announced that he was about to set out on his
journey, the information was accompanied with a declaration of war. "It
was a war," he said, "for the defence of the true religion, its
ministers and preachers; for the deliverance of prisoners detained
against all faith and justice; to free Germany from her wretched
condition, and to oppose the Emperor's completion of that absolute
monarchy toward which he had so long been aiming."

To this manifesto was appended another from the King of France. Therein
Henry announced himself the "defender of the liberties of Germany, and
protector of her captive princes"; further stating "that, broken-hearted
[_le coeur navre_] at the condition of Germany, he could not refuse to
aid her, but had determined to do so to the utmost power of his ability,
even to personally engaging in this war, undertaken for liberty and not
for his personal benefit." This document--written in French--was headed
by the representation of a cap between two poniards, and around it the
inscription "The Emblem of Liberty." It is said to have been copied from
some ancient coins, and to have been appropriated as the symbol of
freedom by Caesar's assassins. Thus singularly was brought to light by a
king of the French Renaissance that terrible cap of liberty, before
which the ancient crown of France was one day destined to fall.

The declaration of the German princes and that of their ally, the King
of France, fell like a thunderbolt on the Emperor--so great was his
astonishment and consternation at the events so unexpected. With rapid
marches Maurice advanced on Upper Germany, while other divisions of the
army, headed by the confederate princes, hastened on toward Tyrol, by
way of Franconia and Swabia, everywhere being received with open arms as
"Germany's liberators." Maurice reached Augsburg on April 1st, and took
possession of that important city--the garrison offering no resistance,
and the inhabitants receiving him joyfully. There, as in other towns on
his march which had willingly opened their gates to him, the Interim was
abolished; the churches restored to the Protestants; the magistrates
appointed by the Emperor displaced, and those he had rejected
reinstated. Money, too, was freely offered him, and the deficiency in
his artillery supplied. At Trent the news that the Protestant princes,
joined by several of the Catholics and free states, "had taken up arms
for liberty," caused a terrible panic. The fathers