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CHAPTER II.

THE OUTBREAK OF THE WAR.

I. Election of the King of Hungary.II. Position of the Emperor Matthias and King Ferdinand relatively to the Bohemian Insurrection: Khlesl’s Fall.III. Efforts of the Emperor and the Bohemians to obtain Allies.IV. The Elector of the Palatinate, the Duke of Savoy, and Count Mansfeld.V. The Outbreak of the War, and Z̃erotín’s [Dgeroteen] Mediation.VI. The Emperor’s Attempt to adjust amicably the Bohemian Contest, and the Manner in which the Insurgents received this.

I.

WHILE at Prague was being performed the opening act of that tragedy as a consequence of which millions of human beings were precipitated into miseries unspeakable, Ferdinand was in Hungary seeking recognition there also as successor of the Emperor. To this end Matthias had convoked a Diet of the kingdom to meet at Presburg on the 23d of March, 1618, and demanded of the same that it accept and crown his cousin Ferdinand as though he were a son. Here, also, the use of the word “elect” was carefully avoided. The design of the court, and especially that of Ferdinand, was to obtain the Hungarian crown under the same conditions as were connected with that of Bohemia. The Diet in Bohemia had been pleased to acknowledge his hereditary right; the Hungarians were expected to do the same. But the grounds were not so decisive here for the lineal right of the Hapsburgs, nor could it be hoped that Hungary would yield readily to

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