Page:The life & times of Master John Hus by Count Lützow.djvu/247

 that it would require a century to purge Constance from sin. A man of ascetic and, if we may call it so, puritanic mind, Hus looked on all this with displeasure, and he must have felt strangely isolated in the city. The house in which he lived was constantly watched by numerous spies, who were in the pay of the Bishop of Litomysl. Bishop John was incessantly demanding that Hus should be immediately arrested. Like most of King Venceslas’s enemies in Bohemia, he was no doubt on good terms with Sigismund, and knew how difficult it would be for him to sanction the arrest of Hus at Constance if he were himself in the city. The spies and informers, therefore, redoubled their activity. When a hay cart was seen before the house of Hus, the spies immediately reported that Hus intended to escape hidden in it. The tale, which, as we know from Mladenovic, was immediately circulated by Michael and Palec, is found also in the chronicle of Richenthal, that somewhat frivolous writer, who was more interested in enumerating the gains of butchers, fishmongers, and others practising less respectable professions than in studying the serious events connected with the council. It has also been conjectured that Richenthal here confused Hus with Jerome of Prague, who actually made a successful attempt to escape secretly from Constance. It should be mentioned that few serious historians have alluded to Richenthal’s tale. A firm adherent of the Roman Church, Baron Helfert, in his interesting work, Hus und Hieronymus, rejects the story as decidedly as do all the other writers who have considered it worth mention. Like many other falsehoods, however, this one also served its purpose. We cannot, of course, fathom the true motives of the members of the council, but Bishop John’s men could not have found a better pretext for obtaining that which they desired—the immediate imprisonment of Hus. That event can best be told in the words of Mladenovic. He