Page:The Story of Prague (1920).djvu/131

 to the thrones of Bohemia and Hungary. It was as a mere pretext that Matthias brought forward the grievance that Rudolph had refused to sanction a treaty with Turkey that he had concluded in his brother’s name. Matthias occupied Moravia, and took possession of that country almost without resistance. He then entered Bohemia and advanced as far as Caslav. Rudolph, though reluctantly, summoned the Bohemian Estates to Prague on May 8, 1608. Though the usual ecclesiastical grievances were brought forward, it soon became evident that the Bohemians did not wish to abandon Rudolph in favour of his brother. The latter had meanwhile advanced as far as Liben, where peace negotiations took place. A treaty was finally signed there by which Rudolph ceded Upper and Lower Austria and Moravia to his brother, but retained Bohemia for his lifetime. In the evening Matthias gave a large banquet in his camp; there were two tables, at each of which a hundred guests were seated. Many healths were drank, and a somewhat scandalous contemporary writer tells us that many of Rudolph’s envoys ‘only returned to Prague about midnight, and very intoxicated.’

Even the cession of almost all his possessions did not ensure Rudolph’s tranquillity during the remaining years of his life. Many nobles who had sided with him against his brother now again brought their demand of religious freedom before him. The leader of the Protestants was now Wenceslas of Budova, whose pious and somewhat Puritan character renders him one of the most interesting figures of the last years of Bohemian independence. When Rudolph had prorogued the Diet of 1609 the Estates continued their meetings in the 105