34 Wallenstein
in Moravia, did not agree, probably because he and his friends would
have been the largest contributors. When Dietrichstein terminated the
levy, Wallenstein, not yet senior enough to override him, could only
protest in an angry letter. Good discipline, he pointed out, depended
on the troops having quarters, rations and pay. Otherwise they would
steal what they could and despoil the countryside. The ordinary people
would be better off paying orderly contributions than being ruined in
this way, and hence civil disorders would be less likely. With evident
frustration he concluded by noting that he had done what he could and
would not be responsible if disturbances occurred.^15
At the end of 1621, with campaigning over for the winter, Wallenstein
was in Vienna and moving in elevated social circles.^16 Prince Christian of
Anhalt the younger, wounded and captured at the White Mountain
and at this time an honoured and paroled prisoner of the emperor,
recorded meeting and talking to him, on one occasion during a visit to
the Spanish ambassador Oñate. In mid-January 1622 both Wallenstein
and the young prince were guests, along with the emperor himself,
at the wedding of Maximilian Waldstein, a relative Wallenstein later
frequently referred to as ‘my cousin Max’ and who he both liked and
trusted. The bride was Katharina Harrach, daughter of the wealthy and
influential privy councillor.
In January 1622 the emperor confirmed Liechtenstein as governor of
Bohemia, a position which had not previously existed and with powers
which were not possible under the old constitution, but Ferdinand
had swept that away, along with the elective monarchy. A day later
Wallenstein was appointed commandant of Prague, and hence in
practice of the whole of Bohemia, giving him the military equivalent
of Liechtenstein’s political role, although the latter held the superior
status.^17 He was the obvious choice, in part because of his Bohemian
origins but more due to his proven loyalty, reliability and competence
during the preceding years of war. Moreover he was rapidly becoming
one of the most prominent of the emperor’s own officers, noting that
Ferdinand had so far relied on the Spanish to provide him with generals,
two of whom had already been killed in his service. Wallenstein was
still some way from achieving that rank, and he had little to do militarily
during 1622, as although the war not only continued but escalated, the
main campaigning was far away in west and north Germany. There
the forces of Spain and of the Catholic League rather than the Imperial
army upheld the Habsburg cause, leaving Wallenstein with a little time
to attend to his own affairs.