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A glittering pageant, no doubt, as it moved along under the shadow of the Church of Our Lady of Tyn, past the Old Town Hall, where the man to whom he owed the throne, George Podiebrad, had been called to rule Bohemia. Then along the Karlova Ulice, under the tower built by Wenceslaus, and over the Charles Bridge up the steep slope of Castle Hill.
No doubt a few halidoms, gramercies and other bits of furniture were set flying about at the time. The barber was so overcome by these marks of royal favour that he died a few days after taking them. This was George Podiebrad in lighter mood; he had a serious side to him as well, as I may try to show you by and by.
King Charles, the founder, father of his country, lies buried here with his four wives, so do other Kings of Bohemia, Ladislas Posthumus, George Podiebrad, Ferdinand I and Maximilian. Looking out over my terrace to where the Cathedral of St. Vitus points its tapering spires towards high heaven, a misty pageant seems to pass beneath it.
But famine would soon have compelled him to capitulate, had not the King of Bohemia, with a force of thirteen thousand men, marched to his aid. Podiebrad relieved the emperor, and secured a verbal reconciliation between the two angry brothers, which lasted until the Bohemian forces had returned to their country, when the feud burst out anew and with increased violence.
Perhaps this direction was subconscious in King George's mind; he may have been actuated only by his desire for peaceful reconstruction behind a united front towards an eastern enemy. However this may be, the idea did not die with George Podiebrad, but has had two revivals, of which I hope to tell you something in time.
In the midst of all this trouble George Podiebrad worked diligently at his League; he gained the adhesion of King Louis of France; Burgundy and Bavaria also joined, and Venice, remembering what good business could be made out of crusades, was also inclined to agree. England, it appears, was not particularly interested, at least is not mentioned in connection with this League.
Tells of Emperor Sigismund, King of Bohemia, his rare and troubled visits to this country. Of an emigration from Prague University, and the founding of another at Leipzig. Of the two Habsburgs who followed Sigismund, and more about another great Bohemian already mentioned in this book, George Podiebrad. King George's Peace League.
King George Podiebrad felt the high importance of this his native country's capital, and from it he wove his web of treaties and agreements for the betterment of Central Europe by means of his League of Peace. Dark Waldstein had formed great and ambitious plans, possibly not so altruistic as those of his spiritual kinsmen, the great men mentioned above.
And the noblest figure in Czech history, George of Podiebrad, whose portrait Palacky has etched with laborious care and unerring insight, is essentially a statesman, not a warrior. Similarly the history of the Russian Slav has marked organic resemblances with that of the Poles and the Czechs. His sombre courage, his enduring fortitude, are a commonplace.
One of the last Slavs to occupy the throne of Bohemia he was a Prince of Poland Vladislav succeeded one of the most popular of Bohemian monarchs, George Podiebrad. The times in which Vladislav reigned were evil; the internal religious struggles of Bohemia had reached a desperate stage; all attempts to reunite the Utraquists with Rome had failed, and Alexander Borgia was Pope.
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