Joseph II. and His Court Part 139

The empress heaved a sigh. "Yes," said she, as if communing with herself, "it all looks smooth and fair on paper. It is very easy to draw boundary lines with your finger, prince. You have traced out mountains and rivers, but you have not won the hearts of the Bavarians; and without their hearts it is worse than useless to occupy their country."

"We shall win their hearts by kindness," exclaimed the emperor. "True, we take their insignificant fatherland, but we give them instead, the rich inheritance of our own nationality; and future history will record it to their honor that theirs was the initiatory step which subsequently made one nation of all the little nationalities of Germany."

The empress answered with another sigh, and looked absently at the outspread map, across which Kaunitz was drawing his finger in another direction.

"Here," said he, "are the estates which the extinct house held in fief from the German emperor."

"And which I, as Emperor of Germany, have a right to reannex to my empire," cried Joseph.

"And here, finally," pursued Kaunitz, still tracing with his finger, "here is the lordship of Mindelheim, of which the reversion was not only ceded to Austria by the Emperor Matthias, but actually fell to us and was relinquished to the Elector of Bavaria by the too great magnanimity of an Austrian sovereign. Surely, your majesty is not willing to abandon your inheritance to the first comer?"

Maria Theresa's head was bent so low that it rested upon the map whereon her minister had been drawing lines of such significance to Austria.

Close by, stood the emperor in breathless anxiety; while opposite sat Kaunitz, impa.s.sable as ever.

Again a deep sigh betokened the anguish that was rending the honest heart of the empress; and she raised her head.

"Alas for me and my declining energies!" said she, bitterly. "Two against one, and that one a woman advanced in years! I am not convinced, but my spirit is unequal to strife. Should we fail, we will be made to feel the odium of our proceedings; should we triumph, I suppose that the justice of our pretensions will never be questioned. Perhaps, as the world has never blamed Frederick for the robbery of Silesia, it may forgive us the acquisition of Bavaria. In the name of G.o.d, then, do both of you what you deem it right to do; but in mercy, take nothing that is not ours. We shall be involved in war; I feel it, and I would so gladly have ended my life in the calm, moon-like radiance of gentle peace."

[Footnote: The empress's own sentiments. Wraxall, i, p. 311.]

"Your majesty shall end your life in peace and prosperity; but far in the future be the day of your departure!" cried Joseph, kissing the hand of the empress. "May you live to see Austria expand into a great empire, and Germany rescued from the misrule of its legions of feeble princes!

The first impulse has been given to-day. Bavaria is rescued from its miserable fate, and becomes an integral portion of one of the most powerful nations in Europe."

"May G.o.d be merciful, and bless the union!" sighed the empress. "I shall be wretched until I know how it is to terminate, and day and night I shall pray to the Lord that He preserve my people from the horrors of war."

"Meanwhile Kaunitz and I will seek a blessing on our enterprise by taking earthly precautions to secure its success. You, prince, will use the quill of diplomacy, and I shall make ready to defend my right with a hundred thousand trusty Austrians to back me. To-night I march a portion of my men into Lower Bavaria."

"Oh," murmured the unhappy empress, "there will be war and bloodshed!"

"Before your majesty marches to Bavaria," said Kaunitz inclining his bead, "her majesty, the empress, must sign the edict which shall apprise her subjects and the world of the step we meditate. I haves drawn it up, and it awaits her majesty's approbation and signature."

The prince then drew from his m.u.f.f a paper, which he presented to the empress. Maria Theresa perused it with sorrowful eyes.

"It is nothing but a resume of our just claims to Bavaria," said Joseph, hastily.

"It is very easy to prove the justice of a thing on paper," replied Maria Theresa; "may G.o.d grant that it prove to be so in deed as well as in word. I will do your bidding, and sign your edict, but upon your head be all the blood that follows my act!"

She wrote her name, and Joseph, in an outburst of triumph, shouted, "Bavaria is ours!"

CHAPTER CXXII.

A PAGE FROM HISTORY.

Maria Theresa's worst apprehensions were realized, and the marching of the Austrian troops into Bavaria was the signal for war. While all the petty sovereigns of Germany clamored over the usurpation of Austria, pamphlet upon pamphlet issued from the hands of Austrian jurists to justify the act. These were replied to by the advocates of every other German state, who proved conclusively that Austria was rapacious and unscrupulous, and had not a shadow of right to the Bavarian succession.

A terrible paper war ensued, during which three hundred books were launched by the belligerents at each other's heads. [Footnote: Schlosser's History of the Eighteenth Century, vol. iv., p. 363.] This strife was productive of one good result; it warmed up the frozen patriotism of all the German races. Bavarians, Hessians, Wurtembergers, and Hanoveriana, forgot their bickerings to join the outcry against Austria; and the Church, to which Joseph was such an implacable enemy, encouraged them in their resistance to the "innovator," as he was called by his enemies.

Of all the malcontents, the noisiest were the Bavarians. The elector palatine, whose advent all had dreaded, was greeted upon his entrance into Munich with glowing enthusiasm; and the people forgot his extravagance and profligacy to remember that upon him devolved the preservation of their independence as a nation.

But Charles Theodore was very little edified by the sentiments which were attributed to him by the Bavarians. He longed for nothing better than to relieve himself of Bavaria and the weight of Austrian displeasure, to return to the palatinate, and come into possession of the flesh-pots that awaited his children in the form of t.i.tles, orders, and florins. He lent a willing ear to Joseph's propositions, and a few days after his triumphant entrance into Munich, he signed a contract relinquishing in favor of Austria two-thirds of his Bavarian inheritance. Maria Theresa, in the joy of her heart, bestowed upon him the order of the Golden Fleece, and on January 3, 1778, entered into possession of her newly acquired territory.

Meanwhile, in Bavaria, arose a voice which, with the fire of genuine patriotism, protested against the cowardly compliance of the elector palatine. It was that of the d.u.c.h.ess Clemens, of Bavaria. She hastened to give information of his pusillanimity to the next heir, the Dune of Zweibrucken, and dispatched a courier to Berlin asking succor and protection from the crown of Prussia.

The energy of this Bavarian patriot decided the fate of the Austrian claim. The Duke of Zweibrucken protested against the cession of the smallest portion of his future inheritance, and declared that he would never relinquish it to any power on earth. Frederick p.r.o.nounced himself ready to sustain the duke, and threatened a declaration of war unless the Austrian troops were removed. In vain Maria Theresa sought to indemnify the duke by offers of orders, florins, and t.i.tles, which had been so successful with Charles Theodore--in vain she offered to make him King of Burgundy--he remained incorruptible. He coveted nothing she could bestow, but was firm in his purpose, to preserve the integrity of Bavaria, and called loudly for Frederick to come to the rescue.

Frederick responded: "He was ready to defend the rights of the elector palatine against the unjust pretensions of the court of Vienna,"

[Footnote: Dohm's Memoirs, vol. i.] and removed his troops from Upper Silesia to the confines of Bohemia and Saxony. This was the signal for the advance of the Austrian army; and despite her repugnance to the act, Maria Theresa was compelled to suffer it. She was also forced to allow Joseph to take command in person. This time her representations and entreaties had been vain; Joseph was thirsting for military glory, and he bounded like a war-horse to the trumpet's call. The empress felt that her hands were now powerless to restrain him, and she was so much the feebler, that Kaunitz openly espoused the side of the ambitious emperor.

With convulsive weeping Maria Theresa saw her son a.s.sume his command, and when Joseph bade her farewell, she sank insensible from his arms to the floor.

CHAPTER CXXIII.

THE EMPEROR AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF.

The Emperor Joseph was pacing the floor of his cabinet. Sometimes he paused before a window, and with absent looks surveyed the plain where his troops were encamped, and their stacked arms glistened to the sun; then he returned to the table where Field-Marshal Lacy was deep in plans and charts.

Occasionally the silence was broken by the blast of a trumpet or the shouts of the soldiery who were arriving at headquarters.

"Lacy," said the emperor, after a long, dreary pause, "put by your charts, and give me a word of consolation."

The field-marshal laid aside his papers and rose from the table. "Your majesty had ordered me to specify upon the chart the exact spot which Frederick occupies by Welsdorf, and Prince Henry by Nienberg."

"I know, I know," answered Joseph impatiently. "But what avails their encampment to-day, when to-morrow they are sure to advance?"

"Your majesty thinks that he will make an attack?"

"I am sure of it."

"And I doubt it. It is my opinion that he will avoid a collision."

"Why then should he have commenced hostilities?" cried Joseph angrily.

"Have you forgotten that although the elector palatine is ready to renounce Bavaria, Frederick opposes our claims in the name of Germany and of the next heir?"

"No, sire; but Frederick has spies in Vienna, who have taken care to inform him that Maria Theresa is disinclined to war. He has, therefore, declared against us, because he hopes that the blast of his coming will suffice to scatter the armies of Austria to the winds."

"The time has gone by when the terror of his name could appal us," cried Joseph, proudly throwing back his head. "I hope to convince him ere long that I am more than willing to confront him in battle, Oh, how weary is the inactivity to which my mother's womanish fears condemn me! Why did I heed her tears, and promise that I would not make the attack? Now I must wait, nor dare to strike a blow, while my whole soul yearns for the fight, and I long either to lead my troops to victory or perish on the field of battle."

"And yet, sire, it is fortunate that you have been forced to inactivity.

To us time is every thing, for Frederick's army outnumbers ours. He has seventy thousand men with him near the Elbe, and fifty thousand under Prince Henry near Nienberg."

"Yes, but I shall oppose his hundred and twenty thousand men with twice their number," cried Joseph impatiently.

"Provided we have time to a.s.semble our men. But we must have several days to accomplish this. At the end of a week our army will be complete in numbers, and we can then await the enemy behind our intrenchments, and the natural defences afforded us by the steep banks of the Elbe."

"Await--nothing but await," said Joseph scornfully. "Forever condemned to delay."