At the foot of the oak, sat a woman, who was certainly not so lovely, as the Allemannic virgin Bissula; who inflamed the heart of the Roman statesman Ausonius, in spite of his age, to such a degree that he went about in his prefecture, spouting poetry in her praise: "her eyes are blue as the colour of the Heavens, and like gold is her wavy hair. Superior to all the dolls of Latium, is she, a child of the barbarians; and he who wants to paint her, must blend the rose with the lily."[[8]] The woman on the Hohenkrähen was old and haggard.
The men were looking at her; whilst the dawn was evidently spreading in the east. The mists hanging over the Bodensee, began to move, and now the sun was casting his first ray on the hills, burnishing their tops with gold. The fiery ball itself had just risen on the horizon, when the woman jumped up; the men following her example. She swung a bunch of mistletoe and fir-tree branches over her head, and then dipping it into the vase, three times sprinkled the bloody drops towards the sun; three times also over the men, and then poured out the contents of the vase, at the foot of the tree.
The men all seized their jugs, and rubbing them in a monotonous way, three times on the smooth surface of the rock, to produce a strange humming noise, lifted them together towards the sun, and then drained them at one draught. The putting them down again, sounded like one single blow, so simultaneous, was the movement. After this everyone put on his mantle, and then they all went silently down hill.
It was the first night of November.
When all had become quiet again, the children stepped out of their hiding-place, and confronted the old woman. Audifax had taken out the slip of parchment,--but the hag snatching up a brand out of the fire, approached them with a threatening look; so that the children hastily turned round, and fled down the hill, as fast as their feet could carry them.
CHAPTER IX.
[The Woman of the Wood.]
Audifax and Hadumoth had returned to the castle on the Hohentwiel, without anybody having noticed their having made this nightly expedition. They did not speak of their adventures, even to each other; but Audifax brooded over them night and day. He became rather negligent in his duties, so that one of his flock got lost in the hilly ground near where the Rhine flows out of the Bodensee. So Audifax went to look for the goat; and after spending a whole day in the pursuit, he triumphantly returned with the truant, in the evening.
Hadumoth welcomed him joyfully; delighted at his success, which saved him from a whipping. By and by, the winter came, and the animals remained in their respective stalls. One day the two children were sitting alone before the fire-place in the servant's hall.
"Dost thou still think of the treasure and the spell?" said Hadumoth.