The rule of Basta was so despotic that the Transylvanians rose in revolt, and under an intrepid chief, Moses Tzekeli, appealed to the Turks for aid.  The Turks were rejoiced again to find the Christians divided, and hastened to avail themselves of the cooeperation of the disaffected.  The Austrians were driven from Transylvania, and the Turks aided in crowning Tzekeli Prince of Transylvania, under the protection of the Porte.  The Austrians, however, soon returned in greater force, killed Tzekeli in the confusion of battle, and reconquered the country.  During all this time wretched Hungary was ravaged with incessant wars between the Turks and Austrians.  Army after army swept to and fro over the smoldering cities and desolated plains.  Neither party gained any decisive advantage, while Hungary was exposed to misery which no pen can describe.  Cities were bombarded, now by the Austrians and now by the Turks, villages were burned, harvests trodden down, every thing eatable was consumed.  Outrages were perpetrated upon the helpless population by the ferocious Turks which can not be told.

The Hungarians lost all confidence in Rhodolph.  The bigoted emperor was so much engaged in the attempt to extirpate what he called heresy from his realms, that he neglected to send armies sufficiently strong to protect Hungary from these ravages.  He could have done this without much difficulty; but absorbed in his hostility to Protestantism, he merely sent sufficient troops to Hungary to keep the country in a constant state of warfare.  He filled every important governmental post in Hungary with Catholics and foreigners.  To all the complaints of the Hungarians he turned a deaf ear; and his own Austrian troops frequently rivaled the Turks in devastation and pillage.  At the same time he issued the most intolerant edicts, depriving the Protestants of all their rights, and endeavoring to force the Roman Catholic religion upon the community.

He allowed, and even encouraged, his rapacious generals to insult and defraud the Protestant Hungarian nobles, seizing their castles, confiscating their estates and driving them into exile.  This oppression at last became unendurable.  The people were driven to despair.  One of the most illustrious nobles of Hungary, a magnate of great wealth and distinction, Stephen Botskoi, repaired to Prague to inform the emperor of the deplorable state of Hungary and to seek redress.  He was treated with the utmost indignity; was detained for hours in the ante-chamber of the emperor, where he encountered the most cutting insults from the minions of the court.  The indignation of the high-spirited noble was roused to the highest pitch.  And when, on his return to Hungary, he found his estates plundered and devastated by order of the imperial governor, he was all ready to head an insurrection.

CHAPTER XIII.

RHODOLPH III.  AND MATTHIAS.

From 1604 to 1609.