Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
The winter of 1633 had set in with unusual severity throughout Suabiaand Bavaria, though as yet scarcely advanced beyond the first week ofNovember. It was, in fact, at the point when our tale commences, theeighth of that month, or, in our modern computation, the eighteenth;long after which date it had been customary of late years, under anyordinary state of the weather, to extend the course of militaryoperations, and without much decline of vigor. Latterly, indeed, it hadbecome apparent that entire winter campaigns, without either formalsuspensions of hostilities, or even partial relaxations, had enteredprofessedly as a point of policy into the system of warfare which nowswept over Germany in full career, threatening soon to convert its vastcentral provinces—so recently blooming Edens of peace and expandingprosperity—into a howling wilderness; and which had already convertedimmense tracts into one universal aceldama, or human shambles, revivingto the recollection at every step the extent of past happiness in theendless memorials of its destruction. This innovation upon the oldpractice of war had been introduced by the Swedish armies, whosenorthern habits and training had fortunately prepared them to receive aGerman winter as a very beneficial exchange; whilst upon the less hardysoldiers from Italy, Spain, and the Southern France, to whom the harshtransition from their own sunny skies had made the very same climate asevere trial of constitution, this change of policy pressed with ahardship that sometimes [Footnote: Of which there is more than oneremarkable instance, to the great dishonor of the French arms, in therecords of her share in the Thirty Years' War.] crippled theirexertions.
It was a change, however, not so long settled as to resist theextraordinary circumstances of the weather. So fierce had been the coldfor the last fortnight, and so premature, that a pretty confidentanticipation had arisen, in all quarters throughout the poor exhaustedland, of a general armistice. And as this, once established, wouldoffer a ready opening to some measure of permanent pacification, itcould not be surprising that the natural hopefulness of the humanheart, long oppressed by gloomy prospects, should open with unusualreadiness to the first colorable dawn of happier times. In fact, thereaction in the public spirits was sudden and universal. It happenedalso that the particular occasion of this change of prospect broughtwith it a separate pleasure on its own account. Winter, which by itspeculiar severity had created the apparent necessity for an armistice,brought many household pleasures in its train—associated immemoriallywith that season in all northern climates. The cold, which had casuallyopened a path to more distant hopes, was also for the present moment ascreen between themselves and the enemy's sword. And thus it happenedthat the same season, which held out a not improbable picture of finalrestoration, however remote, to public happiness, promised them acertain foretaste of this blessing in the immediate security of theirhomes.
But in the ancient city of Klosterheim it might have been imagined thatnobody participated in these feelings. A stir and agitation amongst thecitizens had been conspicuous for some days; and on the morning of theeighth, spite of th