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From the city of Brunn, the capital of Moravia, their wan looks sought the mountain prison above, where frowned the bastions of Spielberg, once a mediaeval castle, then a fortress, built by the Emperor Charles, and, just before the battle of Austerlitz, dismantled by Napoleon, and now the place of confinement for the most degraded criminals of Austria, nearly a thousand of whom there expiate their offences.

What seemed a calamity was a step in advance. Early in March, the Marquis Pallavicini, prisoner of Spielberg, had a long interview with Charles Albert. They sat face to face talking over Italian matters, and the King said confidently that the army was now flourishing; if the die were cast anew, they would win.

That I may not here interrupt my story, I shall give some account of the life of my cousin Baron Francis Trenck, so renowned in the war of 1741, in another part, and who fell, at last, the shameful sacrifice of envy and avarice, and received the reward of all his great and faithful services in the prison of the Spielberg.

"I do not know that it was quite as dramatic as your escape from Spielberg, but I should think that, of the two, the escape from Linz must have seemed the most hopeless.

I felt an intense desire to stop, and embrace once more my beloved friends. I reflected with bitter grief on those, whom, instead of meeting here, I had left in the horrible abode of Spielberg, on those who were wandering in strange lands, on those who were no more.

"You are not really in earnest, Drummond," Stauffen said, "in what you say about escaping?" "I am quite in earnest about getting away, if I see a chance; though I admit that, at present, the matter seems a little difficult." "Perhaps if you will tell us about your escape from Spielberg, we shall be able to get a hint from it."

Should I be guilty of such a scandal! At length the German commissioner arrived, and came to acquaint us that within two days we were to set out. "I have the pleasure," he added, "to give you some consoling tidings. On my return from Spielberg, I saw his majesty the Emperor at Vienna, who acquainted me that the penal days appointed you will not extend to twenty-four hours, but only to twelve.

Besides forgive the vanity of an old man, who has learned to make triple acrostic sonnets to cheat the days and months at Theresienstadt and Spielberg I have suffered too much for Italy to endure patiently the sight of little parliamentary cabals and municipal wranglings, although they also are necessary in this day as conspiracies and battles were in mine.

I was obliged to act an artful, but, at the same time, a very dangerous part. My cousin, Baron Trenck, died in the Spielberg, October 4, 1749, and left me his heir, on condition I should only serve the house of Austria. In March, 1750, Count Bernes received the citation sent me to enter on this inheritance. I would hear nothing of Vienna; the abominable treatment of my cousin terrified me.

At last came the list the Austrians had sent in of the prisoners they had taken, and we were delighted to see your name in it; though, as the Austrians have been so chary of late of exchanging prisoners, we feared that we might not see you for some time. However, remembering how you got out of Spielberg, we did not despair of seeing you back in the spring. "Thirza was especially confident.