A heavy black curtain covered the only window, high on a north wall, so the room was lit by a series of oil burning lamps, the smell of which filled the room with a faint oriental odor. By the light of the lamps, Mendel could see that two of the walls were lined with rows and rows of small drawers, each labeled with a neat, calligraphic sign.

There were a couple of old wooden chairs, one of which was piled high with assorted books and papers. More books stood in confused stacks in the corners, and Mendel was sure he saw a brass astrolabe mixed with a clutter of walking sticks propped in a blue Chinese vase beside the door. But the item of furniture that dominated the room was a massive oak table.

On this table were a series of instruments, polished rods of iron and wood, and an array of clasps, clamps and fasteners. Scattered in slotted boxes were hundreds and hundreds of pieces of pure glass, shaped into lenses, slabs, prisms, and other shapes that had no common name.

"Impressive," murmured Mendel, instantly fascinated by the tools of investigative science, many of which he had seen last as an undergraduate student in Vienna.

"Thank you," said Rosenstrauch, "are you interested in optics?"

"But of course,' Mendel exclaimed, "I studied with Herr Professor Doktor Doppler many years ago, and some of my first experiments were about the properties of lenses." Indeed, Mendel had encountered, and been taught by, the famous physicist Christian Doppler, when he was still the director of the Physical Institute in Vienna. A dull lecturer himself, Doppler had, never the less, seen promise in student Mendel. The kind Professor had taken pity on the penniless student and given him an important position as "assistant demonstrator", even though all these valuable places had been filled long before Mendel arrived.

Doppler, who had died of chronic lung disease in 1852, had discovered the "Doppler effect", where sound waves coming from a moving object, such as a train whistle, change in pitch as the object moves towards the observer, and then away from them.

"What are you doing?" Mendel asked.

"At the moment I am making telescopes as fast as I can," was the reply. "All the officers arriving with the Imperial Army want good telescopes before they go into battle, and I make the best ones. I have sold two already and I expect to sell a lot more before the recruitment is over."

Mendel understood why an officer in the army would need a telescope, but not why a war was expected, or what Rosenstrauch meant by 'recruitment', so he asked.

"Bismarck," whispered Rosenstrauch, lowering his voice and glancing nervously around him as if he expected the Iron Chancellor to appear from behind his boxes. Many people in Brno that spring felt the same way. For over a year Bismarck had been needling and provoking the government of Francis Joseph until the Emperor had finally responded by putting his regiments in Bohemia and Venetia on a war footing.

"I have heard," Rosenstrauch went on, "that Prussia has signed a short-term alliance with Italy only last week, if this is true then we now have armed enemies to the north and the south of us. If it comes to war, and many say it will, we will have to fight on two fronts."

a Map of the Empire

"But why should we be fighting a war at all?" Mendel asked. "I seem to remember that only a few years ago, we were allies with Prussia in a war against the Dutch, or was it the Danes?"

Rosenstrauch sighed. He could not understand men like Brother Gregory who managed to make their way through life completely cut off from politics and all current events. "It was in 1864 and it was against Denmark," he corrected, "we, and the Prussians, forced the Danes to surrender the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein - don't ask why!" he added quickly, seeing the look on Mendel's face. "It seemed like a great victory, for both countries, but in fact it was only the start of our troubles with Prussia."

"Why?" Mendel couldn't help asking.

"Because ever since, the Prussians and that trouble maker Bismarck, have been arguing about who should get what. Just last year, around the time you were giving your talk about peas, Bismarck proposed that the Duke of Augustenburg rule the two duchies, as a compromise, but our Emperor had little sympathy for that idea and turned him down. So, the question of what to do with Schleswig and Holstein still festers."

"But," hesitated Mendel, not sure of his facts, "didn't we have a change in government last year, and didn't the new Minister of State claim to have sorted all that out?"

"You mean Belcredi," Rosenstrauch said, some what surprised that Mendel knew of the 'Ministry of Counts'. "Yes, when the Emperor dismissed Schmerling in July last year (1865) he appointed Graf Richard Belcredi as his prime minister, who, as far as I can see, has only made matters worse." Rosenstrauch hesitated, what he was about to say could be considered by some, treason. He lowered his voice.

"In August, he negotiated with Prussia and came up with the treaty of Gastein. Prussia paid 2,250,000 thalers of silver for Lauenberg but were also given control of Schleswig and Holstein and allowed to move their troops into Keil. At best this compromise only gave us some breathing room, but in September Belcredi revoked the 'February Patent' - our pitiful, joke of a constitution - and has ruled by decree ever since."

Mendel nodded. Brother Matthew, his friend, had almost had a fit when Count Belcredi had first been appointed Minister of State, seeing in the Moravian someone who would try to restore the fictional power of the Austrian nobles.

But, when the constitution of the Empire had been revoked, Brother Matthew switched his loyalties, enthusiastically endorsed the move and cheered the Count. For, as one of his first acts as Minister, Belcredi had established Czech as the language of instruction in all Bohemian schools, where only German had been allowed before. Klacel, Brother Matthew, was an ardent Czech nationalist, and any victory of this kind, no matter how small, was welcomed.

"So shouldn't we be at peace with Prussia?" Mendel asked.

"Tell that to Bismarck," Rosenstrauch snorted, "while Belcredi was revoking our constitution, the Prussian chancellor was visiting the French Emperor and conspiring with him to strip us of our Venetian territories, and twisting the Italians into stabbing us in the back." Here the glass cutter was oversimplifying. Although Bismarck did indeed try to get the French to assist him in putting armed pressure on Austria, it was the Austrians themselves that tried to keep France neutral by offering to cede Venetia to Italy. They would find compensation, they thought, by annexing Silesia.

"Then," Rosenstrauch continued, "in January this year he issued a formal complaint that we were stirring up trouble in Holstein in favor of the Duke of Augustenburg. It was a direct provocation, and in February Belcredi and our Emperor had no choice but to declare our alliance with Prussia at an end. I don't think it impressed Bismarck, however".

"Why?"

"Because he promptly set about excluding us from the German confederation. Even the most pacific of our ministers saw this as an open invitation to war. Why to you think they have mobilized the Grenz Infantry, and begun moving line regiments into this area?"

"You mean they are here to fight?" Mendel asked, shocked. "Brother Matthew thinks they are only here to scare Bismarck. Isn't that why he has made Benedek our commander in chief?" Even Mendel had heard about the controversial appointment of the once popular Ludwig August Ritter von Benedek as the commander of the northern armies facing Germany. Unfortunately he had not heard that Benedek, knowing his limitations, had strenuously opposed his own appointment, and was still in Vienna, despite the ominous build up of Prussian forces on his borders.

"They are here to fight," Rosenstrauch insisted grimly, "haven't you noticed, the ballot of reservists has been ordered and the list should arrive any day now. Once it does, the regiments will start taking in their new draft, and our boys will be off to war." Here Rosenstrauch was correct. Line regiments of Austrian infantry consisted of only 3 field battalions of troops in peace time, but once mobilized, they added a 4th battalion. Recruits were chosen either by voluntary enlistment, of by forced conscription.

Candidates were chosen by ballot from men eligible to serve, and the notorious Abstimmungreservelists were prepared. These lists, consisting of those men who had to join their regiments, were then sent out to each geographic area, and the mobilization process begun. In Brno that year at least 4,000 more young men could expect to find their names on the list. If their families could not afford to buy them an exemption - still a legal and much used method of keeping upper and middle class Germans out of the army - they would be expected to report for duty.