Memorials and Other Papers — Volume 2 by Thomas De Quincey
page 68 of 295 (23%)
page 68 of 295 (23%)
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the city walls, and reporting to the spectators above, by their
agitation and affrighted eyes, those tumultuous disturbances in some remoter part of the forest, which had already reached them in an imperfect way, by the interrupted and recurring echoes of the points of war--charges or retreats--sounded upon the trumpet. But, whilst on the outside of her walls Klosterheim beheld even this unpopulous region all alive with military license and outrage, she suffered no violence from either party herself. This immunity she owed to her peculiar political situation. The emperor had motives for conciliating the city; the Swedes, for conciliating the Landgrave; indeed, they were supposed to have made a secret alliance with him, for purposes known only to the contracting parties. And the difference between the two patrons was simply this: that the emperor was sincere, and, if not disinterested, had an interest concurring with that of Klosterheim in the paternal protection which he offered; whereas the Swedes, in this, as in all their arrangements, regarding Germany as a foreign country, looked only to the final advantages of Sweden, or its German dependences, and to the weight which such alliances would procure them in a general pacification. And hence, in the war which both combined to make upon the forest, the one party professed to commit spoil upon the Landgrave, as distinguished from the city; whilst the Swedish allies of that prince prosecuted their ravages in the Landgrave's name, as essential to the support of his cause. For the present, however, the Swedes were the preponderant party in the neighborhood; they had fortified the chateau of Falkenberg, and made it a very strong military post; at the same time, however, sending in to Klosterheim whatsoever was valuable amongst the furniture of that establishment, with a care which of itself proclaimed the footing upon |
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