Vienna.]

SIEGES.

317

a distance of fifty-four English miles. The new works were inaugurated in the presence of the Emperor and his Court at a giant fountain placed in the middle of the city, which throws water to the height of 180 feet.

The wars in which Vienna and the Empire have been engaged are very numerous; the city has suffered many sieges, and probably no State in modern times has sustained more terrible reverses. From the year 1283, when the Duchy of Austria was bestowed

by the Emperor Rudolph on his son Albert, the city and the State have been periodically in trouble and conflict. In 1291, the nobles rose in rebellion against Albert, and at the same time the people broke out into revolt. Albert retired to a strong position in the Kahlenberg, summoned troops from Suabia, invested the town, and reduced the inhabitants by famine to propose a surrender. The submission was accepted, but the principal inhabitants were commanded to repair to the camp of Albert with their charters, which he tore to pieces, and abrogated all the privileges he considered to be opposed to his authority.

Although during the fourteenth century the nobles were often in rebellion, and the Austrian dominions were the scene of many disastrous conflicts, Vienna during that

period was in comparative peace, and, while continuing to increase in size, had leisure to found those collections of art and literature which are now its boast. The military ambition and rapacity of its rulers were, however, sources of continual trouble to the Viennese. In 1477, an unsuccessful siege of the city was undertaken by the Hungarians, but eight years later the attempt was repeated under Matthias, King of Hungary, who was this time successful, and the city was for a time under the rule of the Hungarian monarch.

Less than half a century later than this, Vienna was again called upon to sustain the horrors of a siege, this time by the Turks under Soliman the Magnificent. In 1562, having defeated and slain the King of Hungary, he immediately marched to the attack of Vienna, but after a protracted siege, was defeated, and his army routed with the loss of 80,000 men. The Turks again in 1683 were casting covetous eyes on Vienna and the Austrian dominion, and being tempted by the unsettled state of Hungary, Mohammed IV. was induced to make war with Austria. An army was accordingly despatched under the Grand Vizier Caza Mustapha, which penetrated to Vienna, and besieged that city, having first defeated the Austrians, under the Duke of Lorraine, before Neuhäusel, and compelled them to retire upon the capital. The night before Lorraine's arrival at Vienna, the Emperor and his Court had fled, amid the clamours and execrations of the people. Lorraine therefore, on his arrival, found the inhabitants in a state of extreme confusion and alarm; he heard on all sides nothing but reproaches against the Emperor and his ministers, whose conduct was by all attributed to the baneful influence of the Jesuits, a party which had for a long time been prominent in the Councils of the Court. Lorraine found the city entirely unprepared for resistance, surrounded by extensive and rapidly-growing suburbs, and in addition such fortifications as the city then possessed were in an utterly dilapidated condition. The energy and renown of the Duke, however, somewhat calmed the general apprehension. He with Starensberg, the governor left behind by the Emperor, promptly destroyed some of the more outlying suburbs, put the fortifications as far as possible in a state of repair, and so placed the city in a condition to offer some resistance to the approaching and victorious Turks. Lorraine left a reinforcement of 8,000 infantry in the city, and fell back with his cavalry beyond the Danube, with the view of harassing the movements and interrupting the communication of the Vizier's army, which, notwitstanding, arrived before Vienna on July 14th, 1688. In a very few days the investment of the city was completed. Frequeat attacks were made on its walls; the inhabitants were reduced to the last extremities for want of provisions, their numbers were sorely thinned both by sickness and in combat, the enemy became possessed of the principal outworks, and the governor was in constant dread lest the city should be taken by storm and sacked by the merciless Ottomans In the meantime the Duke of Lorraine had been by no means idle, and the skill and promptitude of his deeds deserve the highest admiration. Having done all that lay in his power to delay and interrupt the operations of the siege, he at length reached the King of Poland, and persuaded him to lend his assistance and push forward with his army to the aid of the Emperor's subjects, to which he was bound by po mise to the Emperor. Contingents arrived at about the same time from Germany and Saxony, so that Sobieski and Lorraine were enabled to march to the relief of Vienna as joint

Vienna.]

THE TURKS BEFORE VIENNA.

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leaders of an army of 60,000 men, and on the 12th of September, to the unspeakable joy of the citizens, the Christian standard was seen by the beleaguered city floating on the Kahlenberg. The resistance of the garrison, although apparently to themselves so nearly unsuccessful, had made considerable inroads in the ranks of Caza Mustapha's army, which became entirely disconcerted on the unexpected approach of the army of relief. Just before the arrival of Sobieski and Lorraine on the Kahlenberg, an attempt to storm the town had been repulsed with considerable slaughter, and the confusion and consternation incidental to this movement were taken advantage of by the returning force, which at once vigorously attacked the Turks. In this onslaught the Polish monarch and the Imperial general vied with each other in skill and bravery, while for coolness and intrepidity the action of the combined troops was above all praise. At nightfall, the Turkish leader, fearing the worst for his army, held a hasty consultation with his generals, and it was decided to retreat during the night. The withdrawal of the Turks was more than a retreat, for they became panic-stricken and left enormous booty behind, consisting, among other material and effects, of 180 pieces of artillery, several of which were adapted for heavy siege work; tents, ammunition, provisions, and many luxuries of the East. Even the ensign of the Vizier's authority was left behind, together with a standard supposed to be the sacred banner of Mohammed.

The entry of the King of Poland and the Duke of Lorraine into Vienna was welcomed with the wildest acclamation; the inhabitants testified to the King especially their gratitude by marks of affection that amounted almost to adoration; they hailed him as Father and Defender, and struggled among themselves to touch his garments or to kiss his feet.

The enthusiasm of the welcome accorded to Sobieski was in marked contrast with that accorded to the Emperor upon his return to his capital. Feeling deeply the humiliation that accompanied his hasty departure in the time of their approaching trial, the inhabitants offered to him neither honours nor welcome on his passage into the city.

The importance of this defeat of the Turks before Vienna cannot be dwelt upon with too much stress; it was one of the great decisive battles of the world, for the raising of the siege of Vienna in 1683 was the first decisive symptom of Turkish decline-a decline that has been continuing from then until the present day.

The troubles of Vienna did not cease with the repulse of the Turks, for, fifty years later, the city fell into the hands of the French and Bavarians, and Maria Theresa had to fly into Hungary. Again, in 1757, Frederick the Great led an army almost up to the walls of the city, and in 1797 Napoleon's forces were within sight from the heights of the Simmering. During the Revolutionary War the defeats sustained by the Imperial arms were very terrible and frequent, and twice during that war Vienna was in the hands of the French. In 1805 the city was taken by Lannes and Murat, to whom Napoleon had given orders to endeavour by all means to gain possession of the bridge which led across the river, and thus obtain access to the northern provinces of the then so-called German Empire-orders which were carried out by means of what a recent historian has called a 'disgraceful stratagem."

Vienna was again the object of Napoleon's attack in 1809. On the 26th of April of that year, a hundred thousand men were in full march for the city, which was reached

on the 18th of May with Napoleon himself at the head of the besieging force, and the city capitulated three days later. In October of the same year the "Peace of Vienna" was concluded in a treaty-the last that Napoleon signed as a conqueror and by it 50,000 square miles of territory were taken away from Austria, and more than 4,000,000 of inhabitants. It was during the French attack of that year that the great soldier's first addresses were paid to the Archduchess Maria Louisa. The young Princess lay sick in her father's palace within the city, against which the French batteries were being directed, and was too ill to bear the fatigue of removal to any place of safety. This fact was communicated to Napoleon, who at once ordered the direction of the firing to be altered, and so the future consort of the French Emperor remained unharmed in her palace. To the disgust of the Austrian nobility and aristocracy, the marriage was celebrated in the following year, and when Napoleon had crowned his new bride, the Corsican adventurer felt himself at length the equal of the Hapsburgs and the Bourbons.

From 1809 Vienna progressed in the arts of peace and commerce, and was not again disturbed by war until 1848, a time when all the States of Europe were more or less convulsed by uprisings of the people, and the city then fell for a short time into the hands of the revolutionary party. In 1857 the fortifications were destroyed, and Vienna has since been treated as an open city.

During the short but sharp war between Prussia and Austria in 1866, the Prussian army was almost within sight of Vienna, and the inhabitants then feared a bombardment, but were quieted and reassured by the statement that the Emperor and his army would retire were the Prussians to make a further advance. Peace, however, was signed, and the capital was not occupied by the enemy.

Notwithstanding many disadvantages of climate and situation, few cities possess such ample resources, and general means of enjoyment, intellectual and physical, as the Austrian capital. Its magnificent libraries, museums, and public galleries, are all perfect as regards arrangements and accommodation for practical use; its streets are crowded with a lively, active, and busy population; nothing occurs to annoy or molest the visitor; in no other city in Europe does the traveller, whose passports are regular, and whose conduct is orderly, feel or see so little of the interference and regulations of the authorities; no beggars are seen, and no abject poverty is allowed to meet the eye; the Viennese are a happy and enjoying people, frugal, cheerful, and contented, knowing nothing of their Government, except that its influence is mild and paternal; they see their princes and nobles mixing amongst them with all the simplicity and kindness of private citizens, and they love them with an affection they believe to be reciprocal; their general tone of character fits them for quiet enjoyment in themselves, and for promoting it in others, the lower classes as well as the higher being found to be kind and obliging.

CASSELL, PETTER, GALPIN & Co., BELLE SAUVAGE WORKS, LONDON, E.C.