of Madrid blazed with bonfires and illuminations.  At Vienna it was regarded as a victory, and Te Deums were chanted in the cathedral.  Ferdinand, however, conducted with a decorum which should be recorded to his honor.  He expressed the fullest appreciation of the grand qualities of his opponent, and in graceful words regretted his untimely death.  When the bloody waistcoat, perforated by the bullet, was shown him, he turned from it with utterances of sadness and regret.  Even if this were all feigned, it shows a sense of external propriety worthy of record.

It was the genius of Gustavus alone which had held together the Protestant confederacy.  No more aid of any efficiency could be anticipated from Sweden.  Christina, the daughter and heiress of Gustavus, was in her seventh year.  The crown was claimed by her cousin Ladislaus, the King of Poland, and this disputed succession threatened the kingdom with the calamities of civil war.  The Senate of Sweden in this emergence conducted with great prudence.  That they might secure an honorable peace they presented a bold front of war.  A council of regency was appointed, abundant succors in men and money voted, and the Chancellor Oxenstiern, a man of commanding civil and military talents, was intrusted with the sole conduct of the war.  The Senate declared the young queen the legitimate successor to the throne, and forbade all allusion to the claims of Ladislaus, under the penalty of high treason.

Oxenstiern proved himself worthy to be the successor of Gustavus.  He vigorously renewed alliances with the German princes, and endeavored to follow out the able plans sketched by the departed monarch.  Wallenstein, humiliated by his defeat, had fallen back into Bohemia, and now, with moderation strangely inconsistent with his previous career, urged the emperor to conciliate the Protestants by publishing a decree of general amnesty, and by proposing peace on favorable terms.  But the iron will of Ferdinand was inflexible.  In heart, exulting that his most formidable foe was removed, he resolved with unrelenting vigor to prosecute the war.  The storm of battle raged anew; and to the surprise of Ferdinand, Oxenstiern moved forward with strides of victory as signal as those of his illustrious predecessor.  Wallenstein meanly attempted to throw the blame of the disaster at Lutzen upon the alleged cowardice of his officers.  Seventeen of them he hanged, and consigned fifty others to infamy by inscribing their names upon the gallows.

So haughty a man could not but have many enemies at court.  They combined, and easily persuaded Ferdinand, who had also been insulted by his arrogance, again to degrade him.  Wallenstein, informed of their machinations, endeavored to rally the army to a mutiny in his favor.  Ferdinand, alarmed by this intelligence, which even threatened his own dethronement, immediately dismissed Wallenstein from the command, and dispatched officers from Vienna to seize his person, dead or alive.