About this time, the Brothers were enabled to renew their correspondence with Augusta, by the help of one of his gaolers whom they had succeeded in bribing. Unfortunately, this correspondence did not strengthen the friendly relations between the prisoner and the Elders of the Society. Always of a rather imperious disposition, and now embittered by his sufferings, Augusta attempted to assert his authority in a way which the Elders often resented. Indeed, they had begun to think that the exclusion of Augusta from the outer world disqualified him for his office as Elder of the Brotherhood. They consented indeed, in deference to his earnest appeals, to retain him a little longer in his former dignity; and at one time there seemed a hope that this painful dispute might end in the release of the imprisoned Brother, and his return to his former life. The second treachery of Moritz of Saxony had overthrown the hopes of the Imperialists; the treaty of Passau had raised anew the Protestant expectations of religious liberty; and in 1552 the Catholic and Protestant leaders of the Moravian Assembly united in such an earnest appeal for mercy to Ferdinand, that he consented to consider the question of the release of his Protestant prisoners.
But once more the tide turned against the unfortunate Augusta. In February, 1553, his correspondence with the Brotherhood was suddenly discovered. Again Ferdinand was seized with an attack of his conspiracy-mania; Augusta and Bilek were once more hurried off to Prague, and chained together in the White Tower. When no treasonable sense could by any means be extorted from their letters, they were allowed to return to their prison in Kr̆ivoklát; but all further correspondence with the outer world was forbidden; and the Elders of the Brotherhood, having heard that Augusta had been put to death, elected a new Elder in his place.
Nevertheless, the hopes which had been raised by the treaty of Passau were considerably strengthened at this time, by the rumour, which was rapidly gaining ground, that Maximilian, the future king of Bohemia, was opposed to the policy of his father. Ernest of Krajek, a member of that family which had already offered such opposition to Ladislaus and Ferdinand, eagerly welcomed back the Brothers to their old quarters at Mláda Boleslav; and at the same time he despatched a messenger to Vienna, to make sure of the sympathies of Maximilian. This messenger was John Blahoslav, a writer and artist, who was afterwards to attain some celebrity as an historian of the Brotherhood. When he arrived at Vienna he found Maximilian in active sympathy with the Lutherans; and he received much encouragement for the Brotherhood from the preacher who had most influence with the prince.
