“This, too, hath the wise nun wrought?” he asked in growing astonishment. For the tapestry on this wall depicted a scene which had occurred in the Wartburg four years previously, with a fidelity which seemed impossible to anyone but an eye-witness.
It was the celebrated “War of the Poets” on the Wartburg—the “Wartburgkrieg”—the memory of which is as fresh to-day as when young Ludwig looked on the “Wise Nun’s” tapestry, and saw it pictured in glowing colours and wealth of detail on the canvas.
There on the “Minstrels’ Gallery” were the seats of Duke Hermann and Duchess Sophia. The Landgräfin had risen from hers, and with the folds of her mantle was covering a terror-stricken suppliant. In the Minstrel’s Hall, a step or two beneath the Gallery, were the other contestants. Ludwig recognises each of the angry faces that are turned towards the fugitive—Wolfram von Eschenbach, Walther von der Vogelweide, Heinrich von Zweten, and Heinrich Schreiber. A man, with the instruments of the executioner in his hand to label him for the spectator, is starting forward, but the quick movement is arrested by someone he sees in the opening door—a white-haired, venerable man, with a long beard.
“It is Klingsohr, the Wise Man from Hungary, who has come just in time to save the life of Heinrich von Ofterdingen,” says Ludwig, while his mother nodded confirmation. Young Ludwig passed on.
Here was the white-haired man again—in a garden this time before one of the little tables which have been in German inn-gardens since first such things were, and will be, until they are no more. He has risen from the table and is scanning the skies—and, behold! very low in them is hanging the star which shines about Ludwig’s own head in the piece of tapestry opposite. From the other tables, men in the knightly garb of peace, have risen likewise, neglecting their chess, and draughts, and dice, and drinking flagons, to follow the direction of the old man’s pointing arm.
On the left wall another many-figured scene. A king and queen on their thrones in the midst of a full and splendid court. Between them, the wonderful star is poised; and at their feet are kneeling ambassadors, whom Ludwig recognises as those sent from his father’s court, to ask the hand of the little Hungarian Princess (whose birth had been announced to him by Klingsohr) for his eldest son, Hermann.
“How wonderful it is,” said Ludwig, “but why did the ‘Wise Nun,’ so exact in all else, make the mistake of clothing me in the Landgraf’s robes, instead of Hermann?”
Nobody answered, for a peal from the Berchfrid,[8] that rang through every corner of the huge enclosure on the Wartburg, made its way into the women’s apartments, and told those who waited there that they need wait no more. The serving women were busy with their lady’s mantle, and presently the hum of a merry little song, and the ring of a martial (and not quite steady) step was heard along the gallery, and Duke Hermann, somewhat flushed from his mighty potations, but excellently-humoured, came into the “kemenate.”
“Art ready to meet thy daughter-in-law, Frau Landgräfin?” he said, jocularly. “If so, there is no time to be lost. What, Ludwig, still at thy mother’s girdle? It fears me much that we shall never make a sturdy drinker and fighter of thee, to keep thy father in countenance.”
Over Duchess Sophia’s fine face a shadow fell. She loved this passionate Lord of hers, with all his faults and all his weaknesses. But it was the dearest prayer of her soul to preserve her sons from following the path he trod. As much as lay in her power, she strove to keep them away from the motley company which held revel in the hall of the main building. But Hermann had speedily emancipated himself. “The lust of the eyes, the delight of the flesh, and the pride of life,” had put their fascination on him as soon as he had got clear of the women’s apartments. Ludwig was different. A certain asceticism, answering her own, had early revealed itself in his character. A strength of purpose, a force of self-restraint, a natural attitude of noble aloofness from all that seemed unworthy, made her build high hopes on Ludwig. And as for Hermann, who knew what blessings might be brought him by this child-bride from Hungary, whose birth had been accompanied by such wonders, who had already won the gladness of peace for her own land?