He despatched one of his generals, Gallas, to the commander-in-chief, with a mandate depriving him of his dignity of generalissimo, and nominating Gallas as his successor.

Surprised before his plans were ripe, and deserted by many on whose support he had relied, Wallenstein retired hastily upon Egra.

During a banquet in the castle, three of his generals who remained faithful to their leader were murdered in the dead of night.

Roused by the noise, Wallenstein leapt from his bed, and encountered three soldiers who had been hired to despatch him.
Speechless with astonishment and indignation, he stretched forth his arms, and receiving in his breast the stroke of a halbert, fell dead without a groan, in the fifty-first year of his age.
The following anecdote, curiously illustrative of the state of affairs in Wallenstein's camp, is related by Schiller in his _History of the Thirty Years' War_, a work containing a full account of the life and actions of this extraordinary man.

"The extortions of Wallenstein's soldiers from the peasants had at one period reached such a pitch, that severe penalties were denounced against all marauders; and every soldier who should be convicted of theft was threatened with a halter.