Page:The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe Volume 3.djvu/588

 If it please you to suffer them of Prague to live in quietness, I will not be against it, so that there be no treason wrought. If you determine to have war, I am also ready. Look, which ever part you will incline unto, Zisca will be your aid and helper.

When he had spoken these words, the soldiers' minds were changed, and wholly determined to make wars, so that they ran, by-and-by, to take up their armour and weapons, to run unto the walls, to provoke their enemies to fight for the gates of the city. Zisca, in the mean time, prepared all things ready for the assault. There is, a little from Pilsen, a certain village named Rochezana. In this place there was a child born of poor and base parentage, whose name was John; he came to Prague, and got his living there by begging, and learned grammar and logic. When he came to man's estate, he became the schoolmaster of a noble man's child; and, forasmuch as he was of an excellent wit and ready tongue, he was received into the college of the poor; and, last of all, being made priest, he began to preach the word of God to the citizens of Prague, and was named Johannes de Rochezana, by the name of the town where he was born. This man grew to be of great name and authority in the town of Prague. Whereupon, when Zisca besieged Prague, he, by the consent of the citizens, went out into the camp, and reconciled Zisca again unto the city.

When the emperor perceived that all things came to pass according to Zisca's will and mind, and that upon him alone the whole state of Bohemia did depend, he sought privy means to reconcile and get Zisca into his favour, promising him the governance of the whole kingdom, the guiding of all his hosts and armies, and great yearly revenues, if he would proclaim him king, and cause the cities to be sworn unto him. Upon which conditions, when Zisca, for the performance of the covenants, went unto the emperor, being in his journey at the castle of Priscovia, he was stricken with sickness and died. 1424.

Is is reported, that when he was demanded, being sick, in what place he would be buried; he commanded the skin to be pulled off from his dead carcase, and the flesh to be cast unto the fowls and beasts, and that a drum should be made of his skin, which they should use in their battles: affirming, that as soon as their enemies should hear the sound of that drum, they would not abide, but take their flight. The Taborites, despising all other images, yet set up the picture of Zisca over the gates of the city.

I, John Zisca, not inferior to an emperor or captain in warlike policy, a severe punisher of the pride and avarice of the clergy, and a defender of my country, do lie here. That which Appius Claudius, by giving good counsel, and M. Furius Camillus, by valiantness, did for the Romans; the same I, being blind, have done for my Bohemians. I never slacked opportunity of battle, neither did fortune at any time fail me. I, being blind, did foresee all opportunity of well ordering or doing my business. Eleven times, in joining battle, I went victor out of the field. I seemed to have worthily defended the cause of the victor in miserable and hungry against the delicate, fat, and gluttonous priests, and for the field, that cause to have received help at the hands of God. If their envy had not let it, without doubt I had deserved to be numbered amongst the most famous men. Notwithstanding my bones lie here in this hallowed place, even in despite of the pope.