Providence had made use of Edith’s desperate resolution of dropping her little darling from the prison-window, to effect our deliverance. You see in this an example, my children, what insignificant trifles furnish the Omnipotent Ruler of all things with the means of blessing his creatures! Our imprudences, nay even our very faults are not without their use in the great chain of accidents; and managed by a hand of superior power they often produce consequences totally different from those, which might naturally have been expected to follow!
In that night of terror Ludolf’s better angel had guided him safely through a dangerous path on every side beset with steep precipices and vast tremendous chasms. Weeping and exhausted with fatigue, he was found at the foot of a rock by a peasant from the vale of Frutiger. On being informed that he had just made his escape from the burning Castle, and was unwilling to return thither, the honest countryman conducted him to the house of Walter Forest, one of the most distinguished inhabitants of those parts. He received the child with that hospitable kindness, which no true Helvetian ever refuses to the unfortunate. Walter was indeed a true Helvetian; and he felt double pleasure in giving protection to a child like Ludolf, who to the beauty of a cherub united the most unprotected helplessness: surely there is no chain more powerful to bind a noble heart.
It was long, before his new guardian could comprehend the meaning of the child’s broken narrative; but the names of his mother and myself (both of whom Ludolf supposed to have perished in the conflagration) and his calling himself the Count of Mayenfield, roused Walter’s attention sufficiently to induce him to enquire farther into the business; and those enquiries at length made him master of the whole truth.
The virtuous inhabitants of that tranquil valley troubled themselves but little about what past in the rock-founded Castles of the neighbouring lords. They looked upon them as the abodes of vice and of injustice, loathed their possessors for the one, and feared them for the other. Their power was too weak to permit their preventing the commission of those crimes, which frequently took place in these fortresses, though the report of such deeds of horror occasionally reached them; therefore their most earnest wish, respecting these dens of robbers, was to escape the notice of their owners, who might otherwise have been tempted to make them also experience the weight of their oppression.
But Walter Forest (a man, whose sentiments and actions were in every respect far superior to those of his co-temporaries) needed only to be informed, that two unhappy women stood in need of his protection, to make him resolve on granting it. By making enquiries cautiously and discreetly among the household of the Count of Carlsheim, he ascertained the truth of what he had collected from the child’s narration, and also that the captives of whom he spoke had been rescued from the flames. His resolution was immediately adopted, and swift and successful was the execution of his design.
Henric Melthal was an old acquaintance and friend of Walter; and it was to him, that the latter applied for information respecting the history of Edith and myself. That faithful vassal of Count Venosta had long lamented in secret the fate of his former mistress, and anxiously wished to discover the place of her confinement. Readily therefore did he enter into Walter’s plan for my deliverance; and in the mean while (through fear of losing time) he dispatched his son in all haste to give my uncle information of every thing that had taken place.
The measures adopted for our rescue by these two honest Helvetians is easy to be guest from what has been already related. Henric brought with him a small band of faithful friends from the neighbourhood of Sargans, which Walter strengthened with some of the bravest inhabitants of the vale of Frutiger. They were daring enough to present themselves at Ravenstein, as Envoys from the Count of Carlsheim; and the very rashness of the design made it pass without suspicion. The firm and commanding tone, which they assumed, overawed the numerous soldiers of Ravenstein; our friends were well aware, that their artifice could not remain long undiscovered, and therefore they lost not a moment in endeavouring to reap the fruits of it; they were successful, and the captives were once more free!
Edith! Ludolf! dear partners in affliction, ye were restored with me to liberty!—Walter! Henric! our benevolent deliverers, what thanks could suffice to reward your services!—But the generous men expected neither rewards nor thanks. What they had done appeared to them an act so simple, that they rather supposed, we should complain that our rescue had been delayed so long; and they thought it necessary to assure us a thousand times, that ignorance of our situation and want of power to assist us had unavoidably prevented their coming sooner to break our chains; excuses, which we (only awake to sentiments of gratitude and joy) thought perfectly unsuited to the occasion.
These excellent men, who had bravely hazarded their lives in a manner so perfectly disinterested, belonged to the inferior class of people; they were the sons of labour, and strangers to the refinements of wealth and grandeur. Yet does there really exist an inferior class among a people, who inhale with every breath of air the spirit of generosity and the love of freedom? Oh! rocks of Helvetia, ’tis only among you, that we find that mixture of magnanimity of soul and unaffected simplicity, which attracts to your children so large a portion of our admiration and our love at once!
Prevented by distance and by the increasing infirmities of age, Count Venosta had not yet completed his preparations for attempting our rescue, when we threw ourselves at his feet. Arnold Melthal (Henric’s son, whom his father had dispatched with the account of our situation) had assured him, that it was unnecessary for him to collect his forces, since we should certainly be delivered without their assistance; but when those we love are concerned, who ever believes, that too many precautions can be taken? The news, that Edith still lived, and that his niece was innocent, had agitated the venerable warrior’s mind so violently, that had he been master of it, he would have summoned the whole world to our assistance.