkey. The treaty being definitively settled, both Marshal Wallis and Count Neuperg were arrested and sent to prison, where they were detained until the death of Charles VI.

Care and sorrow were now hurrying the emperor to the grave. Wan and haggard he moved about his palace, mourning his doom, and complaining that it was his destiny to be disappointed in every cherished plan of his life. All his affairs were in inextricable confusion, and his empire seemed crumbling to decay. A cotemporary writer thus describes the situation of the court and the nation:

"Every thing in this court is running into the last confusion and ruin; where there are as visible signs of folly and madness, as ever were inflicted upon a people whom Heaven is determined to destroy, no less by domestic divisions, than by the more public calamities of repeated defeats, defenselessness, poverty and plagues."

Early in October, 1740, the emperor, restless, and feverish in body and mind, repaired to one of his country palaces a few miles distant from Vienna. The season was prematurely cold and gloomy, with frost and storms of sleet. In consequence of a chill the enfeebled monarch was seized with an attack of the gout, which was followed by a very severe fit of the colic. The night of the 10th of October he writhed in pain upon his bed, while repeated vomitings weakened his already exhausted frame. The next day he was conveyed to Vienna, but in such extreme debility that he fainted several times in his carriage by the way. Almost in a state of insensibility he was carried to the retired palace of La Favourite in the vicinity of Vienna, and placed in his bed. It was soon evident that his stormy life was now drawing near to its close. Patiently he bore his severe sufferings, and as his physicians were unable to agree respecting the nature of his disease, he said to them, calmly,

"Cease your disputes. I shall soon be dead. You can then open my body and ascertain the cause of my death."

Priests were admitted to his chamber who performed the last offices of the Church for the dying. With perfect composure, he made all the arrangements relative to the succession to the throne. One after another the members of his family were introduced, and he affectionately bade them adieu, giving to each appropriate words of counsel. To his daughter, Maria Theresa, who was not present, and who was to succeed him, he sent his earnest blessing. With the Duke of Lorraine, her husband, he had a private interview of two hours. On the 20th of October, 1740, at two o'clock in the morning, he died, in the fifty-sixth year of his age, and the thirtieth of his reign. Weary of the world, he willingly retired to the anticipated repose of the grave.

"To die,—to sleep;— To sleep! perchance to dream;—ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause."

By the death of Charles VI. the male line of the house of Hapsburg became extinct, after having continued in uninterrupted succession for over four hundred years. His eldest daughter, Maria Theresa, who now succeeded to the crown of Austria, was twenty-four years of age. Her figure was tall, graceful and commanding. Her features were beautiful, and her smile sweet and winning. She was born to command, combining in her character woman's power of fascination with man's energy. Though so far advanced in pregnancy that she was not permitted to see her dying father, the very day after his death she so rallied her energies as to give an audience to the minister of state, and to assume the government with that marvelous vigor which characterized her whole reign.

Seldom has a kingdom been in a more deplorable condition than was Austria on the morning when the scepter passed into the hands of Maria Theresa. There were not forty thousand dollars in the treasury; the state was enormously in debt; the whole army did not amount to more than thirty thousand men, widely dispersed, clamoring for want of pay, and almost entirely destitute of the materials for war. The vintage had been cut off by the frost, producing great distress in the country. There was a famine in Vienna, and many were starving for want of food. The peasants, in the neighborhood of the metropolis, were rising in insurrection, ravaging the fields in search of game; while rumors were industriously circulated that the government was dissolved, that the succession was disputed, and that the Duke of Bavaria was on the march, with an army, to claim the crown. The distant provinces were anxious to shake off the Austrian yoke. Bohemia was agitated; and the restless barons of Hungary were upon the point of grasping their arms, and, under the protection of Turkey, of claiming their ancestral hereditary rights. Notwithstanding the untiring endeavors of the emperor to obtain the assent of Europe to the Pragmatic Sanction, many influential courts refused to recognize the right of Maria Theresa to the crown. The ministers were desponding, irresolute and incapable. Maria Theresa was young, quite inexperienced and in delicate health, being upon the eve of her confinement. The English ambassador, describing the state of affairs in Vienna as they appeared to him at this time, wrote:

"To the ministers, the Turks seem to be already in Hungary; the Hungarians in insurrection; the Bohemians in open revolt; the Duke of Bavaria, with his army, at the gates of Vienna; and France the soul of all these movements. The ministers were not only in despair, but that despair even was not capable of rousing them to any desperate exertions."

Maria Theresa immediately dispatched couriers to inform the northern powers of her accession to the crown, and troops were forwarded to the frontiers to prevent any hostile invasion from Bavaria. The Duke of Bavaria claimed the Austrian crown in virtue of the will of Ferdinand I., which, he affirmed, devised the crown to his daughters and their descendants in case of the failure of the male line. As the male line was now extinct, by this decree the scepter would pass to the Duke of Bavaria. Charles VI. had foreseen this claim, and endeavored to set it aside by the declaration that the clause referred to in the will of Ferdinand I. had reference to legitimate heirs, not male merely, and that, consequently, it did not set aside female descendants. In proof of this, Maria Theresa had the will exhibited to all the leading officers of state, and to the foreign ambassadors. It appeared that legitimate heirs was the phrase. And now the question hinged upon the point, whether females were legitimate heirs. In some kingdoms of Europe they were; in others they were not. In Austria the custom had been variable. Here was a nicely-balanced question, sufficiently momentous to divide Europe, and which might put all the armies of the continent in motion. There were also other claimants for the crown, but none who could present so plausible a plea as that of the Duke of Bavaria.

Maria Theresa now waited with great anxiety for the reply she should receive from the foreign powers whom she had notified of her accession. The Duke of Bavaria was equally active and solicitous, and it was quite uncertain whose claim would be supported by the surrounding courts. The first response came from Prussia. The king sent his congratulations, and acknowledged the title of Maria Theresa. This was followed by a letter from Augustus of Poland, containing the same friendly recognition. Russia then sent in assurances of cordial support. The King of England returned a friendly answer, promising cooeperation. All this was cheering. But France was then the great power on the continent, and could carry with her one half of Europe in almost any cause. The response was looked for from France with great anxiety. Day after day, week after week passed, and no response came. At length the French Secretary of State gave a cautious and merely verbal declaration of the friendly disposition of the French court. Cardinal Fleury, the illustrious French Secretary of State, was cold, formal and excessively polite. Maria Theresa at once inferred that France withheld her acknowledgment, merely waiting for a favorable opportunity to recognize the claims of the Duke of Bavaria.

While matters were in this state, to the surprise of all, Frederic, King of Prussia, drew his sword, and demanded large and indefinite portions of Austria to be annexed to his territories. Disdaining all appeal to any documentary evidence, and scorning to reply to any questionings as to his right, he demanded vast provinces, as a highwayman demands one's purse, with the pistol at his breast. This fiery young prince, inheriting the most magnificent army in Europe, considering its discipline and equipments, was determined to display his gallantry as a fighter, with Europe for the arena. As he was looking about to find some suitable foe against which he could hurl his seventy-five thousand men, the defenseless yet large and opulent duchy of Silesia presented itself as a glittering prize worth the claiming by a royal highwayman.

The Austrian province of Silesia bordered a portion of Prussia. "While treacherously professing friendship with the court of Vienna, with great secrecy and sagacity Frederic assembled a large force of his best troops in the vicinity of Berlin, and in mid-winter, when the snow lay deep upon the plains, made a sudden rush into Silesia, and, crushing at a blow all opposition, took possession of the whole duchy. Having accomplished this feat, he still pretended great friendship for Maria Theresa, and sent an ambassador to inform her that he was afraid that some of the foreign powers, now conspiring against her, might seize the duchy, and thus wrest it from her; that he had accordingly taken it to hold it in safety; and that since it was so very important, for the tranquillity of his kingdom, that Silesia should not fall into the hands of an enemy, he hoped that Maria Theresa would allow him to retain the duchy as an indemnity for the expense he had been at in taking it."

This most extraordinary and impertinent message was accompanied by a threat. The ambassador of the Prussian king, a man haughty and semi-barbaric in his demeanor, gave his message in a private interview with the queen's husband, Francis, the Duke of Lorraine. In conclusion, the ambassador added, "No one is more firm in his resolutions than the King of Prussia. He must and will take Silesia. If not secured by the immediate cession of that province, his troops and money will be offered to the Duke of Bavaria."

"Go tell your master," the Duke of Lorraine replied with dignity, "that while he has a single soldier in Silesia, we will rather perish than enter into any discussion. If he will evacuate the duchy, we will treat with him at Berlin. For my part, not for the imperial crown, nor even for the whole world, will I sacrifice one inch of the queen's lawful possessions."

While these negotiations were pending, the king himself made an ostentatious entry into Silesia. The majority of the Silesians were Protestants. The King of Prussia, who had discarded religion of all kinds, had of course discarded that of Rome, and was thus nominally a Protestant. The Protestants, who had suffered so much from the persecutions of the Catholic church, had less to fear from the infidelity of Berlin than from the fanaticism of Rome. Frederic was consequently generally received with rejoicings. The duchy of Silesia was indeed a desirable prize. Spreading over a region of more than fifteen thousand square miles, and containing a population of more than a million and a half, it presented to its feudal lord an ample revenue and the means of raising a large army. Breslau, the capital of the duchy, upon the Oder, contained a population of over eighty thousand. Built upon several islands of that beautiful stream, its situation was attractive, while in its palaces and its ornamental squares, it vied with the finest capitals of Europe.

Frederic entered the city in triumph in January, 1741. The small Austrian garrison, consisting of but three thousand men, retired before him into Moravia. The Prussian monarch took possession of the revenues of the duchy, organized the government under his own officers, garrisoned the fortresses and returned to Berlin. Maria Theresa appealed to friendly courts for aid. Most of them were lavish in promises, but she waited in vain for any fulfillment. Neither money, arms nor men were sent to her. Maria Theresa, thus abandoned and thrown upon her own unaided energies, collected a small army in Moravia, on the confines of Silesia, and intrusted the command to Count Neuperg, whom she liberated from the prison to which her father had so unjustly consigned him. But it was mid-winter. The roads were almost impassable. The treasury of the Austrian court was so empty that but meager supplies could be provided for the troops. A ridge of mountains, whose defiles were blocked up with snow, spread between Silesia and Moravia.

It was not until the close of March that Marshal Neuperg was able to force his way through these defiles and enter Silesia. The Prussians, not aware of their danger, were reposing in their cantonments. Neuperg hoped to take them by surprise and cut them off in detail. Indeed Frederic, who, by chance, was at Jagerndorf inspecting a fortress, was nearly surrounded by a party of Austrian hussars, and very narrowly escaped capture. The ground was still covered with snow as the Austrian troops toiled painfully through the mountains to penetrate the Silesian plains. Frederic rapidly concentrated his scattered troops to meet the foe. The warlike character of the Prussian king was as yet undeveloped, and Neuperg, unconscious of the tremendous energies he was to encounter, and supposing that the Prussian garrisons would fly in dismay before him, was giving his troops, after their exhausting march, a few days of repose in the Vicinity of Molnitz.

On the 8th of April there was a thick fall of snow, filling the air and covering the fields. Frederic availed himself of the storm, which curtained him from all observation, to urge forward his troops, that he might overwhelm the Austrians by a fierce surprise. While Neuperg was thus resting, all unconscious of danger, twenty-seven battalions, consisting of sixteen thousand men, and twenty-nine squadrons of horse, amounting to six thousand, were, in the smothering snow, taking their positions for battle. On the morning of the 10th the snow ceased to fall, the clouds broke, and the sun came out clear and bright, when Neuperg saw that another and a far more fearful storm had gathered, and that its thunderbolts were about to be hurled into the midst of his camp.

The Prussian batteries opened their fire, spreading death through the ranks of the Austrians, even while they were hastily forming in line of battle. Still the Austrian veterans, accustomed to all the vicissitudes of war, undismayed, rapidly threw themselves into columns and rushed upon the foe. Fiercely the battle raged hour after hour until the middle of the afternoon, when the field was covered with the dead and crimsoned with blood. The Austrians, having lost three thousand in slain and two thousand in prisoners, retired in confusion, surrendering the field, with several guns and banners, to the victors. This memorable battle gave Silesia to Prussia, and opened the war of the Austrian succession.

The Duke of Lorraine was greatly alarmed by the threatening attitude which affairs now assumed. It was evident that France, Prussia, Bavaria and many other powers were combining against Austria, to rob her of her provinces, and perhaps to dismember the kingdom entirely. Not a single court as yet had manifested any disposition to assist Maria Theresa. England urged the Austrian court to buy the peace of Prussia at almost any price. Francis, Duke of Lorraine, was earnestly for yielding, and intreated his wife to surrender a part for the sake of retaining the rest. "We had better," he said, "surrender Silesia to Prussia, and thus purchase peace with Frederic, than meet the chances of so general a war as now threatens Austria."

But Maria Theresa was as imperial in character and as indomitable in spirit as Frederic of Prussia. With indignation she rejected all such counsel, declaring that she would never cede one inch of her territories to any claimant, and that, even if her allies all abandoned her, she would throw herself upon her subjects and upon her armies, and perish, if need be, in defense of the integrity of Austria.

Frederic now established his court and cabinet at the camp of Molnitz. Couriers were ever coming and going. Envoys from France and Bavaria were in constant secret conference with him. France, jealous of the power of Austria, was plotting its dismemberment, even while protesting friendship. Bavaria was willing to unite with Prussia in seizing the empire and in dividing the spoil. These courts seemed to lay no claim to any higher morality than that of ordinary highwaymen. The doom of Maria Theresa was apparently sealed. Austria was to be plundered. Other parties now began to rush in with their claims, that they might share in the booty. Philip V. of Spain put in his claim for the Austrian crown as the lineal descendant of the Emperor Charles V. Augustus, King of Poland, urged the right of his wife Maria, eldest daughter of Joseph. And even Charles Emanuel, King of Sardinia, hunted up an obsolete claim, through the line of the second daughter of Philip II.

At the camp of Molnitz the plan was matured of giving Bohemia and Upper Austria to the Duke of Bavaria. Frederic of Prussia was to receive Upper Silesia and Glatz. Augustus of Poland was to annex to his kingdom Moravia and Upper Silesia. Lombardy was assigned to Spain. Sardinia was to receive some compensation not yet fully decided upon. The whole transaction was a piece of as unmitigated villainy as ever transpired. One can not but feel a little sympathy for Austria which had thus fallen among thieves, and was stripped and bleeding. Our sympathies are, however, somewhat alleviated by the reflection that Austria was just as eager as any of the other powers for any such piratic expedition, and that, soon after, she united with Russia and Prussia in plundering Poland. And when Poland was dismembered by a trio of regal robbers, she only incurred the same doom which she was now eager to inflict upon Austria. When pirates and robbers plunder each other, the victims are not entitled to much sympathy. To the masses of the people it made but little difference whether their life's blood was wrung from them by Russian, Prussian or Austrian despots. Under whatever rule they lived, they were alike doomed to toil as beasts of burden in the field, or to perish amidst the hardships and the carnage of the camp.

These plans were all revealed to Maria Theresa, and with such a combination of foes so powerful, it seemed as if no earthly wisdom could avert her doom. But her lofty spirit remained unyielding, and she refused all offers of accommodation based upon the surrender of any portion of her territories. England endeavored to induce Frederic to consent to take the duchy of Glogau alone, suggesting that thus his Prussian majesty had it in his power to conclude an honorable peace, and to show his magnanimity by restoring tranquillity to Europe.

"At the beginning of the war," Frederic replied, "I might perhaps have been contented with this proposal. At present I must have four duchies. But do not," he exclaimed, impatiently, "talk to me of magnanimity. A prince must consult his own interests. I am not averse to peace; but I want four duchies, and I will have them."

Frederic of Prussia was no hypocrite. He was a highway robber and did not profess to be any thing else. His power was such that instead of demanding of the helpless traveler his watch, he could demand of powerful nations their revenues. If they did not yield to his demands he shot them down without compunction, and left them in their blood. The British minister ventured to ask what four duchies Frederic intended to take. No reply could be obtained to this question. By the four duchies he simply meant that he intended to extend the area of Prussia over every inch of territory he could possibly acquire, either by fair means or by foul.

England, alarmed by these combinations, which it was evident that France was sagaciously forming and guiding, and from the successful prosecution of which plans it was certain that France would secure some immense accession of power, granted to Austria a subsidy of one million five hundred thousand dollars, to aid her in repelling her foes. Still the danger from the grand confederacy became so imminent, that the Duke of Lorraine and all the Austrian ministry united with the British ambassador, in entreating Maria Theresa to try to break up the confederacy and purchase peace with Prussia by offering Frederic the duchy of Glogau. With extreme reluctance the queen at length yielded to these importunities, and consented that an envoy should take the proposal to the Prussian camp at Molnitz. As the envoy was about to leave he expressed some apprehension that the Prussian king might reject the proffer.

"I wish he may reject it," exclaimed the queen, passionately. "It would be a relief to my conscience. God only knows how I can answer to my subjects for the cession of the duchy, having sworn to them never to alienate any part of our country."

Mr. Robinson, the British ambassador, as mediator, took these terms to the Prussian camp. In the endeavor to make as good a bargain as possible, he was first to offer Austrian Guelderland. If that failed he was then to offer Limburg, a province of the Netherlands, containing sixteen hundred square miles, and if this was not accepted, he was authorized, as the ultimatum, to consent to the cession of the duchy of Glogau. The Prussian king received the ambassadors, on the 5th of August, in a large tent, in his camp at Molanitz. The king was a blunt, uncourtly man, and the interview was attended with none of the amenities of polished life. After a few desultory remarks, the British ambassador opened the business by saying that he was authorized by the Queen of Austria to offer, as the basis of peace, the cession to Prussia of Austrian Guelderland.

"What a beggarly offer," exclaimed the king. "This is extremely impertinent. What! nothing but a paltry town for all my just pretensions in Silesia!"

In this tirade of passion, either affected or real, he continued for some time. Mr. Robinson waited patiently until this outburst was exhausted, and then hesitatingly remarked that the queen was so anxious to secure the peace of Europe, that if tranquillity could not be restored on other terms she was even willing to cede to Prussia, in addition, the province of Limburg.

"Indeed!" said the ill-bred, clownish king, contemptuously. "And how can the queen think of violating her solemn oath which renders every inch of the Low Countries inalienable. I have no desire to obtain distant territory which will be useless to me; much less do I wish to expend money in new fortification. Neither the French nor the Dutch have offended me; and I do not wish to offend them, by acquiring territory in the vicinity of their realms. If I should accept Limburg, what security could I have that I should be permitted to retain it?"

The ambassador replied, "England, Russia and Saxony, will give their guaranty."

"Guaranties," rejoined the king, sneeringly. "Who, in these times, pays any regard to pledges? Have not both England and France pledged themselves to support the Pragmatic Sanction? Why do they not keep their promises? The conduct of these powers is ridiculous. They only do what is for their own interests. As for me, I am at the head of an invincible army. I want Silesia. I have taken it, and I intend to keep it. What kind of a reputation should I have if I should abandon the first enterprise of my reign? No! I will sooner be crushed with my whole army, than renounce my rights in Silesia. Let those who want peace grant me my demands. If they prefer to fight again, they can do so, and again be beaten."

Mr. Robinson ventured to offer a few soothing words to calm the ferocious brute, and then proposed to give to him Glogau, a small but rich duchy of about six hundred square miles, near the frontiers of Prussia.

Frederic rose in a rage, and with loud voice and threatening gestures, exclaimed,

"If the queen does not, within six weeks, yield to my demands, I will double them. Return with this answer to Vienna. They who want peace with me, will not oppose my wishes. I am sick of ultimatums; I will hear no more of them. I demand Silesia. This is my final answer. I will give no other."

Then turning upon his heel, with an air of towering indignation, he retired behind the inner curtain of his tent. Such was the man to whom Providence, in its inscrutable wisdom, had assigned a throne, and a highly disciplined army of seventy-five thousand men. To northern Europe he proved an awful scourge, inflicting woes, which no tongue can adequately tell.

And now the storm of war seemed to commence in earnest. The Duke of Bavaria issued a manifesto, declaring his right to the whole Austrian inheritance, and pronouncing Maria Theresa a usurper. He immediately marched an army into one of the provinces of Austria. At the same time, two French armies were preparing to cross the Rhine to cooperate with the Bavarian troops. The King of Prussia was also on the march, extending his conquests. Still Maria Theresa remained inflexible, refusing to purchase peace with Prussia by the surrender of Silesia.

"The resolution of the queen is taken," she said. "If the House of Austria must perish, it is indifferent whether it perishes by an Elector of Bavaria, or by an Elector of Brandenburg."

While these all important matters were under discussion, the queen, on the 13th of March, gave birth to a son, the Archduke Joseph. This event strengthened the queen's resolution, to preserve, not only for herself, but for her son and heir, the Austrian empire in its integrity. From her infancy she had imbibed the most exalted ideas of the dignity and grandeur of the house of Hapsburg. She had also been taught that her inheritance was a solemn trust which she was religiously bound to preserve. Thus religious principle, family pride and maternal love all now combined to increase the inflexibility of a will which by nature was indomitable.



CHAPTER XXVII.

MARIA THERESA.

From 1741 to 1743.

Character of Francis, Duke of Lorraine.—Policy of European Courts.—Plan of the Allies.—Siege of Prague.—Desperate Condition of the Queen.—Her Coronation in Hungary.—Enthusiasm of the Barons.— Speech of Maria Theresa.—Peace with Frederic of Prussia.—His Duplicity.—Military Movement of the Duke of Lorraine.—Battle of Chazleau.—Second Treaty with Frederic.—Despondency of the Duke of Bavaria.—March of Mallebois.—Extraordinary Retreat of Belleisle.—Recovery of Prague by the Queen.

Maria Theresa, as imperial in spirit as in position, was unwilling to share the crown, even with her husband. Francis officiated as her chief minister, giving audience to foreign ambassadors, and attending to many of the details of government, yet he had but little influence in the direction of affairs. Though a very handsome man, of polished address, and well cultivated understanding, he was not a man of either brilliant or commanding intellect. Maria Theresa, as a woman, could not aspire to the imperial throne; but all the energies of her ambitious nature were roused to secure that dignity for her husband. Francis was very anxious to secure for himself the electoral vote of Prussia, and he, consequently, was accused of being willing to cede Austrian territory to Frederic to purchase his support. This deprived him of all influence whenever he avowed sentiments contrary to those of the queen.