CHAPTER XXVI.

WALLENSTEIN.

Such was the story revealed to us by the little manuscript book of Kœningheim, who, wandering from his native land, had sought death among the armies of the Empire, but found honour, rank, wealth, and distinction heaped upon him; for, until now, in every field he had escaped unharmed, and seemed to bear a charmed life, for against his breast the bullet had failed, and the steel lost its point.

Ernestine and I kept the secret between ourselves, and to her care I consigned the little manuscript book, which we resolved to preserve as a relic or souvenir of a brave but unfortunate friend. He was buried with all the military honours of his rank.

King Christian ordered the royal standard to be half hoisted on the _Anna Catharina_, the yards to be topped up in various directions, and the rigging to be thrown into loops and bights; and, under a salute of cannon, the body was lowered into a boat, and slowly pulled ashore. It was the evening of a beautiful and sunny day, but I do not remember to have seen a scene more solemn. The brave and venerable King of Denmark stood bareheaded on the deck, and his single eye glistened with self-gratification at the last honours he was thus enabled to render the bravest of his enemies--one whose valour had mainly contributed to the defeat of the Danes at Lütter.

All the officers of the little fleet and army attended the interment, and three companies of our regiment (M'Alpine's, Kildon's, and my own) formed the firing party. The muffled drum rolled; the shrill fife and the solemn war-pipe poured their saddest wail; and after a prayer from the Rev. Gideon Geddes, our preacher, we lowered him into Danish ground, by the shore of the Baltic sea, whose tideless waves were chafing and rippling on the yellow sand, within a pike-length of his dark and solitary grave.

Close by, a choir of birds sang joyously among a group of green birches and copper beeches; the sun of one of the loveliest days of summer was setting at the far and flat horizon, and between the thickets it poured upon the open grave a flood of that warm light which was dying away on the blue waters of the sea. Three hundred bright musket-barrels flashed thrice in the sun, as they were raised with muzzles skyward for the parting volley.

Then the drums rolled, while the pioneers heaped the sandy earth above him, and all was over.

It was an open and somewhat desert spot; near were three earthen tumuli, where perhaps the warriors of some remote and unknown battle lay. These rose to the height of twenty feet above the wavelike ridges of the coast; and between them lay a small morass, with the roots and trunks of vast pines imbedded in the moss--the remnants of some mighty forest, that of old had shrouded the unhallowed rites to the spirit of Loda.

There was no stone to speak to other years--as our mountain songs have it--to tell his fame to other times; and thus the nameless grave of the poor Scottish wanderer was left in its solitude by the sandy shore of the Baltic sea.

There is ever something solemn, touching, and mysterious about a grave that is solitary; it seems loneliness made more lonely, especially if it is the last resting-place of a stranger--an unknown or a nameless person. Thus it is more than probable, that in time the honest Holsteiners may have framed some dark legend concerning the Scotsman's grave, for oral transmission to the children of their children. But now to resume my own narrative.

Finding that the redoubt or sconce erected on the coast was of considerable strength, and by its elevation a garrison would be able to defend it on the landward, and keep all the adjacent country in check, while from the seaward they could be supplied with every provision,--after some skirmishing with the Imperialists from Kiel, and having one smart encounter, wherein Ian, with two companies of our regiment, handled Wingarti's dragoons (who endeavoured to turn our flank) in such a manner, that to their dying hour they would never forget the Scottish invincibles--King Christian drew all off on board of his ships, except some of old Colonel Dübbelsteirn's Dutch companies, who were left to defend the place; and who--if ultimately taken--would be no great loss.

We then put to sea.

This measure was rendered imperative by certain tidings which, about this time, old Baron Fœyœ brought from the sequestered court of Anna Catharina, concerning the siege of the free, and hitherto peaceful, city of Stralsund.

Wallenstein the Duke of Friedland, as generalissimo of the Emperor by sea and land, had resolved to sweep the shores as well as the waters of the Baltic. By shipping from Dantzig and the Hanse towns, he had carried the war to the other side of that shallow ocean, and pursued the Danes into the heart of their own isles. In the prosecution of his daring and ambitious plans of conquest, he hoped to cut off all communication between the states of Lower Germany and the Scandinavian kings; and by the aid of Poland--which was already dependent on Vienna--he hoped to stretch the authority of Ferdinand II. from the Sound of Elsineur to the shores of the Adriatic.

Such was the _avowed_ intention of this great general; but in his inner heart he nursed one greater and more daring scheme, which was nothing less than to acquire territory and found a power, that, together with the army, which by his bravery, tact, and lavish generosity adored him, he might be enabled to throw off the yoke of that empire he was pretending to extend, and thus found a regal dynasty of his own.

In pursuance of this gigantic view he resolved to seize Stralsund, a city of the Baltic--the sixth of the Hanseatic League. It had remained peaceful during this disastrous war, pursuing those habits of industry which had secured it so many privileges from the Dukes of Pomerania; but its noble harbour, and vicinity to the coasts of Sweden and Denmark, made its possession necessary to the conqueror. He sent Campmaster-general Arnheim to the burghers, requiring them to receive an Imperial garrison; but they wisely refused, and betook them to their muskets and morions, buff-coats and halberts. He then sent Colonel Goëtz, who merely requested permission to march the enormous and disorderly army of Austria through the city; but the burgomaster was too wary, and this also was refused. Then the gates were closed and cannon loaded; the city stood upon its defence, and Wallenstein besieged it with a fury, the greater because it lay so near his newly acquired dukedom of Mechlenburg, and barred his way to mightier conquests. He poured his brigades through Pomerania, made the Duke Bogislaus IV. a prisoner; and after receiving £25,000 from the Stralsunders, as a bribe to leave them, unmolested, coolly put the money into his treasury, and then attacked the city with the greatest determination, investing it on all sides; but left Arnheim and the Count of Carlstein to press the siege, while he went to scourge the citizens of Gustrow, the capital of Mechlenburg, a duchy which had just been bestowed upon him by Ferdinand.

Such were the tidings brought to the king by the Baron Fœyœ,as we lay under easy sail in the Fehmer-sund, about the end of summer, and he was thunderstruck by the intelligence; for if Stralsund fell, the free navigation of the Baltic would be for ever lost, alike to Sweden and to Denmark.

Without an hour's delay, he despatched the Baron Karl on an embassy to the great Gustavus Adolphus, begging that they might now forget their petty jealousies, and unite to save the Stralsunders. Karl made good speed with his mission, and the famous treaty of 1628, concluded soon after, was its result. The northern kings bound themselves to combine for the defence of the city, and to oppose every hostile power in the Baltic. Gustavus offered to send Sir Alexander Leslie of Balgonie with five thousand Scottish troops, while Christian was to furnish a squadron of ships; and this squadron that gallant prince resolved to lead in person.

Elsineur was to be the muster-place, and all the remains of our slender garrisons in Zealand, Laaland, and Falster, and every man who could handle a musket in the king's service, was ordered to repair there by an appointed day.