Drearily passed the days in the beleaguered camp, varied only by an occasional raid by small parties to drive in cattle from the surrounding country, or to intercept convoys of provisions on their way to the Imperialists' camp. So active and watchful were the Croats that these enterprises seldom succeeded, although, to enable his men to move with celerity, Gustavus mounted bodies of infantry on horseback. Thus they were enabled to get over the ground quickly, and if attacked they dismounted and fought on foot. To these mounted infantry the name of dragoons was given, and so useful were they found that the institution was adopted in other armies, and dragoons became a recognized portion of every military force. In time the custom of dismounting and fighting on foot was gradually abandoned, and dragoons became regular cavalry; but in modern times the utility of Gustavus's invention of mounted infantry has been again recognized, and in all the small wars in which England has been engaged bodies of mounted infantry have been organized. Ere long mounted infantry will again become a recognized arm of the service.
But these raids in search of provisions occupied but a small portion of the army. The rest passed their time in enforced idleness. There was nothing to be done save to clean and furbish their arms and armour; to stand on the ramparts and gaze on the distant heights of the Alte Veste, to watch the solid columns of the Imperial army, which from time to time Wallenstein marched down from his stronghold and paraded in order of battle, as a challenge to the Swedes to come out and fight, or to loiter through the narrow streets of Nuremberg, and to talk to the citizens, whose trade and commerce were now entirely at a standstill. Malcolm, with the restlessness of youth, seldom stayed many hours quiet in camp. He did not care either for drinking or gambling; nor could he imitate the passive tranquillity of the old soldiers, who were content to sleep away the greater part of their time. He therefore spent many hours every day in the city, where he speedily made many acquaintances.
In the city of Nuremberg time dragged as slowly as it did in the camp. At ordinary times the centre of a quiet and busy trade, the city was now cut off from the world. The shops were for the most part closed; the artisans stood idle in the streets, and the townsfolk had nought to do, save to gather in groups and discuss the times, or to take occasional excursions beyond the gates into the camp of their allies. The advances then of the young Scottish officer were willingly responded to, and he soon became intimate in the houses of all the principal citizens; and while the greater part of his comrades spent their evenings in drinking and gambling, he enjoyed the hours in conversation and music in the houses of the citizens of Nuremberg.
The long inaction brought its moral consequences, and the troops became demoralized and insubordinate from their enforced idleness. Plundering and acts of violence became so common that Gustavus was obliged to issue the most stringent ordinances to restore discipline; and an officer and many men had to be executed before the spirit of insubordination was quelled. In order to pass some of the hours of the days Malcolm obtained leave from one of the great clockmakers of the town—for Nuremberg was at that time the centre of the craft of clockmaking—to allow him to work in his shop, and to learn the mysteries of his trade.
Most of the establishments were closed, but Malcolm's acquaintance was one of the wealthiest of the citizens, and was able to keep his craftsmen at work, and to store the goods he manufactured until better times should return. Malcolm began the work purely to occupy his time, but he presently came to take a lively interest in it, and was soon able to take to pieces and put together again the cumbrous but simple machines which constituted the clocks of the period.
Workshops were not in those days factories. The master of a craft worked, surrounded by his craftsmen and apprentices. Every wheel and spring were made upon the premises, fashioned and finished with chisel and file; and there was an interest in the work far beyond any which it possesses in the present day, when watches are turned out wholesale, the separate parts being prepared by machinery, and the work of the artisan consisting solely in the finishing and putting them together.
Laying aside his armour and gay attire, and donning a workman's apron, Malcolm sat at the bench by the side of the master, shaping and filing, and listening to his stories connected with the trade and history of Nuremberg. He anticipated no advantage from the knowledge he was gaining, but regarded it simply as a pleasant way of getting through a portion of the day.
Thus for three months the armies confronted each other. Provisions were becoming terribly scarce, the magazines of the city were emptying fast, and although working night and day, the mills of the place did not suffice to grind flour for the needs of so many mouths. The population of the city itself was greatly swollen by the crowds of Protestant fugitives who had fled there for refuge on the approach of the Imperialists, and the magazines of the city dwindled fast under the demands made upon them by this addition, and that of the Swedish army, to the normal population. Fever broke out in the city and camp. The waters of the Pegnitz were tainted by the carcasses of dead horses and other animals. The supplies of forage had long since been exhausted, and the baggage and troop animals died in vast numbers.
Still there was no sign of a change. Wallenstein would not attack, Gustavus could not. The Swedish king waited to take advantage of some false move on the part of the Imperial commander; but Wallenstein was as great a general as himself, and afforded him no opening, turning a deaf ear to the entreaties and importunities of Maximilian that he would end the tedious siege by an attack upon the small and enfeebled army around Nuremberg.
All this time Gustavus was in constant communication with his generals outside, his messengers making their way by speed or stratagem through the beleaguering Croats, and kept up the spirits of his men by daily reviews and by the cheerful countenance which he always wore.
The Swedish columns were gradually closing in towards Nuremberg. One was led by the chancellor Oxenstiern, to whom had been committed the care of the Middle Rhine and the Lower Palatinate, where he had been confronted by the Spanish troops under Don Philip de Sylva.
On the 11th July, leaving Horn with a small force to oppose the Spaniards, the chancellor set out to join his master. On the way he effected a junction with the forces of the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel. This general had been opposed in Westphalia by Pappenheim, but he seized the opportunity when the latter had marched to relieve Maestricht, which was besieged by Frederic of Nassau, to march away and join Oxenstiern.
The Scotch officers Ballandine and Alexander Hamilton were with their regiment in the Duchy of Magdeburg. When the news of the king's danger reached them without waiting for instructions they marched to Halle and joining a portion of the division of the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, to which they were attached, pushed on to Zeitz, and were there joined by the duke himself, who had hurried on from the Lake of Constance, attended only by his guards, but, picking up five Saxon regiments in Franconia. Together they passed on to Wurtzburg, where they joined Oxenstiern and the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel. General Banner, with the fourth corps, was at Augsburg, opposed to Cratz, who was at the head of the remains of Tilly's old army.
Slipping away from his foes he marched to Windsheim, and was there joined by a body of troops under Bernhard of Weimar. The force from Wurtzburg soon afterwards came up, and the whole of the detached corps, amounting to 49,000 men, being now collected, they marched to Bruck, ten miles north of Nuremberg. Three days later, on the 16th of August, Gustavus rode into their camp, and on the 21st marched at their head into Nuremberg, unhindered by the Imperialists.
Gustavus probably calculated that the Imperialists would now move down and offer battle; but Wallenstein, who had detached 10,000 men to bring up supplies, could not place in the field a number equal to those of the reinforcements, and preferred to await an attack in the position which he had prepared with such care. He knew the straits to which Nuremberg and its defenders were reduced, and the impossibility there would be of feeding the new arrivals.
The country round for a vast distance had been long since stripped of provisions, and Gustavus had no course open to him but to march away with his army and leave the city to its fate, or to attack the Imperialists in their stronghold.
On the day after his arrival, the 21st of August, Gustavus marched out and opened a cannonade upon the Imperialists' position, in order to induce Wallenstein to come down and give battle. Wallenstein was not, however, to be tempted, but kept his whole army busy with the spade and axe further intrenching his position. The next day the king brought his guns nearer to the enemy's camp, and for twenty-four hours kept up a heavy fire. The only result, however, was that Wallenstein fell back a few hundred yards on to two ridges, on one of which was the ruined castle called the Alte Veste; the other was known as the Altenburg. The ascent to these was steep and craggy, and they were covered by a thick forest. Here Wallenstein formed in front of his position a threefold barrier of felled trees woven and interlaced with each other, each barrier rising in a semicircle one above the other. Before the Swedish cannon ceased to fire the new position of the Imperialists had been made impregnable.
Unfortunately for Gustavus he had at this moment lost the services of the best officer in his army, Sir John Hepburn, whom he had always regarded as his right hand. The quarrel had arisen from some trifling circumstance, and Gustavus in the heat of the moment made some disparaging allusion to the religion of Hepburn, who was a Catholic and also to that officer's love of dress and finery. The indignant Hepburn at once resigned his commission and swore never again to draw his sword in the service of the king—a resolution to which he adhered, although Gustavus, when his anger cooled, endeavoured in every way to appease the angry soldier.
As he persisted in his resolution Colonel Munro was appointed to the command of the Green Brigade. It is probable that the quarrel was the consummation of a long standing grievance. Hepburn as well as the other Scottish officers had shared the indignation of Sir John Hamilton when the latter resigned in consequence of the Swedish troop being placed in the post of honour at the storm of the castle of Marienburg after the Scots had done all the work. There had, too, been much discontent among them concerning the Marquis of Hamilton, whom they considered that Gustavus had treated ungenerously; and still more concerning Lieutenant Colonel Douglas, whom Gustavus had committed to a common prison for a slight breach of etiquette, a punishment at which the English ambassador, Sir Harry Vane, remonstrated, and which the whole Scottish officers considered an insult to them and their country.
There were probably faults on both sides. The Scottish troops were the backbone of the Swedish army, and to them were principally due almost the whole of the successes which Gustavus had gained. Doubtless they presumed upon the fact, and although Gustavus recognized his obligations, as is shown by the immense number of commands and governorships which he bestowed upon his Scottish officers, he may well have been angered and irritated by the insistance with which they asserted their claims and services. It was, however, a most unfortunate circumstance that just at this critical moment he should have lost the services of an officer whose prudence was equal to his daring, and who was unquestionably one of the greatest military leaders of his age.
It is probable that had Hepburn remained by his side the king would not have undertaken the attack upon the impregnable position of the Imperialists. Deprived of the counsellor upon whose advice he had hitherto invariably relied, Gustavus determined to attempt to drive Wallenstein from his position, the decision being finally induced by a ruse of the Imperialist commander, who desired nothing so much as that the Swedes should dash their forces against the terrible position h............