The Washington herald., 1915-03-14

dition OF the country. Robber harons
overran the land. pillag ing and murder
way. while the bold freeman of the bar
barous age had sunk into the serfage OF
feudalism.
With the end of the ADMINISTRATIONS
the choice of new sovereign fell to the
German Diet. and the electors looked
about them for an uuaggressive. undm-
bilious man who would give the nation
rest from foreign war and conquest.
In their wisdom they chose quiet. pru-
dent, OldSh man In a gray cOal who
lived up in the Swiss mountain. where
he was lord of = handful of goatherds.
The favored candidate was poor in purse
r!ageablc daughters with whom to make
useful alliances Besides. he was a
brother-in-law Of tn" HOhenZollerns.
who were then the ruling family of the
town of Nuremberg. Thus casually did
the crown fall to Count Rudolf OF Haps-
burg. and thus undesignedly was started
an imperial line that has outlasted six
centuries.
Rudolf died while on his way to his
tomb in the Cathedral of Speyer. whittier
he was Fastening in obedience to pre-
monition of death. The Diet now thought
II prudent not to continue the imperial
dead monarch. Onc-Eyed Albert. ran his
sword through the chosen successor of
his father and put on the crown. Soon
this second Hapsburg himself was slain
through more than 10" years the imperial
office was passed around among the
principal families to the accompaniment
of civil and religious wars.
When Chno. Reigned.
At one time there We're three emperors
wrestling for the throne. while chaos
reigned alone. y multitude of mobiles as
serted the right to tax and judge the
people. issue money and take toll of all
commerce passing within the shadows Of
their castles. Bryce tells us that along
the Rhine the lord OF single tower was
usually a sovereign prince.
After that long era of anarchy Haps-
burg again received the crown of the
Caesars in 1i3S. and except for three
wears the family continued to wear II
until Napoleon snatched it away at Aus
terlitZ in 1895. For more than $50 years
Vienna was the imperial capital of the
German world and the Germans Ian
guished beneath the selfish and alien
rule of the Austrian monarchy, which
turned Germany into theater OF war
for the Acknowledgement of the Hapsburg
ambition to rule the world.
Beneath the emperors, Germany was
parCelled out among more than 800 little
soverelEns and sovereignties in the
guise of counties. dukedOms. principali-
ties and free cities. Each sported its
palaces and its court. maintained its
customhouses to thwart the trade of
the country and paraded its army.
though sometimes the Smilitary estab-
lshment comprised less than dozen
soldiers And within that multiplicity of
states the country was subdivided into
/ so domains of the minor nobility. all
claiming special powers and privileges.
Upon a Germany thus divided against
itself. the religious wars OF the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries broke with
the blind fury If men hating each other
for the love of God" The savage fray
eliminated at last in the most terrible
strife that blots the pages OF modern his
tory.
Although the Thirty Years War began
in the Austrian dominions of the Haps-
burgs. Germany quickly fell helpless
victim to its terrors as Austrians and
Danes. Swedes. Firms and Frenchmen.
Italians. Spaniards and foreigners from
all lands swarmed over her Borders to
fight and burn and murder.