occupation of their country by the Prussians, the Bohemians, who were defenceless and unarmed, maintained an attitude of dignified reserve. The same cannot be said of the German inhabitants of Bohemia. Very competent authorities state that they on several occasions welcomed the Prussians with so much enthusiasm that it was only the loyalty with which the King of Prussia, even in the time of war, discouraged such manifestations that prevented their leading to serious consequences.[1]
It is, as I have written elsewhere, a bitter saying in Austria that those nationalities which support the Government suffer, and those that oppose it are rewarded. The Hungarians had been on the verge of rebellion during the campaign of 1866, and had even formed a free corps to support the Prussians. The Bohemians, on the other hand, had remained loyally and undauntedly faithful to the dynasty. Yet in the year following the battle of Kralové Hradec, Hungary obtained almost complete independence, while Bohemia's demand of autonomy was ignominiously rejected.
Count Belcredi's plans received a death blow by the Bohemian campaign. The councillors of Vienna determined to call in the assistance of Baron—afterwards Count—Beust, who before the war had been prime minister of Saxony. He claimed no knowledge of the internal politics of the Habsburg empire. It is no longer a secret that his mission consisted in organizing a new active policy in Germany which might eventually reverse the results of the battle of Kralové Hradec. Beust knew that Hungary had been openly hostile to Austria during the war that had just ended, and that Hungary would some years previously have been lost to the empire, had not Russia interfered. In 1866 no such an intervention could be expected. Count Beust also reflected that as Hungary had never formed part of the Germanic confederation, its autonomy was by no means an obstacle to the re-establishment of the Habsburg hegemony in Germany.
The position of Bohemia was entirely different. On the resignation of Count Belcredi (February 4, 1867) Count Beust, who had hitherto only acted as minister of foreign affairs, undertook also the direction of the internal policy
- ↑ This is particularly mentioned by Duke Ernest of Saxe-Coburg in his Aus memem Leben (vol iii. p. 600).
