Albrecht von Wallenstein

“ It was the sepulchre of the Maccabees at Modin, a structure supported by seven pillars consecrated to the memory of Mattathias, his wife, and their five warrior sons.
Such was the life of great patriot-captains in the olden time. Of the great Soldier of the middle-ages there is perhaps no better example than Wallenstein.
If we call him a soldier of fortune, it is not in the lower sense of a man who sells his sword and pawns his life for money, because he does not know what better to do with himself. Albrecht Wallenstein was not an adventurer of this sort ”

“ Thy heart, say rather—'twas thy heart, my child!
THEKLA.
Faith hath no voice but the heart's impulses.
I am all his! His Present—his alone,
Is this new life, which lives in me? He hath
A right to his own creature. What was I
Ere his fair love infus'd a soul into me?
COUNTESS.
Thou would'st oppose thy father, then, should he
Have otherwise determin'd with thy person?
(Thekla remains silent. The Countess continues.)
Thou mean'st to force him to thy liking?—Child,
His name is Friedland.
THEKLA.
My name too is Friedland.
He shall have found a genuine daughter in me. ”

“ Questenberg, Octavio, and Max. Piccolomini,
Butler, Isolani, Maradas, and three other Generals.
Wallenstein motions Questenberg, who in
consequence takes the chair directly opposite
to him; the others follow, arranging themselves
according to their rank. There reigns
a momentary Silence.
WALLENSTEIN.
I have understood, 'tis true, the sum and import
Of your instructions, Questenberg, have weigh'd them,
And form'd my final, absolute resolve;
Yet it seems fitting that the Generals
Should hear the will of th' Emperor from your mouth. ”

“ In 1606 he returned to Bohemia, and soon afterwards he married an elderly widow, Lucretia Nikossie von Landeck, whose great estates in Moravia he inherited after her death in 1614. His new wealth enabled him to offer two hundred horse, splendidly equipped, to the archduke Ferdinand for his war with Venice in 1617. Wallenstein commanded them in person, and from that time he enjoyed both favour at court and popularity in the army. His wealth and influence were further increased by his marriage with Isabella Katharina, daughter of Count Harrach, a confidential adviser of the emperor Matthias. ”

“ With fifteen thousand men, and only waits
For orders to proceed and join your army.
Those orders I give out, immediately
We're compromis'd.
WALLENSTEIN.
What asks the Chancellor?
WRANGLE. (considerately.)
Twelve Regiments, every man a Swede—my head
The warranty—and all might prove at last
Only false play———
WALLENSTEIN. (starting.)
Sir Swede!
WRANGLE. (calmly proceeding.)
Am therefore forc'd
T' insist thereon, that he do formally,
Irrevocably break with th' Emperor,
Else not a Swede is trusted to Duke Friedland.
WALLENSTEIN.
Come, brief, and open! What is the demand? ”

“ In brief, 'tis sign'd and seal'd that this Octavio
Is my good angel—and now no word more.
(He is retiring.)
TERTSKY.
This is my comfort—Max. remains our hostage.
ILLO.
And he shall never stir from here alive.
WALLENSTEIN. (stops, and turns himself round)
Are ye not like the women, who for ever
Only recur to their first word, altho'
One had been talking reason by the hour?
Know, that the human being's thoughts and deeds
Are not, like ocean billows, blindly mov'd.
The inner world, his microcosmus, is
The deep shaft, out of which they spring eternally. ”

“ Cheap souls, to whom their honor, their good name
Is their poor saving, their last worthless Keep,
Which having stak'd and lost, they stake themselves
In the mad rage of gaming. Thou art rich,
And glorious; with an unpolluted heart
Thou canst make conquest of whate'er seems highest!
But he, who once hath acted infamy,
Does nothing more in this world.
WALLENSTEIN. (grasps his hand)
Calmly, Max!
Much that is great and excellent will we
Perform together yet. ”

“ Wallenstein, Duke of Friedland, Generalissimo of the Imperial Forces in the Thirty-years War.
Duchess of Friedland, Wife of Wallenstein.
Thekla, her Daughter, Princess of Friedland.
The Countess Tertsky, Sister of the Duchess.
Lady Neubrunn.
Octavio Piccolomini, Lieutenant General.
Max. Piccolomini, his Son, Colonel of a Regiment of Cuirassiers.
Count Tertsky, the Commander of federal Regiments, and Brother-in-law of Wallenstein.
Illo, Field Marshal, Wallenstein's Confidant. ”

“ Nay, yield them up that dot, that speck of land—
It goes not from your portion. If you win
The game, what matters it to you who pays it?
WALLENSTEIN.
Off with them, off! Thou understand'st not this.
Never shall it be said of me, I parcell'd
My native land away, dismember'd Germany,
Betray'd it to a foreigner, in order
To come with stealthy tread, and filch away
My own share of the plunder.—Never! never!—
No foreign power shall strike root in the empire,
And least of all, these Goths! these hunger-wolves! ”

“ Ferdinand, to gain his aid, gave him uncontrolled authority over the army he should raise and all its operations.
Wallenstein began recruiting. He soon had forty thousand men. The Catholics grew braver when the reconciliation of Wallenstein and the Emperor became known. This, added to the suspicions of the allies, constrained Gustavus to cease his successful offensive for a cautious holding of what he already had.
Wallenstein marched into Bohemia, the Saxons offering no resistance, and took Prague. He then moved to Bavaria and joined the Elector. ”

“ There serve here many foreigners in th' army,
And were the man in all else brave and gallant,
I was not wont to make nice scrutiny
After his pedigree or catechism.
This will be otherwise i'the time to come.
Well—me no longer it concerns.
⁠ (He seats himself.)
MAX. PICCOLOMINI.
Forbid it, Heaven, that it should come to this!
Our troops will swell in dreadful fermentation—
The Emperor is abus'd—it cannot be.
ISOLANI.
It cannot be; all goes to instant wreck.
WALLENSTEIN.
Thou hast said truly, faithful Isolani! ”

“ The immense riches Wallenstein possessed, the universal reputation he enjoyed, the rapidity with which six years before he had assembled an army of 40,000 men, the little expense at which he had maintained this formidable force, the actions he had performed at its head, and lastly, the zeal and fidelity he had displayed for his master's honor, still lived in the Emperor's recollection and made Wallenstein seem to him the ablest instrument to restore the balance between the belligerent powers, to save Austria, and preserve the Catholic religion. ”

“ To this proud subject of his, fresh from his dalliances with his enemies, the emperor now appealed for help. Wallenstein agreed to raise an army, provided his control of it should be absolute. Ferdinand was constrained to grant all that his old general demanded. Wallenstein now raised his standard, to which rallied the adventurers not only of Germany, but of all Europe as well. The array was a vast and heterogeneous host, bound together by no bonds of patriotism, loyalty, or convictions, but by the spell and prestige of the name of Wallenstein. ”

“ But to the point! The best is yet to come,
Attend now, Generals!
QUESTENBERG.
⁠The Prince Cardinal
Begins his route at the approach of spring
From the Milanese; and leads a Spanish army
Thro' Germany into the Netherlands.
That he may march secure and unimpeded,
'Tis th' Emperor's will, you grant him a detachment
Of eight horse-regiments from the army here.
WALLENSTEIN.
Yes, yes! I understand!—Eight regiments! Well,
Right well concerted, Father Lamormain!
Eight thousand horse! Yes, yes! 'Tis as it should be!
I see it coming.
QUESTENBERG.
⁠There is nothing coming. ”

“ For carrying on the war along the Rhine, he was entirely dependent upon the princes of the Catholic League and their army under Tilly.
Wallenstein now came forward and offered to supply the Emperor with a powerful imperial army which should not cost him a penny. This offer, coming from a mere private gentleman, sounded absurd; and for a time Wallenstein was put aside with contemptuous laughter. At last the Emperor told him, if he thought he could raise as many as ten thousand men, to go ahead. "If I have only ten thousand," said Wallenstein, "we must accept what people choose to give us. ”

“ Great Stone.
No, not for gold and silver have there bled
So many of our Swedish Nobles—neither
Will we, with empty laurels for our payment,
Hoist sail for our own country. Citizens
Will we remain upon the soil, the which
Our Monarch conquer'd for himself, and died.
WALLENSTEIN.
Help to keep down the common enemy,
And the fair border land must needs be your's,
WRANGEL.
But when the common enemy lies vanquish'd,
Who knits together our new friendship then?
We know, Duke Friedland! though perhaps the Swede
Ought not t' have known it, that you carry on
Secret negociations with the Saxons. ”

“ Few generals have surpassed him in the power of quickly organizing great masses of men and of inspiring them with confidence and enthusiasm. But it is as a statesman that Wallenstein is immortal. However much or little motives of personal aggrandisement influenced his schemes and his conduct, “Germany turns ever to Wallenstein as she turns to no other amongst the leaders of the Thirty Years' War. ... Such faithfulness is not without reason. ... Wallenstein's wildest schemes, impossible of execution by military violence, were always built upon the foundation of German unity. ”

“ Then advancing to Bavaria, he effected a junction with Bavarian troops, and found himself sufficiently strong to attempt to arrest the march of Gustavus. The imperial force now amounted to sixty thousand men. Wallenstein was so sanguine of success, that he boasted that in a few days he would decide the question, whether Gustavus Adolphus or Wallenstein was to be master of the world. The Swedish king was at Nuremberg with but twenty thousand men, when he heard {290} of the approach of the imperial army, three times outnumbering his own. ”

“ But however little confidence he had in the moderation of his friend, the extravagant contents of his writing surpassed even his worst expectations. Wallenstein required the uncontrolled command over all the German armies of Austria and Spain, with unlimited powers to reward and punish. Neither the King of Hungary, nor the Emperor himself, were to appear in the army, still less to exercise any act of authority over it. No commission in the army, no pension or letter of grace, was to be granted by the Emperor without Wallenstein's approval. ”

“ Ruined churches, villages in ashes, harvests wilfully destroyed, families plundered, and murdered peasants, marked the progress of these barbarians, under whose scourge the whole of Thuringia, Vogtland, and Meissen, lay defenceless. Yet this was but the prelude to greater sufferings with which Wallenstein himself, at the head of the main army, threatened Saxony. After having left behind him fearful monuments of his fury, in his march through Franconia and Thuringia, he arrived with his whole army in the Circle of Leipzic, and compelled the city, after a short resistance, to surrender. ”

“ Duke Friedland sentenc'd and condemned!
OCTAVIO.
Even so.
MAX. (throws down the paper) .
Oh, this is too much!—O unhappy error!
OCTAVIO.
Read on. Collect thyself.
MAX. (after he has read further, with a look
of affright and astonishment on his father) .
How!—what!—Thou!—thou!
OCTAVIO.
But for the present moment, till the King
Of Hungary may safely join the army,
Is the command assign'd to me.
MAX.
And think'st thou,
Dost thou believe, that thou wilt tear it from him?
Oh, never hope it!—Father! father! father!
An inauspicious office is enjoin'd thee. ”

“ Since that time, Wallenstein and the Emperor had adopted measures which must have been equally offensive to him as a man and as a king. Imperial troops had been despatched to the aid of the Polish king, Sigismund, to defend Prussia against the Swedes. When the king complained to Wallenstein of this act of hostility, he received for answer, "The Emperor has more soldiers than he wants for himself, he must help his friends." The Swedish ambassadors had been insolently ordered by Wallenstein to withdraw from the conference at Lubeck ”

“ The greater his extortions, and the greater his rewards, the greater was the concourse to his standard. Such is human nature. It is said that, in seven years, Wallenstein exacted not less than sixty millions of dollars from one half of Germany—an incredible sum, when the expenditure of the government of England, at this time, was less than two million pounds a year. His armies flourished, while the states through which they passed were ruined. What cared he for the curses of the people, or the complaints of princes, so long as his army adored him? ”

“ He was first made Count, and then Duke of Friedland, with the authority of an independent prince of the Empire.
1625.
Wallenstein was superstitious, and his studies in astrology gave him the belief that a much higher destiny awaited him. Here was the opportunity: he offered to raise and command a second army, in the Emperor's service. Ferdinand II. accepted the offer with joy, and sent word to Wallenstein that he should immediately proceed to enlist 20,000 men. "My army," the latter answered, "must live by what it can take: 20,000 men are not enough. ”

“ It might yet be an easier thing from nothing
To call forth sixty thousand men of battle,
Than to persuade one sixtieth part of them—
WALLENSTEIN.
What now? Out with it, friend?
WRANGEL.
To break their oaths.
WALLENSTEIN.
And he thinks so?—He judges like a Swede,
And like a Protestant. You Lutherans
Fight for your Bible. You are int'rested
About the cause ”

“ But those who doubted did not know the tremendous energy, the boundless resources, and the towering ambition of the man. The plan was carried out to its fullest extent: within a few months a large and well-equipped{170} army was ready to take the field, and Wallenstein, whose name was comparatively unknown in the history of war, suddenly assumed an importance which eclipsed that of the renowned generals of the Catholic League and of the Protestant Union. ”