When I had recovered from the fatigue of my travels, I came to the conclusion that a life of monotony and frequent visits to the tavern were not at all to my taste. The day would come when I had a wife and children to maintain; I therefore wanted a means of livelihood. I voted for the scribal occupation, and had recourse to the influence of Superintendent-general Knipstrow to obtain a position at the chancellery of Wolgast. Our friend's efforts having been successful, I was summoned to Wollin, where the prince was going to hold a diet. The journey by coach enabled me to make ample acquaintance both with the councillors and with my colleagues. I entered upon my duties on November 14, 1546.
The staff of the chancellery was composed of Jacob Citzewitz, chancellor; Erasmus Hausen, accountant-general; Joachim Rust, proto-notary; Johannes Gottschalk, Lawrence Dinnies, Christopher Labbun and Heinrich Altenkuke, secretaries. I need only mention for form's sake Valentine von Eichstedt, a student from Greifswald, whom the chancellor wished to initiate in the dispatch of current affairs.
Valentine hung about the office, now and again copying a fragment of a letter. He was wretchedly dressed; his poor blue jacket scarcely reached to his waist, while, on the other hand, his hose fell over his boots. Rust and Gottschalk refused to have him at the clerks' table; he had his meals lower down with the servants. In spite of this, Valentine, at the retirement of Erasmus Hausen, was appointed to the audit office through the influence of the chancellor. In order to get him into the habit of pleading he was entrusted with the cases that were settled by mutual agreement; after which he was sent to Wittenberg to finish his studies, and in a very short period he became accountant-general. A few years later Citzewitz gave up his position of chancellor to him. The protégé paid his benefactor in the usual way of the world, and on that chapter I myself could say a great deal.
The experience I had gained at the Imperial Chamber and in the chancelleries compelled Rust and Gottschalk to acknowledge that I could handle my pen, and inasmuch as the chancellor preferred my work to theirs, they seized every opportunity to do me harm. I had only to ask them for a few materials for this or that work to be sure to get it badly done and teeming with inaccuracies.
The dissolution of the League of Schmalkalden[[39]] and the threatening attitude of the emperor imparted a feverish activity to the correspondence which was being exchanged between our princes, the Elector of Brandenburg and the Elector of Saxony. The latter spent the winter very sadly at Altenburg. Chancellor Jacob Citzewitz was the soul of these negotiations; his experience of imperial and provincial diets, his learning heightened by eloquence, the personal consideration he enjoyed, his imposing figure, his lofty mind, and his assiduous labours all these, in fact, singled him out to represent the princes both in the councils and on more solemn occasions. Being fully aware of the weightiness of his task, he wholly devoted himself to it; all the enactments of the princes were drawn up by his pen and defied criticism. When Citzewitz at the termination of a debate asked: "Who undertakes the inditing?" all the councillors cried in chorus: "That's Solomon's business," for that was the nickname they had bestowed upon him.
Day and night, on horseback or on wheels, I scoured the highways in company of the chancellor. Starting from Berlin in the evening, we reached Stettin the next afternoon in sufficient time to present the report. Then there were the nights spent at work with the chancellor, who dictated to me the decisions to be submitted to the council on the morrow. I made a fair draft of them before the sitting, so that immediately after their having been read they could be sealed and dispatched. If my children should wish to compute the amount of labour I gave to the court and to Stralsund they will derive a salutary lesson from the reward these labours have brought me in my old days: in fine laborum, ingratitude.
Owing to those constant journeys I did not spend four weeks in six months at Wolgast, and still less at the chancellery. I lodged with Master Ernest, the cook of his Serene Highness Duke Philip, and of his august father and grandfather. Ernest was an honest and God-fearing man.
The year 1547 was an anxious one for the courts of Stettin and Wolgast, and the news that the Duke of Wurtemberg had tendered his submission accelerated the departure of a mission to the emperor. It was instructed to deny all participation of the princes in the League of Schmalkalden. The envoys of Duke Barnim were Dr. Falcke, in the capacity of chancellor, and Captain Jacob Putkammer; those of Duke Philip, Captain Moritz Damitz and Heinrich Normann. I was designated to accompany those four personages, and on March 10 we started by way of Silesia.
At Zittau we were obliged to leave Damitz in the doctor's hands; after which we crossed the Forest of Bohemia and reached Lertmeritz; next to Prague, the principal and best fortified town of the kingdom. We spent several days there in order to get an idea of the condition of affairs. The dislike of the Bohemians to march against the Elector of Saxony was evident, but King Ferdinand brought heavy pressure to bear upon them, he called up many of his troops both from Silesia and from Hungary. These Hungarian horsemen, called Husards, happen to be pitiless brigands. The King had placed them under the command of Sebastian von der Weitmülen, who, at the beginning of the war, had been appointed regent of the kingdom. The headquarters were at Eger, where this soldiery cut the children's hands and feet off to put them into their hats instead of plumes.
The councillors sent me to reconnoitre in the direction of Eger, at Schlackenwerth, and at Schlackenwald. My guide followed on foot. He was an intelligent lad, speaking both German and Bohemian. I ascertained that the Bohemians had cut down the trees in the wood, and as such made the route impassable for the horse and artillery, it was even impossible for the landsknechten to cross it with their standards flying.