THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
gave a ball in our honor, all competition with the Viennese for the favors of the fair sex was in vain. But it was not their outward appearance alone that distinguished them. They were men of marked ability and already had a history behind them which made them an object of general interest and appealed in a high degree to the imagination.
Nowhere had the university students played so important and prominent a part in the revolutionary movement as in Vienna. To them was largely owing the uprising that drove Prince Metternich from power. The “academic legion,” which they organized and which, if I am not mistaken, counted about 6000 men, formed the nucleus of the armed power of the revolution. In the “central committee,” which consisted of an equal number of students and members of the citizens' guard, and which stood for the will of the people as against the government, they exercised a preponderant influence. Deputations of citizens and peasants came from all parts of Austria to present their grievances and petitions to the “Aula,” the headquarters of the students, which had suddenly risen as an authority omnipotent in the opinion of the multitude. When the imperial ministry was about to promulgate a new press-law, which indeed abolished the censorship but still contained many restrictions, its chief requested the students to express their judgment about that law. And on May 15 the students at the head of the armed people forced the government by their determined attitude to revoke the constitution which the government had framed on its own authority, and to promise the convocation of the constituent assembly. The students successfully maintained their organization against various attempts of the government to dissolve it. They compelled the ministry to agree to the removal of the soldiery from the city of Vienna and to the formation of a committee of public
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