bk4-ch6

Home

Chap. xi. :  DISCOURSES ON THE ORDER OF THE MARAUDER BROTHERS

    Now on the way Herzbruder agreed with me that I should give myself
out for his cousin that I might receive greater respect: and he for his
part would get me a horse and a servant and send me to the regiment of
Neuneck, wherein I could serve as a volunteer till an officer’s place
should fall vacant in the army, to which he could help me. And so in a
wink I became a fellow that looked like a good soldier: but in that
summer I did no great deeds, save that I helped to steal a few cattle
here and there in the Black Forest and made myself well acquainted with
the Breisgau and Alsace. For the rest, I had scant luck, for when my
servant and his horse had been captured by the Weimar troops at Kenzingen
I must needs work the other harder, and in the end so ride him to death
that I was fain to join the order of the “Merode-brüder.” My friend
Herzbruder indeed would willingly have equipped me again: but seeing that
I had so soon got rid of the first two horses, he held back, and thought
to let me kick my heels till I had learned more foresight: nor did I
desire it, for I found in my new companions so pleasant a society that
till winter quarters should come I wished for no better employ.

    Now I must tell you somewhat of these Merode brothers, for without
doubt there be some, and specially those that be ignorant of war, that
know not who these people be. And so have I never found any writer that
hath included in his work an account of their manners, customs, rights,
and privileges: besides which ‘tis well worth while that not only the
generals of these days but also the peasants should know what this
brotherhood is. And first as concerns their names, I do hope ‘twill be no
disgrace to that honorable cavalier in whose service they got that name,
or I could not so openly tack it on to any man. For I once saw a kind of
shoe that had in place of eyelet-holes twisted cords, that a man might
more easily stamp through the mud: and these were called Mansfeld’s shoes
because his troops first devised them. Yet should any call Count Mansfeld
himself “Cobbler” on that account, I would count him for a fool. And so
must you understand this name, that will last as long as Germans do make
war: and this was the beginning of it: when this gentleman (Merode) first
brought a newly raised regiment to the army his recruits proved as weak
and crazy in body as the Bretons,* so that they could not endure the
marching and other fatigues to which a soldier must submit in the field,
for which reason their brigade soon became so weak that it could hardly
protect the colours, and wherever you found one or more sick and lame in
the market-place or in houses, and behind fences and hedges, and asked,
“Of what regiment?” the answer was wellnigh always “Of Merode.”

    Hence it arose that at length all that, whether sick or sound,
wounded or not, were found straggling off the line of march or else did
not have their quarters in the field with their own regiment, were called
“Merode-brothers,” just as before they were known as “swine-catchers” and
“bee-taylors”: for they be like to the drones in the beehives which when
they have lost their sting can work no more nor make honey, but only eat.
If a trooper lose his horse or a musqueteer his health, or his wife and
child fall ill and must stay behind, at once you have a pair and a half
of Merode-brothers, a crew that can be compared with none but gipsies,
for not only do they straggle round the army in front, in the flanks, in
the middle, as it pleases them, but also they be like the gipsies in
manners and customs. For you can see them huddled together (like
partridges in winter) behind the hedges in the shade or, if the season
require it, in the sun, or else lying round a fire smoking tobacco and
idling, while the good soldier meanwhile must endure with the colours
heat, thirst, hunger, and all manner of misery. Here again goes a pack of
them pilfering alongside the line of march, while many a poor soldier is
ready to sink under the weight of his arms. They plunder all they can
find before, behind, and beside the army: and what they cannot consume
that they spoil, so that the regiments, when they come to their quarters
or into camp, do often find not even a good draught of water; and when
they are strictly forced to stay with the baggage-train, you will often
find this greater in number than the army itself. And though they do
march together and lodge together, fight and make common cause, yet have
they no captain to order them, no Feldwebel nor sargeant to dust their
jackets, no corporal to rouse them up, no drummer to summon them to
picket or bivouac1 duty, and, in a word, no one to bring them into the
line of battle like an adjutant2 nor to assign them their lodgings like a
quartermaster,3 but they live like noblemen. Howbeit whenever a
commissariat-officer comes, they are the first to claim their share,
undeserved though it be. Yet are the Provost-marshal and his fellows
their greatest plague, being such as at times, when they play their
tricks too scurvily, do set iron bracelets on their hands and feet, or
even adorn them with a hempen collar and hang them up by their precious
necks. They keep no watch, they dig no trenches, they serve on no forlorn
hope, and they will never fight in the line of battle, yet they be well
nourished and fed. But what damage the general, the peasant, and the
whole army, in which many such companions are to be found, do suffer, is
not to be described. The basest of horse-boys, that doth naught but
forage, is worth to the general more than one thousand such, that do make
a trade of such foraging and lie at ease without excuse upon their
bear-skins,** till they be taken off by the adversary or be rapped over
the fingers when they do meddle with the peasants. So is the army
weakened and the enemy strengthened: and even if a scurvy rogue of this
kind (I mean not the poor sick man, but the riders without horses that
for sheer neglect do let their horses perish, and betake themselves to
the brotherhood to save their skins) do so pass the summer, yet all the
use one can have of him is to equip him again for the winter at great
cost that he may have somewhat to lose in the next campaign. ‘Twere well
to couple such together like greyhounds and teach them to make war in
garrison towns, or even make them toil in chains in the galleys, if they
will not serve on foot in the field till they can get a horse again. I
say naught here of the many villages that, by chance or by malice, have
been burned down by them; how many of their own comrades they entice
away, plunder, rob, and even murder, nor how many a spy can be concealed
among them if he know but enough to give the name of a regiment and a
company in the army. To this honourable brotherhood I now must belong,
and so remained till the day before the Battle of Wittenweire, at which
time our headquarters were at Schüttern: for going then with my comrades
into the county of Geroldseck to steal cows and oxen I was taken prisoner
by the troops of Weimar, that knew far better how to treat us, for they
made us take musquets and distributed us in different regiments: and so I
came into Hattstein’s regiment.

Chap. xii.: OF A DESPERATE FIGHT FOR LIFE IN WHICH EACH PARTY DOTH 
ESCAPE DEATH

     Now could I well understand I was born but for misfortune, for some
weeks before the engagement happened I heard some lower officers of
Götz’s army that talked of our war: and says one, “Without a battle will
this summer not pass: and if we win, in the next winter we shall surely
take Freiburg and the Forest-towns: but if we earn a defeat we shall earn
winter quarters too.” Upon this prophecy I laid my plans and said to
myself, “Now rejoice thee, Simplicissimus, for next spring thou wilt
drink good wine of the Lake and the Neckar and wilt enjoy all that the
troops of Weimar can win.” Yet therein I was mightily deceived, for being
now of those troops myself, I was predestinated to help lay siege to
Breisach, for that siege was fully set afoot presently after the Battle
of Wittenweier, and there must I, like other musqueteers, watch and dig
trenches day and night, and gained naught thereby save that I learnt how
to assail a fortress by approaches, to which manner I had paid but scant
attention in the camp before Magdeburg. For the rest, I was but lousily
provided for, for two or three must lodge together, our purses were
empty, and so were wine, beer, and meat a rarity. Apples, with half as
much bread as I could eat, were my finest dainties. And ‘twas hard for me
to bear this when I reflected on the fleshpots of Egypt, that is, on the
Westphalian hams and sausages of Lippstadt. Yet did I think but little on
my wife, and when I did so I did but plague myself with the thought that
she might be untrue to me. At last was I so impatient that I declared to
my captain how my affairs stood and wrote by the post to Lippstadt, and
so heard from Colonel Saint André and my father-in-law that they had, by
letters to the Duke of Weimar, secured that my captain should let me go
with a pass.

     So about a week or four days before Christmas I marched away with a
good musquet on my shoulder from the camp down through the Breisgau,
being minded at this same Christmas-tide to receive at Strassburg twenty
thalers4 sent to me by my brother-in-law, and then to betake myself down
the Rhine with the traders, since now there were no Emperor’s garrisons
on the road. But when I was now past Endingen and came to a lonely house,
a shot was fired at me so close that the ball grazed the rim of my hat,
and forthwith there sprang out to me a strong, broad-shouldered fellow,
crying to me to lay down my gun. So I answered, “By God, my friend, not
to please thee,” and therewith cocked my piece. Thereupon he whipped out
a monstrous thing that was more like a headsman’s sword than a rapier,
and rushed upon me: and now that I saw his true intent I pulled the
trigger and hit him so fair on the forehead that he reeled, and at last
fell. So to take my advantage of this I quickly wrested his sword out of
his hand and would have run him through with it, but it would not pierce
him; and then suddenly he sprang to his feet and seized me by the hair
and I him, but his sword I had thrown away. So upon that we began such a
serious game together as plainly shewed the bitter rage of each other
against the other, and yet could neither be the other’s master: now was I
on top, and now he, and for a moment both on our feet, which lasted not
long, for each would have the other’s life. But as the blood gushed out
in streams from my nose and mouth I spat it into mine enemy’s face, since
he so greatly desired it: and that served me well, for it hindered him
from seeing. And so we hauled each other about in the snow for more than
an hour, till we were so weary that to all appearance the weakness of one
could not, with fists alone, have overcome the weariness of the other;
nor could either have compassed the death of the other of his own
strength and without weapon. Yet the art of wrestling, wherein I had
often exercised myself at Lippstadt, now served me well, or I had
doubtless paid the penalty: for my enemy was stronger than I, and
moreover proof against steel. So when we had wearied us wellnigh to death
says he at last, “Brother, hold, I cry you mercy.”

     So says I, “Nay, thou hadst best have let me pass at the first.”
“And what profit hast thou if I die?” quoth he. “Yea,” said I, “and what
profit hadst thou if thou hadst shot me dead, seeing that I have not a
penny in my pocket?” On that he begged my pardon, and I granted it, and
suffered him to stand up after he had sworn to me solemnly that he would
not only keep the peace but would be my faithful friend and servant. Yet
had I neither believed nor trusted him had I then known of the villainies
he had already wrought. But when we were on our feet we shook hands upon
this, that what had happened should be forgotten, and each wondered that
he had found his master in the other; for he supposed that I was clad in
the same rogue’s hide as himself: and that I suffered him to believe,
lest when he had gotten his gun again he should once more attack me. He
had from my bullet a great bruise on his forehead, and I too had lost
much blood. Yet both were sorest about our necks, which were so twisted
that neither could hold his head upright.

     But as it drew towards evening, and my adversary told me that till I
came to the Kinzig I should meet neither dog nor cat, still less a man,
whereas he had in a lonely hut not far from the road a good piece of meat
and a draught of the best, I let myself be persuaded and went with him,
he protesting with sighs all the way how it grieved him to have done me a
hurt.

Chap. xiii.: HOW OLIVER CONCEIVED THAT HE COULD EXCUSE HIS  BRIGAND’S
TRICKS

     A determined soldier whose business it is to hold his life cheap and
to adventure it easily, is but a stupid creature. Out of a thousand
fellows you could hardly have found one that would have gone as a guest
to an unknown place with one that had even now tried to murder him. On
the way I asked him which army he was of. So he said, he served no prince
but was his own master, and asked of what party I was. I answered I had
served the Duke of Weimar but had now my discharge, and was minded to
betake myself home. Then he asked my name, and when I said “Simplicius”
he turned round (for I made him walk before me because I trusted him not)
and looked me straight in the face. “Is not thy name also
Simplicissimus?” quoth he. “Yea,” says I, “he is a rouge that denies his
own name: and who art thou?” “Why, brother,” he answered, “I am Oliver,
whom thou wilt surely remember before Magdeburg.” With that he cast away
his gun and fell on his knees to beg for my pardon that he had meant to
do me an ill turn, saying he could well conceive he could have no better
friend in the world than he would find in me, since according to old
Herzbruder’s prophecy I was so bravely to avenge his death. And I for my
part did wonder at so strange a meeting, but he said, “This is nothing
new: mountain and valley can never meet, but what is truly strange is
this, that I from a secretary have become a footpad and thou from a fool
a brave soldier. Be ye sure, brother, that if there were ten thousand
like us, we could relieve Breisach to-morrow and in the end make
ourselves masters of the whole world.”

     With such talk we came at nightfall to a little remote labourer’s
cottage: and though such boasting pleased me not, yet I said: “Yea,”
chiefly because his rouge’s temper was well known to me, and though I
trusted him not at all, yet went I with him into the said house, in which
a peasant was even then lighting a fire: to him said Oliver, “Hast thou
aught ready cooked?” “Nay,” said the peasant, “but I have still the cold
leg of veal that I brought from Waldkirch.” “Well then,” said Oliver, “go
bring it here and likewise the little cask of wine.”  So when the peasant
was gone, “Brother,” said I (for so I called him to be safer with him)
“thou hast a willing host.” “Oh, devil thank the rouge,” says he, “I do
keep his wife and child for him and also he doth earn good booty for
himself; for I do leave for him all the clothes that I capture, for him
to turn to his own profit.” So I asked where he kept his wife and child;
to which Oliver answered, he had them in safety in Freiburg, where he
visited them twice a week, and brought him from thence his food, as well
as powder and shot. And further he told me he had long practiced this
freebooter’s trade, and that it profited him more than to serve any lord:
nor did he think to give it up till he had properly filled his purse.
“Brother,” says I, “thou livest in a dangerous estate, and if thou art
caught in such a villainy, how thinkest thou ‘twould fare with thee?”
“Aha,” says he, “I perceive thou art still the old Simplicissimus: I know
well that he that would win must stake somewhat: but remember that their
lordships*** of Nuremberg hang no man till they catch him.” So I
answered, “Yea, but put the case, brother, that thou art not caught,
which is yet but unlikely, since the pitcher that goes often to the well
must break at last, yet is such a life as thou leadest the most shameful
in the world, so that I scarce can believe thou canst desire to die in
it.”

     “What?” says he, “the most shameful? My brave Simplicissimus, I
assure thee that robbery is the most noble exercise that one in these
days can find in the world. Tell me how many kingdoms and principalities
be there that have not been stolen by violence and so taken. Or is it
ever counted for evil of a king or a prince in the whole world that he
enjoys the revenues of his lands, which commonly have been gained by his
forefathers with violence and conquest? Yea, what could be named more
noble than the trade that I now follow? I well perceive that thou wouldst
fain preach me a sermon showing how many have been hanged, drawn, and
quartered for murder and robbery: but that I know already, for so the
laws do command: yet wilt thou see none but poor and miserable thieves so
put to death, as they indeed deserve for undertaking this noble craft,
which is reserved for men of high parts and capacity. But when hast thou
ever seen a person of quality punished by justice for that he has
oppressed his people too much? Yea, and more than that, when is the
usurer punished, that yet doth pursue this noble trade in secret, and
that too under the cloak of Christian love? Why, then, should I be
punishable, I that practice it openly without concealment or hypocrisy?
My good Simplicissimus, thou hast never read thy Machiavel.5 I am a man
of honest mood, and do follow this manner of life openly and without
shame.  I do fight and do adventure my life upon it like the heroes of
old, and do know that such trades, and likewise he that follows them,
stand ever in peril: but since I do adventure my life thereupon, it doth
follow without contradiction that ‘tis but just and fair I should be
allowed to follow my trade.”

     To that I answered, “Whether robbery and theft be allowed to thee or
not, yet do I know that this is against the order of nature, that will
not have it so that any many should do to another what he would not have
done to himself. And this is wrong, too, as against the laws of this
world, which ordain that thieves shall be hanged and robbers beheaded and
murderers broken on the wheel: and lastly, ‘tis also against the laws of
God, which is the chiefest point of all: for He doth leave no sin
unpunished.” “Yea,” said Oliver, “’tis as I said: thou art still the same
Simplicissimus that hath not yet studied his Machiavel: but if I could
but set up a monarchy in this fashion, then would I fain see who would
preach to me against it.”

     And so had we disputed longer: but then came the peasant with meat
and drink, and so we sat together and appeased our hunger, of which I at
least had much need.

Edited by Virginia L. Hudson
 

* Referring to a body of Breton troops sent by Richelieu to help
Guébriant. They turned out worthless. (Goodrick’s note)
1 A military term introduced during the Thirty Year’s War, signifying a
night watch by a regiment to prevent a surprise attack. “Bivouac,” The
Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), vol. 2, p. 236.
2 An officer responsible for assisting superior officers in the army by
receiving and communicating orders and conducting correspondence.
“Adjutant,” The Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1989), vol. 1, p. 160.
3 A lieutenant who provides quarters for soldiers, lays out the campsite,
and looks after the supplies (including food and ammunition) of a
regiment. “Quartermaster,” The Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1989), vol. 7, p. 997.
** “Bearskinner” was the troopers’ name for a malingerer. It was taken
from a very old legend. (Goodrick’s note)
4 Large, silver coins equivalent to three German marks adopted by the
Holy Roman Empire in 1566. “Thaler,” World Coin Encyclopedia (New York:
William Morrow & Co., 1984), p. 249-50.
*** The allusion is to the escape of the robber-knight, Eppelin von
Gailingen, from the Castle of Nuremberg. (Goodrick’s note)
5 Referring to the Italian diplomat and writer Niccolò Machiavelli
(1469-1527). His most famous work was The Prince, written in 1513, which
advocated “desperate measures for a desperate situation” and articulated
Machiavelli’s belief that governments should be absolute in their power,
operating independently of religion and traditional morally accepted
ideas. Oliver had apparently decided these practices, if fit for a king,
ought apply to him as well. “Machiavelli, Niccolò,” Collier’s
Encyclopedia (New York: Collier’s, 1996), vol. 15, p. 163-5.
 
 
