258 The Durrenstein. [Serr, 
fered, at pleasure, to ramble, draw, eat, and pay. Like the great globe 
itself, I was kept in my position by the “ vis inertiz.” 
. But one evening my solitude was pleasantly varied by the sight of 
some berlines straggling along the road below the Castle of Durrenstein. 
‘The German postilions had of course lost their way, or pretended that 
they had lost it, as is the custom, when they know that a tolerable inn 
lies within half a mile of them, and feel more disposed to enjoy them- 
selves there than “be borrowers of the night” for ten miles further. 
I hailed the travellers, and found that they were a party of attachés to 
the foreign ministers at Vienna, who, finding the world at peace, the 
capital hot as an oven, and the dinner and dancing season at an end, 
had come to kill the month of indolence among the wonders of the 
Danube. My services were accepted, first as a guide to their berlines, 
and next, as a cicerone to themselves. I showed them the famous “ rose- 
garden” of Schreckenwold, a name whose very sound is descriptive of 
its ruthless hearer, to any who can pronounce it and live. I pointed 
out the precise locale of the iron door, where this mountain chief thrust 
his unlucky victims over the precipice, and where those who had not 
their necks broken at once, were sure to die of famine. And, after 
startling my makers of manifestos with the atrocity of a rebber “who 
destroyed mankind by one at a time, I relieved their humanity by shew- 
ing the hole, at the foot of the rock, by which the knight had escaped 
from this living grave, who was to neh the power of the robber, 
and hurl Schreckenwold among the roses of his own garden. 
With equal applause I showed them the hollow in the river side, 
where Rudiger, the merchant, entrapped the formidable brothers Had- 
mar the Kuenringer, and Heinrich van Weitra, both surnamed by the 
terrified peasantry, “the Hounds.” << There,” said I, in the words of 
the legend, “ under that weeping willow steered the bold merchant from 
Regensburg, with his decks covered with temptation. There, on the 
corner of the frowning precipice above, stood Hadmar and Heinrich, 
pike in hand, and waiting only the striking of the good ship on 
yonder fatal sandbank, to give a general order to their pikemen and 
‘archers, clustered under those mulberry bushes, to jump on board, and 
possess themselves of fur caps, woollen cloaks, and Moravian cheeses, 
enough to clothe the household and stock the castle for ten years to 
come. 
« On that awful height, where now moulders the renowned castle of 
Aggstein, every casement was then glistening with eyes, as the stately 
‘ship breasted the treacherous stream, and every chamber of it echoed 
with shouts of delight, as under the walls the stately vessel came_to a full 
stop. All was now exultation, the robber chieftains commanded the 
merchant to surrender. He cried out for mercy in vain. Kneeling on 
the deck, he implored them to spare his cargo ; they announced to him 
that it was against their principles. He then bade them take: his life in 
‘compensation. They answered that they would take both. The unfor- 
tunate trader next tried an appeal to their feelings, and prayed them by 
the beards of their father and mother, by the beauty of their wives, and 
the hopes of their children, to spare his last fragment of property under 
the stars. 
“ Their reply. was brief— That as they intended to give him only the 
alternative of being hanged or drowned, the property could be of no 
moment to him.’ The merchant, in obvious despair, then retired to the 
