Or rather, though there was a good deal more which he might have said, he was persuaded not to say it either before the Military Court which reviewed his conduct, or elsewhere. As Adjutant-General Count Crenneville had been sent to him before, so the Archduke Albert was sent to him now, at Graetz, in Styria, whither he had retired after being deprived of his command. He was asked to give a written promise that he would not publish any of the correspondence which had passed between himself and his generals or himself and the Emperor, or publicly vindicate himself in any way. He gave that promise; and the proceedings begun against him were suspended. But then—we come to Francis Joseph’s perfidy. Francis Joseph wanted a scapegoat badly; and he paid Benedek the compliment of believing him to be a more honourable man than himself. He acted indirectly instead of directly—semi-officially instead of officially; hitting at the man who was down, and had promised to make no attempt to rise, by means of an article in the _Wiener Zeitung_. The article began by stating that there was no law in Austria which punished incompetence; and it continued:— “For the rest, the loss of the confidence of his imperial master, the destruction of his military reputation before the world of to-day and of the future, the recognition of the immeasurable misfortune that, under his command, has befallen the army, and, through its defect, has befallen the whole monarchy, must be a heavier penalty for the high-minded man that Benedek always was, than any punishment that could have come upon him by the continuation of legal proceedings.” [Illustration: THE EMPEROR FRANCIS JOSEPH IN 1866.] One can imagine Benedek’s anger at this black treachery; but he did not allow it to sting him into the retractation of his pledged word. He maintained to the end the attitude of an honourable man whom a dishonourable Emperor had tricked; and he bore contumely in silence. It was only in his will that he spoke out; but then he gave full vent to the indignation which he had so long suppressed. This is his last word on the matter:—