Page:The Hussite wars, by the Count Lützow.djvu/165

 help being astounded at these outrageous misstatements. The Grand Duke then declared that he had concluded an alliance with King Sigismund, and now intended to aid him and all the other princes in combating the Bohemians, and that he had therefore recalled Prince Korybutovič from their country.

This letter of the Grand-Duke, probably as insincere as had been his former profession of friendliness for the Utraquists, can only be explained by reference to the general political situation at that moment. In the year 1422 there had been bitter enmity between King Sigismund and the rulers of Poland and Lithuania, and Sigismund had even suggested a plan for partitioning Poland. This menace, of which they were immediately informed, appears to have greatly impressed both Ladislas and Vitold, who fully realised that the fanatical and powerful Roman Catholic clergy in their dominions could scarcely be trusted, should King Sigismund, acting as champion of the Pope, attack Poland. These considerations determined the two princes to agree to what may be called an. unconditional surrender. In the month of March 1423 Ladislas, Vitold, and King Sigismund met at Kasmark in Hungary. It was here decided that the joint forces of the new allies should attack Bohemia. King Ladislas, who had never felt any sympathy for the Utraquist movement, though for political motives and also from personal animosity to King Sigismund he had occasionally appeared to favour it, greatly rejoiced at having regained the favour of the papal see. In a letter addressed to the electors of Germany on April 10, 1423, the King of Poland, replying to a letter of the electors accusing him of favouring heretics, declared that he and the Grand Duke Vitold had been