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242
His preparations for
active hostility.
HISTORY OF THE SWEDES. Humanity of Gustavus
Negotiation for peace.
[1(J12-
war on Sweden, Spain was to conclude a truce
with the Netherlands, afterwards to acquire the
command of the Sound, and tlun-eby both close
the Baltic against Holland, and raise Sigismund
again to the Swedish throne. Charles IX. makes
mention of this plan in a note written by him ^
;
and tlie Hollanders, induced thereby, actually
despatched an embassy to Christian IV., which
however arrived too late to prevent the outbreak
of the Danish war, and was besides received by
the king with small respect ’. During the cessa-
tion of arms with Poland, no hope of peace was
cherished, for Sigismund steadily reserved his
right to the Swedish crown. He considered him-
self also to have claims upon Ilussia, through the
choice of his son Vladislaus, by a party in that
country, to be grand duke, and protested against
the cessions made in the treaty of peace signed
at Stolbova. He now purposed an attack upon
Sweden. An Austrian count of Althan had pro-
mised to levy an army in Germany to that end,
and the Spaniards to equip a fleet in Dunkirk ;
the
estates of Poland had granted a subsidy ;
levies
and war taxes for the same object were instituted
in Polish Prussia ;
the Hanse Towns were warned
to abstain for the present from all intercourse with
Sweden, since God would shortly open to its legi-
timate king the way to his hereditary throne. To
Christian IV. was sent an embassy, with promise
of the absolute cession of Elfsborg, Spain withal
proposing to Denmark a league against Holland,
and common cause with Poland against Sweden ;
exhortations to revolt against Gustavus Adolphus,
and libels upon his father were disseminated
throughout the kingdom ". At the same diet
wherein Gustavus Adolphus made known to the
estates the peace with Ilussia, he was obliged also
to announce to them the fresh eruption of the war
with Poland. On the enemy’s side, indeed, the
execution of the plans bore no cori’espondence to
their extent, for Sigismund, as a Polish historian
says,
" undertook all things unseasonably and per-
versely ’.
"
]Meanwhilc, preparations for defence
were set on foot both in Sweden and in Estland.
Stiernskold, who had been sent to the Netherlands
to levy troops, and to obtain from Denmark free
passage through the Sound for two thousand men,
crossed in the beginning of July, 16)7) to Lifland.
Dunamunde was surrendered to the Swedes by
William, duke of Courland, who had been dis-
’ "The king of Spain’s foundation for erecting his (uni-
versal) monarchy, was in king Charles IX.’s time, Elsinore,
which he expected to obtain, if king Sigismund of Poland
should get Sweden." Copy in the Palmsk. Collections, t. 58.
8 " Non agitur de religione, sed de regione," was his reply
to the envoys.
"
Compare Hallenberg. George Nilson Posse now issued
the bitter lampoon called " Duke Charles’ slaughter-bench."
It was in the year 1615, when the Swedish fugitives began
to stir with similar means, that the historian, John Mes-
senius, accused, but not convicted, of having had secret
Correspondence with Poland, was thrown into prison, where
he was kept until his death in 1(534. Wlien in 1642 John
Daazius published his Inventarium Eccles. Sueo-Goth.
mentioning Messenius as one condemned to perpetual im-
prisonment for a traitorous correspondence with Poland,
the government of the day wrote to him :
" We will by no
means defend the cause of Messenius, but neither can we
accuse him of any treason, sedition, or the like, leaving
him to the judgment of God. Verily there have been
strong presumptions against him, but because that hath not
possessed by the Poles ; Pernau and Salis were
taken, also by the help of the duke’s general,
Wolmar Farensbach, who, however, afterwards
passed over to the enemy, and formed a junction
with the Lithuanian general Iladziwill. The latter
reheved Riga, recovering a redoubt before the
town, which had fallen into the hands of the
Swedes. In the winter of 1C18 the Poles overran
with fire and sword Swedish Livonia and Esthonia,
but speedily retreated. Gustavus Adolphus did
not consent to Stiernskold’s request to put in prac-
tice the right of retaliation ;
he was not to make
incursions of plunder after the enemy’s example,
but when opportunity offered, to assault some
fortress, and upon the march to treat the defence-
less population of the enemy’s country with the
same forbearance as Swedish subjects.
" We have
not proposed to ourselves," the king writes, "to
make war upon the peasants, whom we would
rather see kindly used than utterly ruined." In
such a frame of mind, and albeit Sigismund gtive
the usual answer to a mediatory overture which
had been lately requested from Denmark, Gustavus
Adolphus consented, on the petition of the Est-
landers, to renew the negotiation for a truce,
" to
the end that all might perceive he did not stand
upon war, if peace and quietness were to be had,
and that poor Lifland might not be made absolutely
desolate by both sides." The new truce, by which
the Swedes retained what they held, was concluded
for two years, from Michaelmas, 1618, to the same
day of 1G20, with three months’ notice to be given,
though the ratification from Poland was never
received. Gustavus Adolphus notified his re-
nouncement on the expiration of the term, adding
that he wished for peace; and giving power to his
plenipotentiaries to negotiate accordingly. He
Avould cede Pernau, and leave the frontier as it
had stood on the outbreak of the war in the year
IGOO; but if peace could not be obtained, he was
willing to enter into a ten years’ truce, and even
to leave to Sigismund the name of king of Sweden,
with a reservation that it should not be taken to
imply any right to the kingdom. The Poles con-
sented indeed to negotiate, but only in the name of
the Polish senate ;
their commissioners were with-
out powers from their king, who had declared, that
he could not ratify any convention entered into by
them 2. Hereupon Gustavus Adolphus caused his
been found in him which was presumed, he is likewise not
condemned to perpetual prison, but only kept in custody on
suspicion. Now because in his prison he hath written much
that redoundeth to the honour of the country, therefore do
we bear scruple to lay such imputations upon him, seeing
these tend to make the relations of historians suspected.
Therefore must this be erased or suppressed before the
exemplars are spread abroad." Register for 1643. In the
book the passage stands unchanged at p. 664.
’
Piasecki Chronica ad an. 1616. Verum omnia intem-
pestive, et prfepostere et magis ad praemonendum hostem
fiebant. Nihilque de istis cum consiliariis Polonis confere-
bat, sed cum Suecis et Germanis tantum, qui pauci, illique
rcrum et prsesentis belli ducendi inexpertes in ejus aula
erant. Among these are named Francis Ternagel, a German
refugee, whom Sigismund made iiis Swedish chancellor,
and Gabriel Poze (probably George Posse) a refugee from
Sweden.
- " That your lovingness may be able to refute to our
friends the false rumour which will be spread of our present
actions, we give you to know the truce was expired, and
certain heads, whereon a prolongation might be made, were
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