the prices were every day directed at the town-house; and if any man offered to demand more money for corn than the stated price, he could not sell, because at the town store-house you might buy cheaper.  Here are two instances of good and bad conduct:  the city of Magdeburg had been entreated by the king to settle funds, and raise money for their provision and security, and to have a sufficient garrison to defend them, but they made difficulties, either to raise men for themselves, or to admit the king’s troops to assist them, for fear of the charge of maintaining them; and this was the cause of the city’s ruin.

The city of Nuremberg opened their arms to receive the assistance proffered by the Swedes, and their purses to defend their town and common cause; and this was the saving them absolutely from destruction.  The rich burghers and magistrates kept open houses, where the officers of the army were always welcome; and the council of the city took such care of the poor that there was no complaining nor disorders in the whole city.  There is no doubt but it cost the city a great deal of money; but I never saw a public charge borne with so much cheerfulness, nor managed with so much prudence and conduct in my life.  The city fed above 50,000 mouths every day, including their own poor, besides themselves; and yet when the king had lain thus three months, and finding his armies longer in coming up than he expected, asked the burgrave how their magazines held out, he answered, they desired his Majesty not to hasten things for them, for they could maintain themselves and him twelve months longer if there was occasion.  This plenty kept both the army and city in good health, as well as in good heart; whereas nothing was to be had of us but blows, for we fetched nothing from without our works, nor had no business without the line but to interrupt the enemy.

The manner of the king’s encampment deserves a particular chapter.  He was a complete surveyor and a master in fortification, not to be outdone by anybody.  He had posted his army in the suburbs of the town, and drawn lines round the whole circumference, so that he begirt the whole city with his army.  His works were large, the ditch deep, flanked with innumerable bastions, ravelins, horn-works, forts, redoubts, batteries, and palisadoes, the incessant work of 8000 men for about fourteen days; besides that, the king was adding something or other to it every day, and the very posture of his camp was enough to tell a bigger army than Wallenstein’s that he was not to be assaulted in his trenches.

The king’s design appeared chiefly to be the preservation of the city; but that was not all.  He had three armies acting abroad in three several places.  Gustavus Horn was on the Moselle, the chancellor Oxenstiern about Mentz, Cologne, and the Rhine, Duke William and Duke Bernhard, together with General Baner, in Bavaria.  And though he designed they should all join him, and had wrote to them all