"Schloss?"
Schloss is the German word for castle. Minnie could not speak German; but she knew some words of that language, and the words that she did know she was always perfectly ready to use, whenever an occasion presented.
"Ja, Ja," said the woman; and immediately she opened the gate. By this time Minnie had beckoned Mr. George and Rollo to come up from the road, and they all three went in through the gate.
The woman called to a man who was then just coming down out of the garden, and said something to him in German. None of our party could understand what she said; but they knew from the circumstances of the case, and from her actions, that she was saying to him that the strangers wished to see the ruins. So, the man leading the way, and the three visitors following him, they all went on along a broad gravel walk which led up into the garden.
Mr. George asked the guide if he could speak English, and he said, "Nein." Then he asked him if he could speak French, and he said, "Nein." He said he could only speak German.
"He can't explain any thing to us, children," said Mr. George; "we shall have to judge for ourselves."
The walk was very shady that led along the garden, and as it was now long past eight o'clock, it was nearly dark walking there, though it was still pretty light under the open sky. The walk gradually ascended, and it soon brought the party to a place where they could see, rising up among the trees, fragments of ancient walls of stupendous height. Rollo looked up to them with wonder. He even felt a degree of awe, as well as wonder, for the strange and uncouth forms of windows and doors, which were seen here and there; the embrasures, and the yawning arches which appeared below, leading apparently to subterranean dungeons, being all dimly seen in the obscurity of the night, suggested to his mind ideas of prisoners confined there in ancient times, and wearing out their lives in a dreadful and hopeless captivity, or being put to death by horrid tortures.
Minnie was still more afraid of these gloomy remains than Rollo. She was afraid to look up at them.
"Look up there, Minnie," said Rollo. "See that old broken window with iron gratings in the walls."