Reports went around that the election would be a stormy one, for the whole country was divided between three chief candidates,—Condé, the Princes of Neuberg and of Lorraine. It was said that each party would endeavor to seat its own candidate, even by force. Alarm seized hearts; spirits were inflamed with partisan rancor. Some prophesied civil war; and these forebodings found faith, in view of the gigantic military legions with which the magnates had surrounded themselves. They arrived early, so as to have time for intrigues of all kinds. When the Commonwealth was in peril, when the enemy was putting the keen edge to its throat, neither king nor hetman could bring more than a wretched handful of troops against him; but now in spite of laws and enactments, the Radzivills alone came with an
