All at once an opening offered for the Duke to gain both renown and money. Henry I. of Condé was at the court of the Elector Palatine at Heidelsberg, soliciting assistance in behalf of the Huguenots against the King of France. The Elector agreed to send a force under his son John Casimir, and the Duke of Liegnitz offered his services, which were readily accepted. He was to lead the rearguard, and to receive a liberal pay for his services. Whilst he was collecting this force and getting underway, John Casimir and the Prince of Condé marched through Lorraine to Metz, and Hans went with John Casimir. He trusted he was now on his way to fortune. But it was not so to be. The Duke, his master, insisted that he should return to him, and Hans, on doing so, found him rioting and gambling away, at Frankfort and Nassau, the money paid him in advance for his useless services. Almost the first duty imposed on Hans, on his return, was to negociate a loan for £5,000 with the magistrates of Frankfort, which was peremptorily refused; whereupon the Duke went to Cologne and stayed there seven months, endeavouring to cajole the town council there into advancing him money. But we can not follow any further the miserable story of the degradation of the Silesian Duke, till at the beginning of the new year, 1577, the Duke ran away from the town of Emmerich, leaving his servants to pay his debts as best they could. Hans sold the horses and whatever was left, and then, not sorry to be quit of such a master, returned on foot to his Silesian home. It is, perhaps, worth while quoting Duke Henry's letter, which Hans found in the morning announcing his master's evasion. "Dear Hans,--Here is a chain, do what you can with it. Weigh it and sell it, also the horses for ready money; I will not pillow my head in feathers till, by God's help, I have got some money, to enable me to clear out of this vile land, and away from these people. Good morning, best-loved Hans. "With mine own hand, HENRY, DUKE." As he neared home, sad news reached Hans. The Ducal creditors had come down on his father, who had made himself responsible, and had seized the family estates; whereat the old man's heart broke, and he had died in January. When Hans heard this, he sat for two hours on a stone beside the road, utterly unmanned, before he could recover himself sufficiently to pursue his journey.