news of the capture being
brought to him at Paris, sent orders to shoot him within twenty-four
hours.

He died as bravely as he had lived. When placed before the firing-party
of twelve riflemen, he refused either to kneel or to allow himself to be
blindfolded. "I stand before my Creator," he exclaimed, in firm tones,
"and standing will I restore to him the spirit he gave."

He gave the signal to fire, but the men, moved by the scene, missed
their aim. The first fire brought him to his knees, the second stretched
him on the ground, where a corporal terminated the cruel scene by
shooting him through the head. He died February 20, 1810. At a later
date his remains were borne back to his native alps, a handsome monument
of white marble was erected to his memory in the church at Innsbruck,
and his family was ennobled.

Of the two other principal leaders of the Tyrolese, Haspinger, the
Capuchin, escaped to Vienna, which Speckbacher also succeeded in
reaching, after a series of perils and escapes which are well worth
relating.

After the dispersal of his troops he, like Hofer, sought concealment in
the mountains where the Bavarians sought for him in troops, vowing to
"cut his skin into boot-straps if they caught him." He attempted to
follow the mountain paths to Austria, but at Dux found the roads so
blocked with snow that further progress was impossible. Here the
Bavarians came upon his track and attacked the house in which he had
taken refuge. He escaped by leaping from its roof, but was wounded in
doing so.

For the twenty-seven days that followed he roamed through the snowy
mountain forests, in danger of death both from cold and starvation. Once
for four days together he did not taste food. At the end of this time he
found shelter in a hut at Bolderberg, where by chance he found his wife
and children, who had sought the same asylum.

His bitterly persistent foes left him not long in safety here. They
learned his place of retreat, and pursued him, his presence of mind
alone saving him from capture. Seeing them approach, he took a sledge
upon his shoulders, and walked towards and past them as though he were a
servant of the house.

His next place of refuge was in a cave on the Gemshaken, in which he
remained until the opening of spring, when he had the ill-fortune to be
carried by a snow-slide a mile and a half into the valley. It was
impossible to return. He crept from the snow, but found that one of his
legs was