The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck Volume I Part 8

The reader will pardon my native hatred of hypocrisy and falsehood, especially when he hears I have to thank the Jesuits for the loss of all my great Hungarian estates. Father Kampmuller, the bosom friend of the Count Grashalkowitz, was confessor to the court of Vienna, and there was no possible kind of persecution I did not suffer from priestcraft. Far from being useful members of society, they take advantage of the prejudices of superst.i.tion, exist for themselves alone, and sacrifice every duty to the support of their own hierarchy, and found a power, on error and ignorance, which is destructive of all moral virtue.

Let us proceed. Mournful and angry, I left the college, and went to my lodging-house, where I found a Prussian recruiting-officer waiting for me, who used all his arts to engage me to enlist; offering me five hundred dollars, and to make me a corporal, if I could write. I pretended I was a Livonian, who had deserted from the Austrians, to return home, and claim an inheritance left me by my father. After much persuasion, he at length told me in confidence, it was very well known in the town that I was a robber; that I should soon be taken before a magistrate, but that if I would enlist he would ensure my safety.

This language was new to me; my pa.s.sion rose instantaneously; I remembered my name was Trenck, I struck him, and drew my sword; but, instead of defending himself, he sprang out of the chamber, charging the host not to let me quit the house. I knew the town of Thorn had agreed with the King of Prussia, secretly, to deliver up deserters, and began to fear the consequences. Looking through the window, I presently saw two under Prussian officers enter the house. Sch.e.l.l and I instantly flew to our arms, and met the Prussians at the chamber door. "Make way," cried I, presenting my pistols. The Prussian soldiers drew their swords, but retired with fear. Going out of the house, I saw a Prussian lieutenant, in the street, with the town-guard. These I overawed, likewise, by the same means, and no one durst oppose me, though every one cried, "Stop thief!" I came safely, however, to the Jesuits' convent; but poor Sch.e.l.l was taken, and dragged to prison like a malefactor.

Half mad at not being able to rescue him, I imagined he must soon be delivered up to the Prussians. My reception was much better at the convent than it had been before, for they no longer doubted but I was really a thief, who sought an asylum. I addressed myself to one of the fathers, who appeared to be a good kind of a man, relating briefly what had happened, and entreated he would endeavour to discover why they sought to molest us.

He went out, and returning in an hour after, told me, "n.o.body knows you: a considerable theft was yesterday committed at the fair: all suspicious persons are seized; you entered the town accoutred like banditti. The man where you put up is employed as a Prussian enlister, and has announced you as suspicious people. The Prussian lieutenant therefore laid complaint against you, and it was thought necessary to secure your persons."

My joy, at hearing this, was great. Our Moravian pa.s.sport, and the journal of our route, which I had in my pocket, were full proofs of our innocence. I requested they would send and inquire at the town where we lay the night before. I soon convinced the Jesuit I spoke truth; he went, and presently returned with one of the syndics, to whom I gave a more full account of myself. The syndic examined Sch.e.l.l, and found his story and mine agreed; besides which, our papers that they had seized, declared who we were. I pa.s.sed the night in the convent without closing my eyes, revolving in my mind all the rigours of my fate. I was still more disturbed for Sch.e.l.l, who knew not where I was, but remained firmly persuaded we should be conducted to Berlin; and, if so, determined to put a period to his life.

My doubts were all ended at ten in the morning when my good Jesuit arrived, and was followed by my friend Sch.e.l.l. The judges, he said, had found us innocent, and declared us free to go where we pleased; adding, however, that he advised us to be upon our guard, we being watched by the Prussian enlisters; that the lieutenant had hoped, by having us committed as thieves, to oblige me to enter, and that he would account for all that had happened.

I gave Sch.e.l.l a most affectionate welcome, who had been very ill-used when led to prison, because he endeavoured to defend himself with his left hand, and follow me. The people had thrown mud at him, and called him a rascal that would soon be hanged. Sch.e.l.l was little able to travel farther. The father-rector sent us a ducat, but did not see us; and the chief magistrate gave each of us a crown, by way of indemnification for false imprisonment. Thus sent away, we returned to our lodging, took our bundles, and immediately prepared to leave Thorn.

As we went, I reflected that, on the road to Elbing, we must pa.s.s through several Prussian villages, and inquired for a shop where we might purchase a map. We were directed to an old woman who sat at the door across the way, and were told she had a good a.s.sortment, for that her son was a scholar. I addressed myself to her, and my question pleased her, I having added we were unfortunate travellers, who wished to find, by the map, the road to Russia. She showed us into a chamber, laid an atlas on the table, and placed herself opposite me, while I examined the map, and endeavoured to hide a bit of a ragged ruffle that had made its appearance. After steadfastly looking at me, she at length exclaimed, with a sad and mournful tone--"Good G.o.d! who knows what is now become of my poor son! I can see, sir, you too are of a good family. My son would go and seek his fortune, and for these eight years have I had no tidings of him. He must now be in the Austrian cavalry." I asked in what regiment. "The regiment of Hohenhem; you are his very picture." "Is he not of my height?" "Yes, nearly." "Has he not light hair?" "Yes, like yours, sir." "What is his name?" "His name is William." "No, my dear mother," cried I, "William is not dead; he was my best friend when I was with the regiment." Here the poor woman could not contain her joy. She threw herself round my neck, called me her good angel who brought her happy tidings: asked me a thousand questions which I easily contrived to make her answer herself, and thus, forced by imperious necessity, bereft of all other means, did I act the deceiver.

The story I made was nearly as follows:--I told her I was a soldier in the regiment of Hohenhem, that I had a furlough to go and see my father, and that I should return in a month, would then take her letters, and undertake that, if she wished it, her son should purchase his discharge, and once more come and live with his mother. I added that I should be for ever and infinitely obliged to her, if she would suffer my comrade, meantime, to live at her house, he being wounded by the Prussian recruiters, and unable to pursue his journey; that I would send him money to come to me, or would myself come back and fetch him, thankfully paying every expense. She joyfully consented, told me her second husband, father-in-law to her dear William, had driven him from home, that he might give what substance they had to the younger son; and that the eldest had gone to Magdeburg. She determined Sch.e.l.l should live at the house of a friend, that her husband might know nothing of the matter; and, not satisfied with this kindness, she made me eat with her, gave me a new shirt, stockings, sufficient provisions for three days, and six Lunenburg florins. I left Thorn, and my faithful Sch.e.l.l, the same night, with the consolation that he was well taken care of; and having parted from him with regret, went on the 13th two miles further to Burglow.

I cannot describe what my sensations were, or the despondence of my mind, when I thus saw myself wandering alone, and leaving, forsaking, as it were, the dearest of friends. These may certainly be numbered among the bitterest moments of my life. Often was I ready to return, and drag him along with me, though at last reason conquered sensibility. I drew near the end of my journey, and was impelled forward by hope.

March 14.--I went to Schwetz, and

March 15.--To Neuburg and Mowe. In these two days I travelled thirteen miles. I lay at Mowe, on some straw, among a number of carters, and, when I awoke, perceived they had taken my pistols, and what little money I had left, even to my last penny. The gentlemen, however, were all gone.

What could I do? The innkeeper perhaps was privy to the theft. My reckoning amounted to eighteen Polish grosch. The surly landlord pretended to believe I had no money when I entered his house, and I was obliged to give him the only spare shirt I had, with a silk handkerchief, which the good woman of Thorn had made me a present of, and to depart without a single holler.

March 16.--I set off for Marienburg, but it was impossible I should reach this place, and not fall into the hands of the Prussians, if I did not cross the Vistula, and, unfortunately, I had no money to pay the ferry, which would cost two Polish sch.e.l.lings.

Full of anxiety, not knowing how to act, I saw two fishermen in a boat, went to them, drew my sabre, and obliged them to land me on the other side; when there, I took the oars from these timid people, jumped out of the boat, pushed it off the sh.o.r.e, and left it to drive with the stream.

To what dangers does not poverty expose man! These two Polish sch.e.l.lings were not worth more than half a kreutzer, or some halfpenny, yet was I driven by necessity to commit violence on two poor men, who, had they been as desperate in their defence as I was obliged to be in my attack, blood must have been spilled and lives lost; hence it is evident that the degrees of guilt ought to be strictly and minutely inquired into, and the degree of punishment proportioned. Had I hewn them down with my sabre, I should surely have been a murderer; but I should likewise surely have been one of the most innocent of murderers. Thus we see the value of money is not to be estimated by any specific sum, small or great, but according to its necessity and use. How little did I imagine when at Berlin, and money was treated by me with luxurious neglect, I may say, with contempt, I should be driven to the hard necessity, for a sum so apparently despicable, of committing a violence which might have had consequences so dreadful, and have led to the commission of an act so atrocious!

I found Saxon and Prussian recruiters at Marion-burgh, with whom, having no money, I ate, drank, listened to their proposals, gave them hopes for the morrow, and departed by daybreak.

March 17.--To Elbing, four miles.

Here I met with my former worthy tutor, Brodowsky, who was become a captain and auditor in the Polish regiment of Golz. He met me just as I entered the town. I followed triumphantly to his quarters; and here at length ended the painful, long, and adventurous journey I had been obliged to perform.

This good and kind gentleman, after providing me with immediate necessaries, wrote so affectionately to my mother, that she came to Elbing in a week, and gave me every aid of which I stood in need.

The pleasure I had in meeting once more this tender mother, whose qualities of heart and mind were equally excellent, was inexpressible.

She found a certain mode of conveying a letter to my dear mistress at Berlin, who a short time after sent me a bill of exchange for four hundred ducats upon Dantzic. To this my mother added a thousand rix-dollars, and a diamond cross worth nearly half as much, remained a fortnight with me, and persisted, in spite of all remonstrance, in advising me to go to Vienna. My determination had been fixed for Petersburg; all my fears and apprehensions being awakened at the thought of Vienna, and which indeed afterwards became the source of all my cruel sufferings and sorrows. She would not yield in opinion, and promised her future a.s.sistance only in case of my obedience; it was my duty not to continue obstinate. Here she left me, and I have never seen her since.

She died in 1751, and I have ever held her memory in veneration. It was a happiness for this affectionate mother that she did not hive to be a witness of my afflictions in the year 1754.

An adventure, resembling that of Joseph in Egypt, happened to me in Elbing. The wife of the worthy Brodowsky, a woman of infinite personal attraction, grew partial to me; but I durst not act ungratefully by my benefactor. Never to see me more was too painful to her, and she even proposed to follow me, secretly, to Vienna. I felt the danger of my situation, and doubted whether Potiphar's wife offered temptations so strong as Madame Brodowsky. I owned I had an affection for this lady, but my pa.s.sions were overawed. She preferred me to her husband, who was in years, and very ordinary in person. Had I yielded to the slightest degree of guilt, that of the present enjoyment, a few days of pleasure must have been followed by years of bitter repentance.

Having once more a.s.sumed my proper name and character, and made presents of acknowledgment to the worthy tutor of my youth, I became eager to return to Thorn.

How great was my joy at again meeting my honest Sch.e.l.l! The kind old woman had treated him like a mother. She was surprised, and half terrified, at seeing me enter in an officer's uniform, and accompanied by two servants. I gratefully and rapturously kissed her hand, repaid, with thankfulness, every expense (for Sch.e.l.l had been nurtured with truly maternal kindness), told her who I was, acknowledged the deceit I had put upon her concerning her son, but faithfully promised to give a true, and not fict.i.tious account of him, immediately on my arrival at Vienna.

Sch.e.l.l was ready in three days, and we left Thorn, came to Warsaw, and pa.s.sed thence, through Crakow, to Vienna.

I inquired for Captain Capi, at Bilitz, who had before given me so kind a reception, and refused me satisfaction; but he was gone, and I did not meet with him till some years after, when the cunning Italian made me the most humble apologies for his conduct. So goes the world.

My journey from Dantzic to Vienna would not furnish me with an interesting page, though my travels on foot thither would have afforded thrice as much as I have written, had I not been fearful of trifling with the reader's patience.

In poverty one misfortune follows another. The foot-pa.s.senger sees the world, becomes acquainted with it, converses with men of every cla.s.s. The lord luxuriously lolls and slumbers in his carriage, while his servants pay innkeepers and postillions, and pa.s.ses rapidly over a kingdom, in which he sees some dozen houses, called inns; and this he calls travelling. I met with more adventures in this my journey of 169 miles, than afterwards in almost as many thousand, when travelling at ease, in a carriage.

Here, then, ends my journal, in which, from the hardships therein related, and numerous others omitted, I seem a kind of second Robinson Crusoe, and to have been prepared, by a gradual increase and repet.i.tion of sufferings, to endure the load of affliction which I was afterwards destined to bear.

Arrived at Vienna in the month of April, 1747.

And now another act of the tragedy is going to begin.

CHAPTER IX.

After having defrayed the expenses of travelling for me and my friend Sch.e.l.l, for whose remarkable history I will endeavour to find a few pages in due course, I divided the three hundred ducats which remained with him, and, having stayed a month at Vienna, he went to join the regiment of Pallavicini, in which he had obtained a lieutenant-colonel's commission, and which was then in Italy.

Here I found my cousin, Baron Francis Trenck, the famous partisan and colonel of pandours, imprisoned at the a.r.s.enal, and involved in a most perplexing prosecution.

This Trenck was my father's brother's son. His father had been a colonel and governor of Leitschau, and had possessed considerable lordships in Sclavonia, those of Pleternitz, Prestowacz, and Pakratz. After the siege of Vienna, in 1683, he had left the Prussian service for that of Austria, in which he remained sixty years.

That I may not here interrupt my story, I shall give some account of the life of my cousin Baron Francis Trenck, so renowned in the war of 1741, in another part, and who fell, at last, the shameful sacrifice of envy and avarice, and received the reward of all his great and faithful services in the prison of the Spielberg.

The vindication of the family of the Trencks requires I should speak of him; nor will I, in this, suffer restraint from the fear of any man, however powerful. Those indeed who sacrificed a man most ardent in his country's service to their own private and selfish views, are now in their graves.

I shall insert no more of his history here than what is interwoven with my own, and relate the rest in its proper place.

A revision of his suit was at this time inst.i.tuted. Scarcely was I arrived in Vienna before his confidential agent, M. Leber, presented me to Prince Charles and the Emperor; both knew the services of Trenck, and the malice of his enemies; therefore, permission for me to visit him in his prison, and procure him such a.s.sistance as he might need, was readily granted. On my second audience, the Emperor spoke so much in my persecuted cousin's favour that I became highly interested; he commanded me to have recourse to him on all occasions; and, moreover, owned the president of the council of war was a man of a very wicked character, and a declared enemy of Trenck. This president was the Count of Lowenwalde, who, with his a.s.sociates, had been purposely selected as men proper to oppress the best of subjects.

The suit soon took another face; the good Empress Queen, who had been deceived, was soon better informed, and Trenck's innocence appeared, on the revision of the process most evidently. The trial, which had cost them twenty-seven thousand florins, and the sentence which followed, were proved to have been partial and unjust; and that sixteen of Trenck's officers, who most of them had been broken for different offences, had perjured themselves to insure his destruction.

It is a most remarkable circ.u.mstance that public notice was given, in the _Vienna Gazette_, to the following purport.

"All those who have any complaints to make against Trenck, let them appear, and they shall receive a ducat per day, so long as the prosecution continues."

It will readily be imagined how fast his accusers would increase, and what kind of people they were. The pay of these witnesses alone amounted to fifteen thousand florins. I now began the labour in concurrence with Doctor Gerhauer, and the cause soon took another turn; but such was the state of things, it would have been necessary to have broken all the members of the council of war, as well as counsellor Weber, a man of great power. Thus, unfortunately, politics began to interfere with the course of justice.

The Empress Queen gave Trenck to understand she required he should ask her pardon; and on that condition all proceedings should be stopped, and he immediately set at liberty. Prince Charles, who knew the court of Vienna, advised me also to persuade my cousin to comply; but nothing could shake his resolution. Feeling his right and innocence, he demanded strict justice; and this made ruin more swift.

I soon learned Trenck must fall a sacrifice--he was rich--his enemies already had divided among them more than eighty thousand florins of his property, which was all sequestered, and in their hands. They had treated him too cruelly, and knew him too well, not to dread his vengeance the moment he should recover his freedom.

I was moved to the soul at his sufferings, and as he had vented public threats, at the prospect of approaching victory over his enemies, they gained over the Court Confessor: and, dreading him as they did, put every wily art in practice to insure his destruction. I therefore, in the fulness of my heart, made him the brotherly proposition of escaping, and, having obtained his liberty, to prove his innocence to the Empress Queen.

I told him my plan, which might easily have been put in execution, and which he seemed perfectly decided to follow.