Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/146

 138 REVIEWS OF BOOKS January Germany than many thousands of troops. Ferdinand has the charm of a vigorous and yet adaptable personality in the making. The unpleasant feature in his character is his acquisitiveness. He never lost anything by not asking for it. On each of the crises in the history of Milan he begs for the investiture, and the ultimate bestowal on the Spanish line must have been a bitter pill. In return for trifling concessions to Venice, due under treaty but grudgingly given up, he demands ample compensation in Alsace» More than once he tries to deprive his aunt Margaret of her possession of the county of Burgundy and Auxonne, and even suggests the transference to himself of her government of the Netherlands. On the death of hia brother-in-law, Lewis, all other interests must give place to his claims on Hungary and Bohemia. Charles never aimed at universal empire, but Ferdinand might well have had this ambition, had he won the throne in early life. The last year illustrated by this volume passed heavily for the house of Habsburg. In Germany the mauldite secte was obviously stronger, though perhaps the full results of the diet of Speyer were not yet realized by Charles or even Ferdinand. In Italy the victory of Pa via seemed to have proved barren. Clement VII was openly hostile ; Venice had captured Cremona, her constant aim for a century past ; Frundsberg's force of 16,000 could only hope to save the castle of Milan, and not this if the French took the offensive. Charles could not safely reach Italy either by sea or land ; Ferdinand was called away from his intended quarters at Trent or Innsbruck to face the danger in the east. After the death of Lewis and the loss of all his artillery Austria could hardly hope to with- stand the Turk, and, if Austria went, all Germany must follow. What could the 5,000 men loyally voted by the estates of Tyrol do against 200,000 disciplined Turks ? Ferdinand's dynastic hopes were on the wane ; he could not be king of the Romans till Charles could come to Italy to be crowned ; he had, indeed, been crowned king of Bohemia, but he still feared the rival Bavarian and Saxon candidates, and yet more the king of Poland, to whose house Tjcwis had belonged. In Hungary Zapolya had taken him by surprise, and had hurried through a partisan election and coronation. As against Magyar, Slav, and Transylvanian there was no real Austrian party except on the western fringe, but Zapolya's strongest asset was the notorious favour of the Porte. The peasant revolts in Tyrol and Salzburg had been scotched rather than killed, and highly dangerous were Bavarian intrigues for the control of the great Salzburg see, the old and inadequately buried bone of contention between Wittelsbach and Habsburg. Yet the Habsburgs were a tough race. They had been far nearer ruin under Ferdinand's great-grandfather, and were to be nearer at more than one later crisis. There may be exceptions even to the rigid rule * il n'y a pas d'homme necessaire '.^ E. Armstrong. ' Since this review was written it seems to have been proved that of such ezcep* tions the Habsburgs are not one.