THE LAST DREAM OF GLORY.
Destiny was testing the fortitude of the emperor with unrelenting
harshness. It would seem that inflexible fate stood by, while one by one
this man's hopes of fame, honor, and love were wrested away, that the
world might see and know how much of bitterness and disappointment it is
in the power of one human heart to endure.
In the Netherlands and in Hungary he was threatened with rebellion. The
Magyars especially resented the violation of their constitutional
rights; in Tyrol, too, the people were disaffected; and Rome had not yet
pardoned him the many indignities she had endured at his hands. This
very war, which he had welcomed as a cure for his domestic sorrows, was
yielding him naught but annoyance and misery.
Yes, destiny had decreed that nothing which he undertook should prosper.
His army, which was encamped in the damp marshes that lie between the
Danube and Save, was attacked by a malarious fever more destructive by
far than the bloodiest struggle that ever reddened the field of battle.
The hospitals were crowded with the sick and dying, and the enfeebled
soldiers, who dragged themselves about their ramps, wore sullen and
discontented faces; a spirit of insubordination was beginning to
manifest itself among the troops, and the very men who would have rushed
to the cannon's mouth, grew cowardly at the approach of the invisible
foe that stole away their lives, by the gradual and insidious poison of
disease. The songs and jests of the bivouac were hushed, the white tents
were mournful as sepulchres, and the men lost all confidence in their
leaders. They now accused the emperor and Lacy of incapacity, and
declared that they must either be disbanded or led against the enemy.
This was precisely what Joseph had been longing to do, but he was
compelled to await the advance of the Russians, with whom it had been
arranged that the Austrians were to take a junction before they marched
into Turkey. The Russians, however, had never joined the emperor; for
some misunderstanding with Sweden had compelled the czarina to defend
her northern frontier, and so she had as yet been unable to assemble an
army of sufficient strength to march against Turkey. Joseph then was
condemned to the very same inaction which had so chafed his spirit in
Bavaria; for his own army of itself was not numerous enough to attack
the enemy. He could not snake a move without Russia. Russia tarried, and
the fever in the camp grew every day more fatal.
Instead of advancing, the heart-sick emperor was forced to retreat. His
artillery was withdrawn to Peterwardein, and the siege of Belgrade
entirely relinquished. Disease and death followed the Austrians to
their new encampment, and louder grew the mutterings of the men,
and more bitter their denunciations of the emperor.
They little knew that while they were assailed by physical infirmities,
their hapless chieftain was sick both in body and mind. He shared all
their hardships, and watched them with most unremitting solicitude. He
erected camp hospitals, and furnished the sick with wine and delicacies
which he ordered from Vienna for their use. All military etiquette was
suspended; even the approach of the emperor for the time being was to be
ignored. Those who were lying down were to remain lying, those who were
sitting were to keep their seats.
Meanwhile Joseph walked daily through the hospitals, bestowing care and
kindness upon all, and no man there remarked that the deadly malaria had
affected him in an equal degree with his troops. Heat, hardships, and
disappointment had done their work as effectually upon the
commander-in-chief as upon the common soldier; but no one suspected that
fever was consuming his life; for by day, Joseph was the Providence of
his army, and by night, while his men were sleeping, he was attending to
the affairs of his vast empire. He worked as assiduously in camp as he
had ever done at home in his palace. Every important measure of the
regency was submitted to him for approval; the heads of the several
departments of state were required to send him their reports; and many a
night, surrounded by heaps of dispatches, he sat at his little table, in
the swampy woods, whose noxious atmosphere was fitter for the snakes
that infested them than for human beings of whatever condition in life.
[In the archives of Vienna is preserved a dispatch of Joseph, written in
the open woods on the night before the taking of
Sabacz.--Gross-Hoffinger, iii., p. 464.]
One little ray of light relieved the darkness of this gloomy period.
This was the taking of the fortress of Sabacz where Joseph led the
assault in person. Three cannoneers were shot by his side, and their
blood bespattered his face and breast. But in the midst of danger he
remained perfectly composed, and for many a day his countenance had not
beamed with an expression of such animated delight. This success,
however, was no more than a lightning-flash relieving the darkness of a
tempestuous night. The fortress won, the Austrians went back to their
miserable encampment in the sickly morasses of Siebenburgen.
Suddenly the stagnant quiet was broken by the announcement that the
Turks had crossed the Danube. This aroused the army from their sullen
stupor, and Joseph, as if freed from an incubus, joyfully prepared
himself for action.
The trumpet's shrill call was heard in the camp, and the army commenced
their march. They had advanced but a few miles when they were met by
several panic-stricken regiments, who announced that the Austrian lines
had been broken in two places, that General Papilla had been forced to
retreat, and that the victorious Turks were pouring their vast hordes
into Hungary.
Like wildfire the tidings spread through the army, and they, too, began
their retreat, farther and yet farther back; for, ever as they moved,
they were lighted on their way by the burning villages and towns that
were the tokens of a barbarous enemy's approach. The homeless fugitives,
too, rent the air with their cries, and clamored for protection against
the cruel infidel.
No protection could they find, for the Austrians were too few in number
to confront the devastating hosts of the invading army. They were still
compelled to retreat as far as the town of Lugos, where at last they
might rest from the dreadful fatigues of this humiliating flight. With
inexpressible relief, the soldiers sought repose. They were ordered,
however, to sleep on their arms, so that the artilleryman was by his
cannon, the mounted soldier near his horse, and the infantry, clasping
their muskets, lay in long rows together, all forgetting every thing
save the inestimable blessing of stretching their limbs and wooing
sleep.
The mild summer moon looked down upon their rest, and the emperor, as he
made a last tour of inspection to satisfy himself that all lights were
extinguished, rejoiced to think that the Turks were far away, and his
tired Austrians could sleep secure.
Joseph returned to his tent, that is, his caleche. He, too, was
exhausted, and closed his eves with a sense of delicious languor. The
night air, blowing about his temples, refreshed his fevered brow, and he
gave himself up to dreams such as are inspired by the silvered
atmosphere, when the moon, in her pearly splendor, looks down upon the
troubled earth, and hushes it to repose.
The emperor, however, did not sleep. For a while, he lay with closed
eyes, and then, raising himself, looked up toward the heavens. Gradually
the sky darkened; cloud met cloud and obscured the moon's disk, until at
last the firmament was clothed in impenetrable blackness. The emperor,
with a sad smile, thought how like the scene had been to the panorama of
his life, wherein every star had set, and whence every ray of light had
fled forever!
He dreamed on, while his tired men slept. Not all, however, for, far
toward the left wing of the army, a band of hussars were encamped around
a wagon laden with brandy, and, having much more confidence in the
restorative powers of liquor than of sleep, they had been invigorating
themselves with deep potations. Another company of soldiers in their
neighborhood, awakened by the noisy mirth of the hussars, came forward
to claim their share of the brandy. It was refused, and a brawl ensued,
in which the assailants were repulsed.
The hussars, having driven them from the field, proceeded to celebrate
their victory by renewed libations, until finally, in a state of
complete inebriation, they fell to the ground, and there slept the sleep
of the intoxicated.
The men who had been prevented from participating in these drunken
revels resolved to revenge themselves by a trick. They crept stealthily
up to the spot where the hussars were lying, and, firing off their
muskets, cried out, "The Turks! the Turks!"
Stupefied by liquor, the sleepers sprang up, repeating the cry. It was
caught and echoed from man to man, while the hussars, with unsheathed
sabres, ran wildly about, until hundreds and hundreds were awakened,
each one echoing the fearful words--
"The Turks! the Turks!"
"Halt! halt!" cried a voice to the terrified soldiers. "Halt, men,
halt!"
The bewildered ears mistook the command for the battle-cry of the Turks,
"Allah! Allah!" and the panic increased tenfold. "We are surrounded!"
shrieked the terror-stricken Austrians, and every sabre was drawn, and
every musket cocked. The struggle began; and the screams of the
combatants, the groans of the wounded, the sighs of the dying filled the
air, while comrade against comrade, brother against brother, stood in
mortal strife and slew each other for the unbelieving Turk.
The calamity was irretrievable. The darkness of the night deceived every
man in that army, not one of whom doubted that the enemy was there. Some
of the terrified soldiers fled back to their camps, and, even there,
mistaken for Turks, they were assaulted with sabre and musket, and
frightful was the carnage that ensued!
In vain the officers attempted to restore discipline. There was no more
reason in those maddened human beings than in the raging waves of the
ocean--The emperor, at the first alarm, had driven in his caleche to the
place whence the sound seemed to come.
But what to a panic-stricken multitude was the voice of their emperor?
Ball after ball whistled past his ears, while he vainly strove to make
them understand that they were each one slaying his brother! And the
night was so hideous, so relentless in its darkness! Not one star
glimmered upon the face of the frightful pall above--the stars would not
look upon that fratricidal stuggle!
The fugitives and their infuriated pursuers pressed toward a little
bridge which spanned a stream near the encampment. The emperor drove
rapidly around, and reached the banks of the river before them, hoping
thence to be heard by his men, and to convince them that no Turks were
by.
But they heeded the sound of his voice no more than the sea heeded that
of the royal Canute. Trey precipitated themselves toward the bridge,
driving the carriage of the emperor before them to the very edge of the
steep river-bank. It wavered; they pushed against it with the butt-ends
of their muskets. They saw nothing--they knew nothing save that the
carriage impeded their flight!
It fell, rumbling down the precipice into the deep waters which bubbled
and hissed and then closed over it forever. No man heeded its fall. Not
one of all that crowd, which oft had grown hoarse with shouts at his
coming, paused to save the emperor from destruction. But he, calm and
courageous, although at that moment he could have parted with life
without a sigh, had made a desperate spring backward, and had alighted
on the ground.
When he recovered from the violence of the fall, he found himself
unhurt, but alone. Not one of his suite was to be seen; in the mad rush
of the men for the crossing, they had been parted from him. The little
rustic bridge bad fallen in, and those who remained behind had rushed
with frantic yells in search of some other crossing. The emperor could
hear their cries in the distance, and they filled his heart with anguish
inexpressible.
With desponding eyes he gazed upward, and murmured, "Oh, that I could
die before the sun rises upon the horrors of this night My soul is
weary--my every hope dead. Why did I turn back when death was smiling
from the crystal depths of that placid stream? Even now, I may still
find rest. Who will ever know how the emperor met his fate?" He paused,
and looked around to see if any thing was nigh. Nothing! He made one
step forward, then shuddering, recoiled with an exclamation of horror at
his miserable cowardice.
"No!" cried he, resolutely, "no, I will not die--I must not, dare not
die. I cannot go to the grave misjudged and calumniated by my own
subjects! I must live, that, sooner or later, they may learn how
faithfully I have striven to make them happy! I must live to convince
them that the promotion of their welfare has been the end and aim of my
whole life!" [Footnote: The emperor's own words.--Hubner, ii., p. 488.]
At that moment there was a rent in the blackened firmament, and the moon
emerged, gradually lighting up the dark waters and the lonely woods,
until its beams shone full upon the pale, agitated features of that
broken-hearted monarch.
"The emperor!" cried a loud voice, not far away. "The emperor!" and a
rider, galloping forward, threw himself from his horse.
"Here, your majesty, here is my horse. Mount him. He is a sure and fleet
animal."
"You know me, then?" asked Joseph.
"Yes, sire; I am one of your majesty's grooms. Will you do me the honor
to accept my horse?"
The emperor replied by swinging himself into the saddle. "But you, my
good fellow, what will you do?"
"I shall accompany your majesty," replied the groom, cheerfully. "There
is many a horse seeking its master to-night, and it will not be long
before i capture one. If it please your majesty, I will conduct you to
Karansches. The moon has come out beautifully, and I can easily find the
way."
"I have found MY way," murmured the emperor to himself. "God has pointed
it out to me, by sending help in this dark, lonely hour. Well, life has
called me back, and I must bear its burdens until Heaven releases me."
Just then a horse cane by, at full speed. The groom, who was walking by
the emperor's side, darted forward, seized the reins, and swung himself
triumphantly into the saddle.
"Now, sire," said he, "we can travel lustily ahead. We are on the right
road, and in one hour will reach Karansebes."
"Karansebes!" mused the emperor. "'Cara mini sedes!' Thus sang Ovid, and
from his ode a city took her name--the city where the poet found his
grave. A stately monument to Ovid is Karansebes; and now a lonely,
heart-sick monarch is coming to make a pilgrimage thither, craving of
Ovid's tomb the boon of a resting-place for his weary head. Oh, Cara
mihi sedes, where art thou?"
In the gray of the morning they reached Karansebes. Here they found some
few of the regiments, the emperor's suite, and his beloved nephew Franz,
who, like his uncle, had been almost hurried to destruction by the
hapless army, but had been rescued by his bold and faithful followers.
They had shielded the archduke with their own bodies, forming a square
around his person, and escorting him, so guarded, until they had
penetrated the dangerous ranks of the demented fugitives. [Footnote:
Hubner, ii:, p. 477.]
All danger was past, but the events of that night were too much for the
exhausted frame of the emperor. The fever, with which he had wrestled so
long, now mastered his body with such violence that he was no longer
able to mount his horse. Added to this, came a blow to his heart. The
army refused to follow him any longer. They called loudly for Loudon,
the old hero, who, in spite of his years, was the only man in Austria
who would lead them to victory.
The emperor, stung to the soul by the mistrust of his men, gave up his
last hope of military glory. He sent for Loudon; and Loudon, despite his
infirmities, came at the summons.
The old hero was received with shouts of welcome. The huzzas reached the
poor, mean room where Joseph lay sick with a burning fever. He listened
with a sad smile, but his courage gave way, and scalding tears of
disappointed ambition moistened his pillow. "Loudon has come," thought
he, "and the emperor is forgotten! No one cares for him more!--Well--I
must return to Vienna, and pray that the victory and fame, which have
been denied to me, may be vouchsafed to Loudon!"