IV.
While the Emperor’s prospects of help from the countries ruled by himself grew thus more and more unfavorable, his applications for aid from foreign lands were no better received. The Duke of Bavaria and the German bishops were deaf to his entreaties for money and the materials of war, and the King of Spain alone, as will be narrated hereafter, offered him help. On the contrary, the prospects of the Bohemians for foreign aid grew more favorable—at least one of the most prominent of the princes of the Empire, the Elector of the Palatinate, assured them of the most ample support. The Bohemian insurrection had indeed nowhere given rise to greater satisfaction than at Heidelberg. Without waiting for a message from the Bohemian Estates, immediately upon the first news of the events at Prague, the Elector, Frederic V., dispatched thither, as confidential agent, Conrad Pawel, in order to obtain an exact account of the range and circumference of the rising in Bohemia. The letters sent home by the envoy gave the highest satisfaction, and left no doubt that the matter involved a fearful contest with the power of the Hapsburgs. It was decided therefore to dispatch to Prague a man of high position, whom the Estates might be expected to meet with their confidence, and through whom a further union might be effected. Christian, of Anhalt, would have been the best person for this mission; but it would not do, on account of the prominence in which, for ten years already past, he had stood, to think of him, as this would alarm the Emperor at once. For this reason Count Albert von Solms, who, as marshal of the Elector’s court, had won distinction, was chosen.
