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 SPECULATION

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SPECULATION

age of twelve he was a poacher and was often involved in fights with the customs officers. When a little older, he worked in the imperial salt-mines at Hall. On 10 Feb., 1794, he married Maria Schmiederer of Judenstein, and in this way came into possession of her farm and house. At the beginning of the war with France he became one of the volunteers who sought to defend the fatherland; his first encounter with the enemy took place at the bloody .skirmish near Spinges on 2 April, 1797. He was a fine sharp-shooter and one of the most zealous of the TjTolean patriots. In 1805 he fought under Lieutenant-Colonel Swinburne against Marshal Ncy, but was obliged like the other patriots to accept the cession of the TjtoI to Bavaria in 1806. When in 1808 the Archduke John entered into negotiations with Andreas Hofer for regaining the Tyrol, Speckbacher soon became one of the most trusted friends of Hofer and courageously supported the latter in preparing for the struggle for liberty. With the entranee of the Austrian army into the Pus- tertal in the month of April, 1809, began the heroic struggle of the Tyrolese. Speckbacher took a promi- nent part in the throe efforts to free the country from the j'oke of Napoleon. He showed himself to be not only a daring fighter, but above all a cautious, unterri- fiecf strategist. In this year, according to his own diary, he took part in thirty-six battles and skirmishes. On 12 April, 1S09, he surprised the city of Hall early in the morning, made the garrison prisoners, and pre- vented the flight of the French into the valley of the lower Inn. On 31 May he commanded the left wing of the battle of Mount Isel, and fought victori- ously near Hall and Volders. He conducted the siege of the castle of Kuf stein (2.3 Jun(^16 July). Here he gave countless proofs of personal courage, built batteries, destroyed the mills and boats, burnt the city, captured the train of provisions, and made his way as a spy into the castle. From 4 Aug. to 11 Aug. he was most of the time the commander in the battles between Stcrzing and Franzensfeste against ^larshal Lefeb\Te. He forced the marshal to retire and with Hofer and Haspinger commanded at the famous third battle of Mount Isel (13 and 15 .\ugust). After the enemy had been driven away, he and his men forced their way into the mountains of Salzburg, and stimu- lated there the defence of the countrj-; on 25 Sept. he defeated the allied French and Bavarians at Lofer and with great loss fell back on Reichenhall. On 16 Oct. he was surprised at Melleck by a superior force of the enemy and was obliged to ret ire ; his young son Andreas was taken prisoner, and he himself was severely wounded. At Waidring on 17 Oct. and at Volders on 23 Oct. he was able to maintain himself against the foe, escaped capture once more in a skir- mish on 2S Oct., and captured a battalion of the en- emy. After the last and unsucces.sful fight on Mount Isei on 1 Xo\-., he wished to continue the struggle, but was obliged to abandon the unequal contest. He was proscribed, and a reward of five hundred florins was offered to anyone who would deliver him alive or dead.

Speckbacher spent the entire winter in the Tyrolese mountains, sometimes hid among friends at lonely farms, sometimes hid in Alpine huts and always hunted by enemies. He was betrayed only once, but he saved himself this time by a daring flight and hid himself until Jan., 1810, in the clefts of the rocks, be- ing often near death from hunger. His wife and four children were also obliged to seek safety by flight and to hide in the mountains. Speckbarher's last hiding- place was near the summit of a high mountain in the Voldertal, where the only person who came to him was his faithful servant (leorge Z(i))pel, who brought him food. On 14 March he wa,s severely injured by an avalanche which overwhelmed him. He was brought by friends to his farm at Judenstein, where Zoppel hid him in the stable under the floor until 2 May.

When scarcely well Speckbacher fled amid great dan- gers through the Pinzgau and Styria to Vienna, where he was warmly received by the Emperor Francis I. The emperor presented him with a chain of honour and a pension. The emperor's plan to settle the Tyrolean refugees in Hungary could not be carried out and in 1811 Speckbacher was made the superin- tendent of an estate near Linz given by the ruler to Hofer's son. Speckbacher's wife, who had been im- prisoned thirteen weeks at Munich, however, remained on the farm in the Tyrol. In the autumn of 1813 Speckbacher returned to the Tyrol as a major of the Tyrolese volunteers in the imperial army under Gen- eral Fenner. He shared with these troops in the gar- risoning of Southern Tyrol against the French and in maintaining these garrisons against the enemy. On 12 Sept., however, the Bavarian government at Inns- bruck once more set a price, 1000 florins, on his head, and it was not until the summer of 1814 that Speck- bacher was able to return home unmolested. A year later he received a second gold chain of honour, and in 1816 at the time of the national demonstration he re- ceived the personal notice of the emperor. He joy- fully met his son, who had been well educated at Munich, and looked forward to a peaceful old age, but the hardships he had undergone forced him to sell Ms farm and move to Hall, where he died after a short illness.

He was first buried at Hall, but in the summer of 1852, at the command of the Emperor Francis Joseph I, his remains were transferred to the Court church at Innsbruck, where they were placed by those of Hofer and Haspinger. In 1908 a bronze statue was erected to him at Hall. His widow received a pension from the emperor of 500 florins and a supplementarj' sum for the education of her children. She died in 1846. Speckbacher's eldest son Andreas only lived to the age of thirty-seven years. After conpleting his studies as a mining engineer he went to the iron works at Mariazell and Eisenerz in Styria, received positions at Pill- ersee, Brixlegg, and Jenbach in the Tyrol, where he did much to improve the methods of mining ore. He married Aloisia Mayr and died in 1834. His sons and his brother died at an early age, and the family is ex- tinct in the male line. Speckbacher was one of the most striking of the men who shared in the struggle for freedom in the Tyrol. His character is well ex- pressed in his epitaph: "In war wild but also human, in peace quiet and faithful to the laws, he was as soldier, subject, and man worthy of honour and love".

HiRN, Tiroh Erhebung 1809 (Innsbruck, 1910); Mair, Speck- bacher, eine Tiroler Heldengeschichte (Innsbruck, 1904) ; Domanig, Speckbacher, der Mann von Rinn. Schauspiel in fiinf Akten (Kempten, 1909), from the dramatic trilogy Der Tyroler Frei- heitskampf) ; von Scala, Josef Speckbacher, der Mann von Rinn. Volksschauspiel in titer Aufzugen (Brixen, 1905).

Heinrich von Worndle.

Speculation, a term used with reference to business transactions to signify the investing of money at a risk of loss on the chance of unusual gain. The word is commonly used only when the risk of loss is greater than ordinary business methods and prudence war- rant. A coal merchant who sees grounds for thinking that the coming winter will be severe, and that there will be a general strike among coal miners, shows en- terprise if he lays in a large stock of coal with the expectation of reaping more than us\ial profit from its sale. He incurs the ordinary risks of business, he does not speculate. But if a man thinks, on trivial indica- tions, that there is going to be a great development in the opening >ip of a new country, anil buys largi^ tracts of prairie land in the district on llic chance of it.s rising rapidly in value, he would be suid to speculate in land. More specifically, siH-i-iihitinii is u.srd to designate deal- ings in futures anil options on the Exchanges, espe- cially when the parties to the transaction do not intend any effective transference of commodities or securities,