favourite saint of the Bohemians seems to have had so little vigour, as a ruler, that he could not protect even the clergy, whom he most desired to favour, from the intimidation of Boleslav and Drahomíra. Thus, for instance, when he invited the Bishop of Regensburg to consecrate a new church at Prague, the bishop was so terrified by the threats of his enemies that he dared not come. It would, indeed, be unjust to deny that the position of a Christian Duke in the midst of this sudden revival of heathenism was a most difficult and dangerous one; nor is there the smallest ground to suspect Wenceslaus of personal cowardice. On the contrary, he is represented on two occasions as offering personal combat to an invading prince, in order to save his country from the evils of war; and no doubt, according to his lights, he was very willing to sacrifice himself for the good of Bohemia. Yet one cannot but detect certain weaknesses in his career, which may well have alarmed some of the stronger, if coarser, statesmen, who stood near the throne; and though he distinguished himself by many acts of benevolence and devotion, and succeeded on several occasions in preserving peace and preventing bloodshed, yet it was not wholly by his virtues that he excited the indignation of the party led by his brother. The tendency to encourage those who were engaged in other work to become priests, and his excessive reliance on the authority of the Emperor, might well have given occasion to a more reasonable opposition than that which expressed itself in the mere persecution of the Christians. Nor is it a wholly satisfactory sign that his piety, like that of Edward the Confessor, took the form of a contempt for marriage, or, to use the ecclesiastical phrase, of the zeal for preserving his virginity. He was therefore probably in the right when he meditated retiring into a Benedictine monastery; but the Pope, glad enough, no doubt, to secure a Christian Duke on the throne of a half-converted nation, threw great difficulties in the way of his abdication. His mother and brother, indignant at the frustration of their hopes, resolved on murder; and as a first step, to their purpose, they invited Wenceslaus to be present at the baptism of the son of Boleslav. So unexpected a concession to Christianity aroused the suspicions of Wenceslaus; but his religion throughout seems to have had a touch of fatalism, and he went to the feast in the full expectation of death. While the revelry was at its height, he withdrew from the table to worship in the church; and it was there that Boleslav found him and murdered him, while he clung to the door of the church for safety. The murder was followed by a general massacre of the Christian priests, among whom is especially mentioned Podiven, the follower known to English readers as having warmed his feet by treading in the footsteps of his master.[3]