Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 1, 1851).djvu/228

38 let no one believe. For why should he hesitate to seek the dignity of a king, as report says that he did, from the pope if he had received it already from the emperors?

I have said all this in the cause of my august master, Maximilian, who, as long as he lived, was a firm and faithful friend of King Sigismund. Why, indeed, should I speak of myself? How, I would ask, could I have presumed to go and return so often into Poland and Lithuania, to enter the presence of the two Sigismunds, father and son, kings of Poland, to take a part in public meetings of the Poles, and to look princes in the face, if I had compromised my prince in this matter, in whose name I have very often laid before the King and other persons of various ranks despatches couched in brotherly, kind and friendly terms, despatches that might well be sent from an excellent and most generous emperor in closest alliance with them. If there be nothing secret which shall not be revealed, it would certainly have come to light a long time ago, had I sanctioned anything unworthy of my office. But I comfort myself with the consciousness of rectitude, which is the strongest of all consolations; and I gratefully acknowledge that I never lacked the favour of the King of Poland, nor, indeed, the goodwill of persons of all ranks in that country. There were, perhaps, times when such things might occur without causing so much jealousy as now; but to promulgate them at this time, is only to seek the means of dissolving good feeling between princes who are most closely allied to each other,—a good feeling which has been cemented and consolidated by all kinds of obligations and good offices. Every thing which was generally regarded as of paramount importance towards preserving the remains of Hungary, and recovering what had been lost, seemed to have been done. But the very parties to whom this fact had already been of great service, and would have been of still greater service hereafter, under the influence of a Turkish or some other such perverse spirit, have ignored treaties and