1682 to 1683.
On the 8th December, 1682, the servants of Count Caprara had reached
Vienna with tidings of the enormous preparations of the Turks. The
reports from Hungary were also unfavourable, and the necessity for
immediate measures of defence was palpable as it was urgent. The first
requisite, money, was sought for in an impost of a hundredth part
of the means of the higher and lower nobility, and of the clergy,
usually exempt from such burthens, but considered liable in the case
of invasion by the enemy of Christendom. It was, however, to Poland
that Austria now looked with the deepest anxiety, though it must have
been with profound reluctance, and at first with little expectation of
success, that the Emperor could turn to that quarter for assistance.
The fate of Hungary at the least, and of the Austrian capital, hung,
however, on the success of Austrian diplomacy with the great soldier,
John Sobieski, who now filled the throne of Poland. His neutrality
alone would have left both to a certain fate, and even that neutrality
was hardly to be depended upon; for at a recent period French officers
in the service of Tekeli had been allowed to commence the levy of a
force in Poland for the support of that dangerous ally of the Turks.
Mohacs had been lost by the defection of Zapolya. John Sobieski as a
leader was as much superior to Zapolya as the 20,000 Sarmatian horse
which he and he alone could bring into the field were superior to
Zapolya’s Transylvanian cavalry. A long course of slights received
and interests thwarted had alienated him from the throne of Austria,
and cemented the connexion which his education, his marriage, and
his political interests had hitherto maintained with France. To
remove these obstacles it was necessary in the first instance for
the hereditary sovereign of the House of Hapsburg to concede to the
Elective King of Poland the title of Majesty. This was an act of
derogation which nothing but hard necessity could have wrung from
a sovereign so faithful to the traditions of Austrian etiquette as
Leopold. It was easier to hold out hopes, which he never intended to
realise, of more substantial advantages, of a marriage between Prince
James, the heir of Sobieski, and an Austrian Archduchess, and of the
establishment of themselves and their descendants on an hereditary
throne. The devices, however, of diplomacy would probably have been
unavailing to overthrow the influence of France, which was unceasingly
exerted against that of Vienna, but for an accident of the time.
“Porta salutis
Quâ minimè reris Graiâ pandetur ab urbe.”
The intrigues of the French court were defeated by those of a
Frenchwoman. Sobieski had espoused, in 1665, ten years before his
accession to the throne, Marie Casimire de la Grange, daughter of Henri
de la Grange, Marquis d’Arquien. She had early acquired an influence
over her husband, which she exerted in a manner almost uniformly
detrimental to his peace, his interests, and those of his kingdom;
and the wife of 41 continued now to exercise over the consort of 53
the dangerous fascination of a mistress. It pleased that Providence,
which so frequently works out its greatest designs by contemptible
instruments, to disappoint this woman in an intrigue which she had
set on foot at Versailles for the elevation of her father to a French
dukedom. On her announcement of an intended journey to France, question
had been raised in this quarter also as to that title of Majesty
which has been mentioned as affecting her husband’s relations with
Austria. These, and such as these, were the influences which are said
at this critical moment to have caused the scale to descend in favour
of Austria, to have outweighed the uxorious Sobieski’s recollections
of his education in France, to have saved Vienna and rescued Hungary
from Mahometan rule. That other and sounder considerations had not
their influence upon Sobieski’s decision, it would be preposterous to
suppose. Sincere and earnest to the verge of bigotry in his attachment
to the Romish form of Christianity, he could not look with indifference
to the probable success of the Turkish arms in Hungary and Austria.
He had received, however, assurances from Turkey that in the event
of his continued neutrality the Polish frontier should be kept free
from invasion. To that neutrality he was in strictness bound by the
fidelity with which the Ottoman Porte had observed the engagements
of her last pacification with Poland—a fidelity which all historians
agree has usually characterized the proceedings of the Porte, and
which stands out in strong and frequent contrast with the practice
of Christian States. Relying on the faith of treaties, Mohammed IV.
had left the important fortress of Kaminiec and the frontier of
Podolia unguarded; and if Sobieski had sought for an excuse to avoid
alliance with Austria, he might have found it in the obligations of
the Treaty of Zurawno, which had been so faithfully observed by the
Turks. Rome, however, was at hand to dispense with these obligations
towards the infidel. Advisers meanwhile were not wanting to suggest
that by continuing awhile a spectator of a struggle which must produce
exhaustion on either side, and by striking in at the proper time and
in the proper quarter, Sobieski might best find occasion to recover
from the Turk the much coveted fortress of Kaminiec. It was under such
circumstances that the good genius of Christendom stepped in in the
disguise of an intriguing Frenchwoman. Influenced for once in a right
and sound direction by his wife, and inspired by the memories of former
victories, among others of that great battle of Choczim, in which he
had seen the turbans floating thick as autumnal leaves on the Dniester,
he flung his powerful frame into the saddle and his great soul into the
cause, and gladly forgot, in the congenial occupation of collecting and
recruiting his reduced and scattered army, the perpetual intrigues of
his court and household. By the treaty now concluded the two sovereigns
contracted a mutual obligation to assist each other against the Turk,
bringing into the field respectively 60,000 and 40,000 men. The Emperor
conceded a questionable claim to the salt-mines of Wieliezka, and the
more important point of a pretension to the eventual succession to the
crown of Poland in favour of his son. He was well advised to exact
that the treaty should be ratified by the solemn sanction of an oath
administered by a Cardinal Legate. There is no doubt that the sense
entertained by Sobieski of the obligation of this oath had a serious
influence on his subsequent conduct. By a precaution to which Pascal,
had he been alive, might have referred as illustrative of the practices
which spring from the school of Loyola, the two parties to this oath
bound themselves not to resort to the Pope for any dispensation from
its observance. How far it was logical and consistent thus to limit
the Pope’s power, and confine its valid operation to one dispensation,
it is not for Protestants to decide. The Abbé Coyer quotes this as a
secret article. Possibly at the moment the parties were ashamed of
it; but it is extant in the copy of the treaty printed in Dumont’s
_Corps Universel Diplomatique_, 1731. It was agreed that, should
either sovereign take the field in person, the chief command should
be vested in him. This article was doubtless intended to effect the
purpose, which it accomplished, of turning to practical account the
acknowledged military talents of Sobieski, and the terror which his
name excited among the Turks. No provision is made in the treaty for
the contingency of the appearance of both sovereigns in the field.
Leopold was no soldier; and though he at one time threatened a visit to
the army, from which he was judiciously dissuaded by his confessor, it
is not probable that he ever contemplated an appearance on the field of
battle. An anecdote however is current that, after the great success
before Vienna, he reproached his minister, Sinzendorf, for having
advised his absence from the field, with so much bitterness, that the
latter died of the infliction. If this had been believed at the time,
it is not probable that Sobieski would have failed to report so piquant
an anecdote in his correspondence with his wife.
In Poland as well as in Austria time was required to bring into the
field the forces promised on all hands; and in the mean time the
Austrian frontier was uncovered, for the Imperial army under command
of the brave and experienced Duke Charles of Lorraine, stationed
in the neighbourhood of Presburg, scarcely amounted to 33,000 men.
From this scanty force garrisons were to be drawn for Raab, Komorn,
Leopoldstadt, and Presburg—two flying corps to be furnished against
the first advance of the enemy on the Raab and the Mur, and with the
overplus the Austrian monarchy was to be upheld till the promised
succours should appear. Austria was fortunate in the leader upon whom
these difficult and complicated duties devolved. Trained to arms
against the Turks under Montecuculi, and against Condé under William
of Nassau, Charles Leopold, Duke of Lorraine, had matured his military
talents, in independent command, against the armies of France, through
several scientific campaigns on the Rhine and in Flanders. He was now
in a situation which required him to call forth all the resources
acquired in such schools as these, and which demanded a cautious and
patient application of strategical and tactical lore to retrieve the
disadvantages of vast disparity of numbers and great local difficulties
of position. To make any serious stand against the first rush of the
invaders with the small force at his command was impossible, and his
first duty was to save from destruction an army outflanked and nearly
surrounded, upon the extrication of which the ultimate preservation
of the capital depended. It was manifest, under these circumstances,
that Vienna must again bide the brunt of the storm. The shape of the
city was nearly what it had been in 1529, and what it still continues,
but the defences had been improved under Ferdinand III. and Leopold I.
The entire population of the neighbouring country were now summoned
by Imperial edict to labour on the outworks, and to fell trees for
palisades. On the fortifications themselves 3000 labourers were daily
employed, and the families in the suburbs were called upon to furnish a
man from each house for two months for the same object. Elevated spots
within range of the walls, and the nearer houses, as in 1529, were
levelled, and upwards of 30,000 palisades of solid oak prepared and
disposed. On the 20th March the labourers mustered from all sides, and
the work of fortification went on from that date with regularity, but
slowly, from the insufficient supply of tools and materials. By another
edict every citizen was summoned under heavy penalties to furnish
himself with provisions, for a year’s consumption, within the space of
a month. Those clearly unable to do so were directed to quit the city.
While these measures were in progress hostilities had commenced in
Upper Hungary. The Pacha of Neuhaüsel received orders under pain of the
bowstring to make himself master of the Schütt island of the Danube. He
attempted in the middle of February to pass the river for this purpose
on the ice, but it broke, and he was compelled to retire with a loss
of 90 men. On the 8th of March he repeated the attempt with 2000 men,
but after a partial success, was driven back into the fortress with
loss by the Imperialist, Colonel Castelli. Other places, however, of
small note fell into the hands of the Turks, and the tide of war rolled
steadily on towards Vienna. On the 6th of May the Emperor reviewed the
army near Kitsee, but it had as yet received no material accession to
its strength. Hungary, although at a Diet held in Oedenburg it had
promised a levy en masse, had as yet scarcely furnished 3000 men,
under the Palatine Esterhazy, a number insufficient to protect the
shores of the Raab and the Danube from the predatory excursions of the
Turkish garrison of Pesth. The Emperor, accompanied by such of the
princes of the empire as were present, inspected the army, distributed
500,000 florins among the troops, and caused the Pope’s indulgence to
be read to them by the Primate of Hungary, the Archbishop of Gran. In
a council of war, in which it is probable the Lorraine was overruled
by the influence of the court, it was determined to adopt the course,
difficult if not impossible, of taking the initiative of hostilities
in Hungary, on the reliance that the main army of the Turks could
not be in presence before July, and in the hope of encouraging the
troops by some preliminary success. It was first proposed to lay siege
to Gran; but as it was found impossible to close the passage of its
supplies by the Danube, and 20,000 men were moving from Pesth to its
relief, this enterprise was abandoned, and the army encamped on the
3rd of June before Neuhaüsel. The Pacha made answer to a summons that
the Imperialists should learn to what kind of men the Sultan confided
his fortresses, and he was as good as his word. The Imperialists had
carried the suburbs and attacked the body of the place when they were
driven back by a successful sally with the loss of two young volunteers
of distinction, the Counts Taxis and Kazianer. The report also reached
them of the approach of the Turkish main army, and of the wide-spread
irruption of its forerunners, the Tartar cavalry, which threatened
their line of retreat. On the 10th June this siege without an object
was raised, and the army withdrew along the Danube, but not without
loss from sallies of the enemy. Garrisons were hastily flung into Raab,
Komorn, and Leopoldstadt, sufficient for their defence should the enemy
leave them in his rear. The army, reduced by this draft on its numbers
to about 12,000 foot and 11,000 horse, took up the best position it
could find between the Raab and Raduitz, and there awaited the approach
of the enemy.