252 Wallenstein
escape at the siege of Göding in 1623. He was sure that he could do bet-
ter, but such self-belief is not the same thing as ambition, as the merely
ambitious often lack the competence to perform at the highest level.
At this distance in time Wallenstein’s true personality could not eas-
ily be assessed even were it not obscured by contemporary fables and
calumnies, and the accretions of the centuries upon them. Arguably
it is not of great importance, as his role and place in history are not
dependent upon whether he was personally congenial, and it makes
little difference to the facts of his achievements whether they were
the result of circumstances or ambition. Nevertheless both legend and
historiography are replete with highly coloured images of the supposed
Wallenstein, so it is therefore worth bearing in mind some caution-
ary observations about the quality of the evidence upon which they
are based. Richelieu warned in his memoirs, with specific reference
to Wallenstein although it has a more general applicability, that good
or bad reputations derive principally from the last period of life, and
although good and bad are transmitted to later ages, because of its
own wickedness the world is more inclined to believe the latter than
the former. Schiller, himself a historian, wrote that it was Wallenstein’s
misfortune that his enemies survived him to write his history, while
Richelieu noted that after his death many censured him who would
have praised him had he lived.^15
In one of history’s little ironies a cousin wrote to Wallenstein from
exile in Amsterdam in 1629, telling the general that he had heard that
Tilly had Imperial orders to arrest him, or failing that to have him
murdered. While thanking him for his concern Wallenstein replied that
Ferdinand was ‘a just and grateful master who recompenses faithful
service in a fashion different from the one of which you inform me’.
Elsewhere he wrote of his own ‘true, faithful and selfless service’, adding
that ‘had I served God as I have the emperor I would be the holiest of
heaven’s saints’. He said the same on another occasion: ‘If I paid as much
attention to my own soul’s salvation as to the emperor’s service I would
certainly not go to purgatory, still less to hell.’ Richelieu concurred, not-
ing that ‘the emperor never found another, the value of whose service
even began to approach Wallenstein’s’, so that for the worldly-wise
cardinal ‘Wallenstein’s death remains a monstrous example, whether
it be of the ungratefulness of his subordinates or of the cruelty of his
master’.^16
One question unanswered by those who ascribe unlimited ambition
to Wallenstein is why he devoted so much effort to achieving a negoti-
ated peace rather than an Imperialist victory. Defeating first the Saxons