Page:The Hussite wars, by the Count Lützow.djvu/82

 the great importance which the Bohemians attach to the coronation of their kings. The ceremony took place on July 28. Sigismund was crowned by the archbishop of Prague, Conrad of Vechta, in the presence of numerous German princes, among whom was his son-in-law, Albert, archduke of Austria. Some Bohemian nobles of the Catholic party were also present. Two days later Sigismund and his forces retired to Kutna Hora, where they remained for a considerable time.

In Prague the citizens, who now enjoyed temporary quiet, began to take counsel as to the future government of their country. They now already decided to send an embassy to Ladislas, King of Poland, which was to offer him the Bohemian crown. Žižka, who, though an implacable hater of Sigismund, was not opposed to the monarchical system of government, gave his support to this scheme. The proposal was, however, rejected by King Ladislas, who, a heathen by birth, had only recently been received into the Roman Church, and was strongly averse to any conflict with the head of the Church which he had just joined. As appeared later, the Bohemians would probably have been received more favourably had they offered the crown to Prince Vitold of Lithuania, a relation of King Ladislas. Vitold, also born a heathen, had afterwards joined the Greek Church, but was now a Roman Catholic. His intense ambition was, however, little troubled by religious scruples. Though it has been necessary to mention here already these plans of the restoration of monarchy under a Slavic prince, it will be better to refer again to these negotiations later, when they had become more fully developed. The short period of respite which the citizens of the capital had secured was, unfortunately, also marked by the beginning of discord between the Táborites and the moderate Utraquists or Praguers, as they began to be called, that city being the centre of moderate Hussitism. The presence of Táborite priests in Prague had greatly influenced many of the citizens whose