If anything could have comforted Maria Theresa’s mind and raised her spirits, it would have been this experience. There is not much danger of a tottering throne where the people are so ready to prove their devotion by any sacrifice; and what Hungary promised it faithfully performed. At this time the mixture of peoples along the Danube, where it approaches the Turkish possessions, with the tribes that Russia in Asia had contributed, could hardly have been equalled for wildness and barbarity. They were good light horsemen, and always ready when it was a question of destruction and pillage; but in open warfare against the well-drilled Prussians they stood but a doubtful chance. Nevertheless, they had Cossacks among them that had not done badly in harassing the French. The Hungarians, though headed by a nobility of their own, had only these people to depend on, but they were better than nothing, and the fifteen thousand nobles with their followers made a heavy balance in the scales. Every heart was full of enthusiasm for the noble woman who was so hard pressed, and while their forces were being organized—for an army is not raised by the stroke of a magic wand—this sentiment deepened continually. While the hostile army had already advanced as far as Linz, the Queen hoped for assistance from England in the shape of gold from London and troops from Hanover, but it seemed in truth as though all help would be cut off. Even when George II of England had raised an army in Hanover, the French, under Maillebois, marched up through Westphalia, and the English began to find Hanover uncomfortable. With an Englishman charity begins at home, and George’s “skin was nearer to him than his shirt,” as the saying goes, so he made the best terms he could with the French, and abandoned Maria Theresa in spite of all his chivalrous protestations. With France, Bavaria, and Saxony threatening her on one side, Prussia on the other, and as yet no army to oppose them with any hope of success, what could be more welcome than a settlement with Frederick II, arranged by England’s mediation, and to which Frederick gladly agreed, since it secured him the possession of Silesia and averted the danger that seemed impending from the attitude of the Elector of Bavaria? The treaty was signed at Oberschnellendorf, but absolute secrecy was to be maintained concerning it. Thus Maria Theresa acquired, in this direction, at least, a free hand; and it was very necessary, for Bavaria and France were seriously threatening the capital of Bohemia, whence the Elector of Bavaria might have taken Vienna at a single blow, but, allured by the prospect of a crown, the attraction in Bohemia was too strong.[9]