THE WREATH.

Or the Quästenburg, once a very celebrated fortress at the extremity of the Harz, the terror of the surrounding plains and of the itinerant trader, only a ruin and a popular tradition, kept in remembrance by an annual public festival, have been preserved. Coarse grass now covers the castleyard; and in the halls where high-spirited knights held their carousals, where the scornful laugh of the robbers' feast resounded, now hardly a trace is to be found. Instead of retainers on the look-out for prey, a cowering screech owl is to be seen sitting on the moss-covered openings of the walls. Of all the once vast buildings nothing remains but here and there some ruined walls, or some cellars, the entrance to which snakes and toads and wild plants (which also deck the walls) dispute with the inquisitive wanderer; some ruins of the former gate-tower and the castle dungeons.

The hill on which the robbers' castle rose is surrounded by high mountains as with a wreath, which in former times served both to conceal and protect it. These are in some parts covered with wood, in others heaped up like rugged masses of rock in the most fantastic groups. On one side only a pass, which opens between the mountains, gives to the scarcely-perceived castle a freer prospect across a narrow valley, which at the present time is occupied by the peaceful village of Questenberg, and thence, across a somewhat confined tract of land, over the golden meadows, which at the extremity of the horizon is bounded by the Kyffhäuser Mountains and the Rothenburg.

Craftily enough had a knight of the middle ages selected this lurking place for deeds that shunned the light; for not easily could the wagons laden with goods, which passed through this much-frequented part of Thuringia, escape the vigilant eyes of the owner of the castle, who, concealed in the fortress, lay in wait for his prey, like the ant-eater by his sandy crater. The following tradition explains the origin of the name of the Quästenburg, and shows that, even in times of lawless rapine, nature asserts her rights.

1

One of the old lords of this castle had an only daughter. When this child was about four or five years old, she one day lost herself in the forest which encircled it. In the evening of that day a charcoal-burner, living at some distance, found the little girl quietly sitting by his hut, and busied in plaiting a wreath of wild flowers. He asked her whence she came, who her father and mother were, and what she came there for. To all these questions the little girl could only answer that her mother was dead, and that her father's name was Kurt. At that time a hundred different persons thereabouts owned the name of Kurt; so that all the charcoal-burner could do was to carry the child home to his hut, and take care of her, until he obtained further information.

The lord of the castle, inconsolable for the loss of his child, had despatched all his followers and serving-men in every direction, in quest of her. After a long, fruitless search, and after many days passed in sorrow, some of the villagers of Rota found the child sitting in a meadow, busied in plaiting a wreath of wild flowers. She led them to the hut of the charcoal-burner, who had taken such care of her, and soon after they carried her with great rejoicings back to the castle. The charcoal-burner, who had also accompanied her thither, took the wreath, which the child had plaited while sitting at the door of his hut, and presented it to her father, who joyfully clasped his little daughter in

his arms.

A wreath was in those days called Quäste. In .commemoration of this event he named his castle the Quästenburg (which had previously borne the name of Finsterberg), from the wreath, which he ever after religiously preserved. In gratitude for having recovered his daughter, he gave to the charcoal-burner, and the villagers of Rota, the meadow for ever, in which his child was found, and appointed a public festival for all his serving-men, at which a wreath, or Quäste, was to be fastened on the largest oak on the highest mountain in the neighbourhood, that it might be seen far and wide.

This festival is still held, and is perhaps unique of its kind. On the third day of Whitsuntide, the young men from the valley of Questenberg bring the largest oak which

they have been able to find in the neighbouring forest, amidst a countless multitude of shouting spectators from the adjacent places; and, accompanied by horns and trumpets, ascend the mountain which looks down on the ruins of the old Quästenburg. But they must, conformably to the custom, use only their hands in rolling or in dragging the huge tree to the mountain. On the summit of the mountain, which overlooks the neighbouring country, the tree is then set up, and to a pole laid crosswise a large wreath, formed of boughs, and resembling a carriage wheel, is fastened, when all exclaim: The wreath hangs! The wreath hangs!" Dancing on the mountain follows, in which consists the principal amusement.

After some hours thus passed, the whole assembled multitude, accompanied by loud music, descend the mountain, and proceed to the house of the clergyman of Questenberg, whom they fetch to a solemn service in the church, which terminates the holyday. The oak remains erect on the mountain for a year, and is afterwards sold to defray the expenses of the festival. The great wreath is by the inhabitants of the neighbourhood called the “QUÄSTE."

66

THE KNIGHTS' CELLAR IN THE KYFFHÄUSER.

66

66

A POOR, though honest and very merry man in Tilleda, once invited some friends to a christening; it was already the eighth he had had; and, according to custom, he was obliged to give a treat to the gossips. The wine of the country, which he had set before his guests, was soon drunk out, and they called for more. Go," said the merry host to his daughter Ilsabe, a handsome girl of sixteen, go, and fetch some better wine out of the cellar." "Out of what cellar?" asked the girl. "Oh!" replied her father jokingly, "out of the great wine-cellar belonging to the knights in the Kyffhäuser." The maiden, in her simplicity, went out, with a jug in her hand, to the mountain. About midway she found a venerable matron sitting at the ruined entrance of a large cellar in a strange garb, and with a huge bunch of keys at her side. The young girl was dumb with astonishment; but the old woman, in a

LORA, THE GODDESS OF LOVE.

THE mountain-fortress of Lora is so called from a goddess of that name. Before Charles, the conqueror of

Saxony, and his missionary, Winfrid*, had baptized the subjugated inhabitants of the Harz, Lora was held in great veneration by the Saxons of those parts. To her was consecrated a large awe-inspiring forest, the remains of which, even at the present day, almost involuntarily, and as it were by enchantment, transport our thoughts back to ages long passed away. The only memorial of it, at the present day,

is a wood of small extent, the abode of numberless flocks of birds, called the Ruhensburg, between the Reinhartsberg, Bleicherode, and the fortress of Lora, together with some detached woods, among which well-built villages, watered by the Wipper, now enliven the delightful landscape, to which the distant Brocken serves as a background.

From this forest the youths, in time of old, offered to the goddess Lora, in the autumn, the first-fruits of the chase; and in the spring, the young maidens, singing joyful songs, brought wreaths of flowers to the goddess. With the finest wreath the high priest of Lora solemnly adorned the head of that maiden who had most distinguished herself by the feminine virtues: by constancy in love, and by unshaken fidelity to her beloved.

In the middle of the mountain on which Lora was principally worshiped there gushed forth a spring, to which a pilgrimage was made by unhappy lovers, especially young maidens, whom death had bereft of their beloved, in the hope that, by drinking of those waters, they might obtain peace and forgetfulness. On the summit of this mountain a noble Saxon lady, whose lover had fallen in a battle with the Franks, built the Ruhensburg, from which the wood

* The apostle of Germany, better known by his ecclesiastical name of Boniface. He was born at Crediton in the year 680, and was murdered by the pagan Frisians in 755. Boniface placed the crown on the head of Pepin, the first monarch of the Carlovingian race, and, besides many monasteries in Germany, founded the sees of Erfurt, Buraburg, Eichstädt, and Würzburg. He died archbishop of Mentz.

+ From ruhe, peace of mind, quiet, and burg, castle.

derives its present name. She called the spot the Ruhensburg, because in the wood the goddess sent her a new lover worthy of her, whose love comforted the mourner, and gave back to her heart its long-lost peace.

But terrible was this sacred forest to the faithless lover. There Hermtrud expiated her crime with her life. She was betrothed to Eilgern, a noble Saxon youth. The defence of his country tore him from her. At parting, she swore to him, with hypocritical tears, eternal fidelity; but in a few days after, Lora saw the violator of faith and duty in the arms of Herrman. The culprits had concealed themselves in the Buchen, a wood not far from the Ruhensburg. Here Lora startled them by a deer that came rushing through the thicket; and Hermtrud fled, and entered, without reflection, Lora's sacred grove. The mountain trembled, and the earth darted forth flames, which consumed the false-hearted fair one. The priests hastened to the spot, collected Hermtrud's ashes, and buried them in a little valley at the foot of the mountain. Here may still be heard at twilight the mournful wail of the false one, a warning to all faithless lovers not to enter the sacred grove.

Winfrid, the terror of the Saxon gods, together with his companions, destroyed the Ruhensburg; for Lora's might had then fled. The following act of revenge exhausted her last remaining powers. Not far from the Reinhartsberg she overtook Winfrid, exulting in his spiritual victories. His carriage and horses suddenly stuck fast in the mire; and he would have been instantly swallowed up, had not his prayers to the Holy Virgin saved him. In memory of this danger he erected three crosses, which are yet to be seen, on the spot where the abyss opened its jaws to receive him, and in his misery dedicated, in Lora's wood, a chapel to the Virgin. From this event the place is still called ELEND (Misery).

н н 2