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He was master of Vienna before England had even organised the expedition to which I have just alluded. He left Paris on the 11th of April, was at Donauwerth on the 17th, and on the 23d he was master of Ratisbon. In the engagement which preceded his entrance into that town Napoleon received a slight wound in the heel. He nevertheless remained on the field of battle.
In the mean time, the leaders of the Union assembled an army; the Emperor and the League did the same. The troops of the latter were assembled under the banners of Maximilian at Donauwerth, those of the Union at Ulm, under the Margrave of Anspach.
He now confirmed the alliance he had concluded with it on the shores of the Baltic, and excited the citizens to zealous activity and fraternal unity against the common enemy. After a short stay in Nuremberg, he followed his army to the Danube, and appeared unexpectedly before the frontier town of Donauwerth.
Wrangel now hoped to accomplish the object in which his predecessors had failed, the more so, as the Imperial and Bavarian army was far in his rear upon the Lahn, and could only reach Bavaria by a long march through Franconia and the Upper Palatinate. He moved hastily upon the Danube, defeated a Bavarian corps near Donauwerth, and passed that river, as well as the Lech, unopposed.
The Diet of Ratisbon, to which the Protestants had looked forward with the hope of obtaining a renewal of the Religious Peace, had broken up without coming to a decision, and to the former grievances of the Protestant party was now added the late oppression of Donauwerth. With incredible speed, the union, so long attempted, was now brought to bear.
In 1796, Moreau's army, entering the Black Forest, expected to find terrible mountains, frightful defiles and forests, and was greatly surprised to discover, after climbing the declivities of the plateau that slope to the Rhine, that these, with their spurs, were the only mountains, and that the country, from the sources of the Danube to Donauwerth, was a rich and level plain.
At Donauwerth it was reported to us, A Swedish caravan was on its way, Transporting a rich cargo of provision, Almost six hundreds wagons. This my Croats Plunged down upon and seized, this weighty prize! We bring it hither ILLO. Just in time to banquet The illustrious company assembled here. BUTLER. 'Tis all alive! a stirring scene here! ISOLANI. Ay!
But the vigour with which Gustavus Adolphus prosecuted the siege, soon compelled him to take measures for a speedy and secure retreat, which amidst a tremendous fire from the Swedish artillery he successfully executed. The conquest of Donauwerth opened to the king the further side of the Danube, and now the small river Lech alone separated him from Bavaria.
Donauwerth recovered its liberties. The important claims of the heirs of the Palatine, however important it might be for the Protestant cause not to lose this electorate vote in the diet, were passed over in consequence of the animosity subsisting between the Lutherans and the Calvinists.
Too weak to meet the enemy in the field, he had no choice left, but either to throw himself into Nuremberg, and run the risk of being shut up in its walls, or to sacrifice that city, and await a reinforcement under the cannon of Donauwerth.