Zigzag Journeys in Northern Lands, Hezekiah Butterworth [best short novels .txt] 📗
- Author: Hezekiah Butterworth
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“Louis le Debonnaire, the son of Charlemagne, became weary of state-craft and the crown. He felt that his end was near. He desired to die where he could hear the waves of the Rhine. He was taken to this rock, and there with the ebb of the river his troubled life ebbed away.
“Most of the old castles are built on the narrows of the river. These narrows are between high rocks and rocky hills. They are in the Middle Rhine, or between Mayence and Bonn. The Middle Rhine has some thirty conspicuous castles on its banks. It is sometimes called the Castellated Rhine, and its narrows are termed the Castellated Rhine Pass.
VIEW ON THE RHINE.
“On, on we drifted. Every high rock seemed a gateway to some new scene of beauty; wonder followed wonder.
“And now the water seemed agitated. Dark rocks projected into the river; the view was intercepted.
“The boatman conversed in an animated way with me, and I looked up to a high rock with an interested expression and an incredulous smile.
“He turned to us quietly and said,—
“‘This is the Lorelei Pass.’
“He presently added,—
“‘That is the Lorelei.’
THE LORELEI.
THE WONDERFUL STORY OF THE LORELEI.Who has not heard it, repeated it in verse, echoed it in song?
It is the best known of the Rhine tales, not because it is the most interesting, but because it is associated with the noblest scenery of the river, with poetry and music. It is hardly equal to such legends as the “Drachenfels” and the “Two Brothers,” but it is lifted into historic prominence by its associations.
Still the story is richer in incident than the mere song would indicate. The origin and development of the popular legend is as follows:—
In the shadowy days of the Palatines of the Rhine,—shadowy because of ignorance and superstition,—the boatmen among the rocks above St. Goar on the Rhine used to fancy that they could see at night the form of a beautiful nymph on the “Lei,” or high rock of the river. Her limbs were moulded of air; a veil of mist and gems covered her face; her hair was long and golden, and her eyes shone like the stars. Her robe was blue and glimmering like the waves, decked with water flowers and zoned with crystals. She was most distinctly seen by pale moonlight.
They called this recurring vision of mist and gems Lore, the enchantress. They believed that her favor brought good luck, but her ill will destruction.
Nothing could be more natural than for the simple fishermen to think that they saw a form of mist, very bright and lovely, above the rocks at night, when once the story had been told them.
In the days of superstition such a story was sure to grow.
It was said that this Undine of the Rhine, the enchantress Lore, had a most melodious and seductive voice. When she sang those who heard her listened spellbound. If the boatmen displeased her, she entranced them by her song, and drew them into the whirlpools under the rocks, where they disappeared forever. To the landsmen who offended her, she made the river appear like a road, and led them to fall over the rocks to destruction. With all her beauty and charms, she was the evil genius of the place.
Herman, the only son of the last Palatine, a youth of some fifteen summers, was delicate in health. Instead of devoting himself to chivalrous exercises, he gave his attention to music and song.
One night he and his father were descending the Rhine, when he felt an inspiration come over him to sing. His voice was silvery and flute-like, and breathed the emotional sentiment of the heart of youth. As the boat drew near the Lei, Lore, the enchantress, heard the song, and she herself became spellbound by the sentiment and deep feeling expressed in the mellifluent music.
She tried to answer him, but her voice failed.
As Herman grew to manhood his ill health disappeared, and his character changed. He became rugged and manly, and abandoned the arts for the chase, horsemanship, and the preparations for martial contests.
He became a renowned hunter. He rode the wildest steeds, and ventured into places and merrily blew his horn where no huntsman dared follow him.
The enchantress Lore, from the time she had heard his song, disappeared from the rocks. The change that came over his person and character seemed like enchantment: was the siren invisibly following him?
And now a strange thing began to startle him by its mystery. When alone, crossing a wild mountain or a ravine, he would seek to keep up a communication by shouting through his hands,—
“Hillo-ho-o-o-o!”
Immediately a sweet voice would answer,—
“Ho-o-o-o!”
He would follow the sound.
“Hillo-ho-o-o-o!”
“Ho-o-o-o!”
It always led him towards the Lei.
He became alarmed at this occurrence. He believed that he was followed by a spirit, and that a spell was upon him, which boded destruction. He resolved to abandon the chase and devote himself to the arts again.
He was sitting by the window of the castle on a summer evening. A purple mist lay on the forests and river, and the moon poured her light over it, making all things appear like an enchanted realm.
He heard a nightingale singing in the woods. Did ever a bird sing like that? He listened. There was a witchery in the song. He rose and went into the woods. The song filled the air like a shower of golden notes. He followed it. It retreated. He went on. But the song, more and more enchanting and alluring, floated into the shadowy distance. He found himself at last on the Lei.
He beheld there a dazzling grotto, full of stalactites, and a nymph of wondrous beauty on a coral throne. He felt his being thrill with love. He was about to enter the grotto, when, oh thought of darkness and horror! the recollection of the enchantress came to him, and he crossed his bosom and broke the spell. He hurried home with a beating heart.
But the temptation and vision had proved fatal to him. He was never himself again. He dreamed constantly of Lore. All his longings were for her.
At eve he would hear the same nightingale singing. He would long to follow the voice. It inflamed his love. His will, his senses, all that made life desirable, were yielding to the fatal passion.
He went to a good priest for advice.
“Father Walter, what shall I do?”
“Shake off the spell, or it will end in your ruin.”
One day Herman and the priest went fishing on the Rhine. The boat drifted near the Lei. The moon rose in full splendor in the clear sky, strewing the water with countless gems.
Herman took a lute and filled the air with music.
It was answered from the Lei. Oh, how wonderful! The air seemed entranced with the spiritual melody. Herman was beside himself with delight. The priest also heard it.
“The Lore! In the name of the Virgin, let us make for the shore!”
Herman’s eyes were fixed on the rock. There she sat, the siren!
The priest plied the oar, to turn the boat back.
But nearer, nearer drifted the boat to the rock.
Nearer and nearer!
The moon poured her white light upon the crags.
Nearer and nearer!
There was a shock.
The boat was shivered like glass.
Walter crossed himself, and floated on the waves to the shore.
But Herman—he was never seen again!
Mr. Beal’s narrative nearly filled the evening. A few stories were told by other members of the Club, but they were chiefly from Grimm, and hence are somewhat familiar.
Charlie Leland closed the meeting with a free translation of a poem from Kerner.
Justinus Kerner was born in Ludwigsburg, in 1786. He was a physician and a poet. He belonged to the spiritualistic school of poets, and his illustrations of the power of mind over matter, in both prose and poetry, are often very forcible. The following poem will give you a view of his estimate of physical as compared with mental power:—
IN THE OLD CATHEDRAL.In the gloaming, weird and cold,
Are the coffins of old King Ottmar,
And a poet, renowned of old.
Enthroned in pomp and pride,
And his crown still rests upon him,
And his falchion rusts beside.
Has slumbered in darkness long,
But he holds in his hands, as an emblem,
The harp of immortal song.
Hark! ’tis the war-cry dread!
But the monarch’s sword is not lifted,
There, in the vaults of the dead!
List to the minstrels’ strain!
’Tis the poet’s song they are singing,
And the poet lives again.
CHAPTER X. NIGHT THE SIXTH.
The Beautiful Rhine.—Coblentz.—A Zigzag to Weimar.—Goethe and Schiller.—The Strange Story of Faust.—Faust in Art.—The Seven Mountains.—The Drachenfels.—The Story of the Dragon.—Stories of Frederick the Great.—The Unnerved Hussar.
MR. BEAL occupied much of the time this evening. He thus continued the narrative of travel:—
“From St. Goar to Boppard, two stations at which the Rhine boats call, is about an hour’s run; but the journey is an unfailing memory. The rocky walls of the river, the continuous villages, the quaint churches amid the vineyards and cherry orchards, the mossy meadows about the mountains, the white-kerchiefed villagers, present so many varied and delightful objects, that the eye feasts on beauty, and wonders expectantly at what the next turn of the river will reveal. The rock shadows in the water contrast with the bright scenes above the river, and add an impression of grandeur to the effect of the whole, like shadows on the cathedral walls that heighten the effect of the rose-colored windows. Beautiful, beautiful, is the Rhine.
“Grand castles, perched on high cliffs and mountain walls, surprise us, delight us, and vanish behind us, as the boat moves on;—the Brother Castles, Marksburg, the mountain palace Solzenfels, with their lofty, gloomy, and barbaric grandeur, reminding one always of times whose loss the mind does not regret.
“And now a beautiful city comes in view, nestled at the foot of the hills, and protected by a stupendous fortress on the opposite side of the river. The fortress is Ehrenbreitstein, the Gibraltar of the Rhine, capable of holding an army of men. It is a great arsenal now, well garrisoned in peace as in war; in short, it may be called the watch on the Rhine.
EHRENBREITSTEIN.
“The lovely city under its guns, on the opposite side of the river, is Coblentz. It is a gusset of houses, a V-shaped city, at the confluence of the Rhine and Moselle. The Romans called it the city of the Confluence, or Confluentia; hence, corrupted, it is known as Coblentz.
GOETHE’S PROMENADE.
“It is the half-way city between Cologne and Mayence, and a favorite resting place of tourists. The summer residence of the King of Germany is here.
“From Coblentz we made a détour into the heart of Germany, going by rail to Weimar, once called the Athens of the North. It was once the literary centre of Germany. Here lived
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