luxuriant country, rich in vineyards and watered by the Neckar, which flows through it.

This country, which is the "Würtemberg" treated of in these volumes, was originally of small compass. Its previous history, which is enveloped in darkness, tells us that it rose through various conflicting struggles to its present position among the neighbouring states. When we reflect on the time when it was surrounded by such powerful frontier neighbours as the Stauffens, the Dukes of Teck and the Counts of Zollern, we are astonished that its name should still exist as a nation; for the repeated storms of internal as well as external violence often threatened to erase it from the annals of history. There was a time, indeed, when the head of the reigning family was, to all appearance, driven for ever from the halls of his ancestors. Duke Ulerich von Würtemberg being obliged to fly his country and seek shelter in painful exile from the fury of his enemies, left his castles in the possession of foreign masters, his lands being occupied by their mercenaries. Little more was wanting to complete the extinction of the name of Würtemberg, than the parcelling out of the spoil of its blooming fields among the many, or the whole becoming a province of the house of Austria.

Among the many events related by the Swabians of their country and their ancestors, there is none more fraught with romantic interest than the struggles of that period, which are closely connected with the extraordinary fate of their unfortunate prince. We have attempted to bring them to life again, as they have been related to us on the heights of Lichtenstein and the banks of the Neckar, at the risk, however, of being misapprehended. We shall probably be told that the character of Ulerich¹ is one not fit to be exhibited in a favourable point of view in an historical romance. He has been calumniated in many instances, and it has been even the custom, when reviewing the long list of Dukes of Würtemberg, to pass over in silence the descendant between Eberhard² and Christoph, and to look upon him with a kind of horror, as if the troubles of a country were to be attributed solely to the conduct of its ruler, or that it were better to bury in oblivion the days of its misfortunes.

It may, however, be a question, whether the condemnation pronounced on the name of Ulerich, by his bitterest enemy Ulerich von Hutten, has not been exaggerated; for, to say the least of it, he was too much a party concerned to be trusted as an impartial judge. The voice which the Duke and his family raised in vindication of his innocence of the crimes imputed to him, having been too feeble to withstand the accusations and calumnies of his enemies, contained in the flagitious publication "Philippica in Ducem Ulericum," has been silenced by the revolutions of time.

We have conscientiously compared most of the contemporaneous writers of that most boisterous period, and have not met with one who absolutely condemns him. It is but just to keep in view the powerful influence which time and circumstances produce upon the minds of men. Ulerich von Würtemberg was brought up under the guardianship of bad counsellors, who, for the purpose of making him subservient to their views, fostered the evil propensities of his mind. As he took the reins of government into his own hands when boyhood is scarcely ripened into youth, justice at least compels us to make allowances, and though we cannot extenuate the outrages he committed during the course of his career, we are bound to look to the noble side of his character, in which we shall discover strength of mind and undaunted courage, in circumstances of extreme difficulty.

The year 1519, the date of our narrative, decided his fate and saw the beginning of his misfortunes. Posterity, however, may date it as the era of his prosperity; for, having passed through the ordeal of a long banishment, in which he learnt to know himself, he came out of it a wiser man and a more powerful Prince. From that period fortune favoured him, and each Würtemberger has cause to prize the latter years of his government, esteeming the religious reformation which this prince effected in his country, as the greatest blessing conferred on his countrymen.

The public mind, in the year 1519, was still in a state of great excitement. The insurrection of "poor Conrad,³" six years before, had been partially quelled, though with difficulty. The country people in many places still shewed symptoms of discontent. The Duke, among his many failings, had not the method of gaining the affections of his subjects, for they were oppressed by his men in office, under his own eye, and burdened with accumulated taxes to satisfy the wants of the court. The Swabian League, composed of a formidable confederacy of princes, counts, knights, and free cities of Swabia and Franconia, formed originally for the mutual protection of their rights, was treated with contempt by the Duke, particularly owing to his refusal to become a member of it. His frontier neighbours, therefore, watched his actions with the eye of enmity, appearing to wait for an opportunity to let him feel the weight of the power which he had despised. Neither was the Emperor Maximilian, who reigned at that period; very well inclined towards him, since he was suspected of having supported the knight Götz von Berlichingen, for the purpose of avenging himself on the Elector of Mains.

A coolness had subsisted for some time between him and the Duke of Bavaria, his brother-in-law, a powerful neighbour, owing to his having ill-treated his wife Sabina, the Duke's sister. Added to that (and which hastened his downfall) was the supposed murder of a Franconian knight who lived at his court. Chronicles of undoubted authority mention, that the intimacy between Johann yon Hutten and Sabina was such that the Duke could not behold it with indifference. One day at a hunt, the Duke taxed him with, and upbraided him for his treacherous conduct, and calling upon him to defend his life, run him through the body. The family of Hutten, and particularly Ulerich, Johann's cousin, raised their voices against the supposed murderer; and their complaints and the cry of vengeance resounded throughout Germany. The Duchess also, whose imperious querulous temper had, even as a bride, irritated the Duke, now broke all ties with him; and flying with the aid of Dieterich von Spät, appeared before the Emperor as his accuser and bitterest enemy. Agreements between the contending parties were concluded and not held; peaceable adjustments of their grievances were no sooner proposed than broken off again. The Duke's troubles augmented from month to month; but his proud mind would not bend to submission, for he believed himself in the right. The Emperor died in the midst of these altercations. He was a prince who had manifested much forbearance and mildness of character towards Ulerich, in spite of the many complaints of his enemies. The Duke lost in him an impartial judge, to whom he could alone look for aid in his present troubles.

The funeral service for the Emperor was being performed in the Castle of Stuttgardt, when a messenger suddenly arrived, seeking the Duke, with the intelligence that some people of the imperial town of Reutlingen, which lay within his frontier, had slain the administrator of his woods and forests on the Achalm. The townsfolk had, on some former occasion,