field, retreating towards the house by which they had obtained entrance to the city. From thence they finally effected their escape into the open country, and reached Bonn, in a most disastrous plight, the same evening.

The victory and the defeat cost both parties their principal leaders, as well as their best men; the Lord of Falkenberg, the archbishop's cousin, being slain in the action, and the Count of Limburg made prisoner: Mathias Overstolz, on the other side, died of his wounds.

For a considerable period subsequently Bonn became daily more opulent and more powerful, in consequence of the accession of the old noble families of Cologne, who resorted thither when driven from their native city by the turbulence of the commonalty. It arrived at its highest pitch of riches and greatness in the years 1254-6, when it joined as a member the famous Hanseatic league. Two disastrous sieges which it sustained in the beginning of the sixteenth century, both arising from one cause- a contest for the principality—gave the first deadly blow to its power and opulence.

In the year 1480, the chapter of Cologne elected to the episcopal dignity Rupert, Pfalzgraf of the Middle Rhine, younger brother to the celebrated Pfalzgraf of the same title, better known as Frederic the Victorious. He was called to that station because of his family influence; but he did not answer, in other respects, the expectations of those who elected him. Calculating for support upon his brother's power, he paid no attention to the wishes of the superior clergy: the consequence of which was, that, after various complaints and much disputation, the chapter of Cologne ultimately deposed him, and elected Hermann, a Landgraf of Nassau, in his stead, A. D. 1500. Rupert was taken unawares by this bold act of his clergy; but he did not lose his courage. He fled to his brother's court, and claimed his assistance. Frederic was not slow in affording him assistance the most ample and efficient. At the head of an immense army, inured to fatigue and accustomed to conquest, the brothers dropped down the Rhine; and, making themselves masters of several refractory towns on their way, finally took post before Bonn. The siege was short, but effective: the city

surrendered unconditionally, and was once more placed in the power of the exiled prelate.

But, though Rupert succeeded in gaining the city of Bonn and the greater part of the territory of the archdiocess of Cologne, he alienated, by this act of calling in the aid of his family influence, the hearts of those of his subjects who were not previously adverse to his cause, as well as of those who were indifferent parties in the struggle between him and his more immediate enemies. Hermann, his opponent, besides the support he received from his brother, the powerful Landgraf of Hesse, succeeded, also, in winning to his side the still more powerful Duke of Gueldres, and several other princes his neighbours. The Emperor of Germany, the weak and wicked Frederic III., also abetted his cause, and identified himself with his quarrel more through hatred of the great Frederic, his namesake, than through any feeling for him, or against Rupert. As if to complete the misfortune of Rupert, his brother, the victorious Pfalzgraf, died suddenly at this time; with him died all his hopes of effectual resistance to his foes. The chapter, on the news of this event, once more took heart; and the hapless archbishop was again constrained to fly from Bonn. Being now without the aid of his mighty relative, he cast about for assistance in some other equally influential quarter. Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy, was at this period one of the most powerful and most ambitious princes in Europe: prompt to embrace any cause which promised him aggrandisement: heedless of the justice of any quarrel in which he engaged, so that it brought him an accession of power, or an increase of territory: unscrupulous as to the means he employed - always, however, preferring force to cunning —so the end he sought was attained; he was, perhaps, more fitted for an emergency of the kind than any other sovereign in existence. To him the deposed prelate applied to reinstate him once more in his lost sovereignty; and his application was at once entertained and acceded to.

The history of the siege of Bonn, undertaken by this ambitious prince at the suit of this desperate prelate, differs in no wise from that of those which preceded it. It was brief, but bloody. A glance at the composition of the beleaguering

host will not, however, be without interest to the general reader.

Immediately on the conclusion of the treaty of alliance with the archbishop, Charles despatched heralds to Bonn, and, subsequently, to Cologne, demanding the re-instatement of Rupert in the temporal and ecclesiastical government of the diocess; the expulsion of Hermann of Nassau from the episcopal chair; and the delivery up to him of all the leaders of the opposition; all, in short, who took part in deposing his friend and ally, the archbishop. These conditions the chapter refused to comply with, and returned an answer of defiance instead. Charles then set his army in motion, and descended the Rhine, ostensibly for the purpose of constraining them to his purpose, but, in reality, to make himself master of the lower part of the river; and thus to possess that important thoroughfare from Basle to the sea, in furtherance of his long-conceived design to make himself master of all western Europe. His forces consisted of thirty thousand of the best and bravest soldiers in Christendom, all picked men from various nations - Burgundians, French, Italians, and English commanded by the duke in person, assisted by the ablest generals of the age. They were accompanied and followed by about ten thousand other beings, of both sexes, to administer to their wants or their pleasures. Among them were fifteen hundred filles de joie, and four hundred priests, suttlers innumerable, and a host besides of those idlers who follow a camp as the raven follows the scent of carrion.

Bonn soon fell before this irresistible power; and was delivered up to the archbishop, after it had been duly plundered.

The subsequent history of this city may be rapidly related. It was ravaged once more, A. D. 1584-1589, in consequence of siding with the Elector Gebhard of Walburg, who at the outbreak of the reformation, after marrying Agnes von Mansfeldt, a nun, attempted to secularise the diocess, and constitute it into a temporal principality. In 1673, it surrendered to the united powers of Holland, Spain, and Austria. Frederick III., Duke of Brandenburg, afterwards the first King of Prussia, made himself master of it in 1689; and, in 1703, the Dutch, under the command of the celebrated General Cöhorn, or Kühorn, the great engineer, assaulted and carried it after a short bombardment.

About the latter end of the same year, it fell into the hands of our Duke of Marlborough and the allies. From 1795 to 1814, it continued in the possession of the French government, republican and imperial. In the latter year, it was entered and occupied by the allied forces on the expulsion of Bonaparte from France; and in 1818, two years subsequently, it was annexed to the territories of Prussia, part of which kingdom it still continues.

THE MÜNSTER.

THE VEHM-GERICHTE, OR SECRET TRIBUNAL.

Certainly the most prominent public structure in Bonn is the Parochial, or Münster-Kirche. Tradition assigns its origin to the Empress Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great; and the crypt is, undoubtedly, Roman in its construction: but the present superstructure, however, dates no further back than the twelfth century; and it is, most probably, a re-edification of the ancient church, constructed, perhaps, by that celebrated patroness of Christianity.

It was in the crypt of this venerable edifice, according to the most credible traditionary authorities, that the terrific tribunal, known, in the middle ages, as the Vehm-gerichte, or Secret Tribunal, held its chief court, and issued therefrom those fearful mandates, which made even the proudest princes of the period quail and tremble.

From the date of the decay of the ancient institutions of Charlemagne, the German empire became a prey to intestine discord, until it was afflicted with almost every evil incident to an unsettled state of society. The power of the strong hand (Faustrecht) predominated; might grew into right in the minds of men; and no redress existed for oppression or wrong, provided the culprit could afford to set the insufficient laws, and the venal and weak authorities appointed to enforce them, at defiance. At this juncture, happily for the peace of the land, the great Elector and Archbishop of Cologne, Engelbert the First, made his ap

pearance on the public stage (A. D. 1213-25), and set about effecting those reforms in the social condition which the disordered state of the times, and the general disorganisation of all classes, rendered absolutely necessary.

Of Engelbert's character, mention has already been made:* he was truly the greatest man of his age and country. Το remedy the general disorder which prevailed, not alone in his own dominions, but also over the entire empire, he projected, as a first step, the establishment of a secret tribunal; and then he obtained from the emperor and the pope, their sanction to his self-appointment as its chief-the grand inquisitor of the empire. This tribunal was termed the Vehm-Gerichte.† He next entered into the strictest secret alliances with the princes neighbouring on his diocess, and also with the great barons who were interested in the preservation of order; and bound them, by the most stringent oaths, to further the decrees and execute the judgments of the Vehm-Gerichte, of which they were all constituted members by this compact. The original object of this tribunal was one of the most laudable description possible; it took extrajudicial cognisance of all murders, assassinations, rapes, robberies, sacrileges, and adulteries; and punished them accordingly. The culprit, or accused party, was cited before the secret tribunal by means of a summons, generally affixed to some conspicuous part of his bed-chamber; but often also conveyed secretly on his person, or offered to his sight, under circumstances of peculiar mystery, by the numerous emissaries of the tribunal. If the citation was answered by him, he was tried in secret, and privately punished; if he refused to appear, he was proceeded against as if he were present, and the guilt of contumacy was added to the other charges of which he might be accused. In the latter case, he very rarely escaped the doom pronounced against him; for the agents of the terrific tribunal were every where; and no place was deemed free from their all

* Vide pp. 17, 98.

+ From Vehm, or Wehm, a word of uncertain etymology, and of still more uncertain meaning, but probably from Weh (wo, grief, sorrow), and Gerichte (jurisdiction, or judgment, court, tribunal, &c.). Sir F. Palgrave says it is derived from Ehme (" law"), vide "Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth. London, 1832."

VOL. I.

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