Page:The Hussite wars, by the Count Lützow.djvu/347

 defenders of Plzeň. A large sum of money was collected and safely remitted to the citizens. The depredations of the soldiery and their anarchical behaviour necessarily caused many defections from the Táborite ranks. Thus one of their generals, Přibík of Klenov, secretly assisted the Catholics in sending provisions to Plzeň. Many Utraquists, who did not wish to aid the enemies of their creed, but strongly disapproved of the anarchical conduct of the mercenary troops, left the camp and returned to their homes.

Under these circumstances it was natural that the plan of ending the depredations of the Táborite and Orphan bands, which had hitherto only been occasionally mooted, should now have been generally accepted. The regent Aleš of Riesenburg, whose election Prokop had approved of, and who had been entrusted with unlimited authority over the armed forces of the country, was justly indignant that the armed bands entirely ignored his commands. The Utraquist lords, among whom BorěkBořek [sic] of Miletinek and Kostka of Postupic acted as leaders, first met secretly—the locality has remained unknown—and decided to force the Táborites to desist from further warfare. The citizens of the Old Town of Prague immediately joined the confederacy of the nobles. The many victories of the Táborites had, however, rendered them so formidable that the nobles did not venture openly to oppose them, aided only by the conservative townsmen of Prague. They therefore—some of them somewhat reluctantly—decided to form a coalition with the lords “sub una.” It will be remembered that a similar coalition had once been founded previously, during the last year of the life of Žižka. These negotiations were mainly conducted by Menhard of Jindřichův Hradec, through whose influence Ulrich of Rosenberg, leader of the lords “sub una,” joined the confederacy with the consent of the Emperor Sigismund. John Palomar, whom the Council had sent to the Bohemian frontier to watch the events and to assist the citizens of Plzeň, took a large part in these negotiations, which were