Of course the earl received a Korb.[[2]] Ernst and Jutta were married. Ernst became the director of the mine, loaded with honours for his discovery, and ever since the valley has been called the Valley of the Lute.
[[2]] Korb—basket. Er hat einen Korb bekomnen, is the German or "He has been rejected;" "he has got the mitten;" that is, "he has got the basket."
Eva von Trotta.
A HISTORICAL TALE.
On one of the border mountains, on the western slopes of the Harz, in gloomy desolation, rise the grey ruins of the old Schloss Staufenburg, which still remind us of a most romantic though sad history.
Home-like, and at the same time sublime, silent, and solitary, must have been this now destroyed seat of kaisers and princes in the mysterious Middle Ages. Its position is fascinating, surrounded on three sides by high wooded mountains, with a wide view open to the south, which was then probably partially shut out by the primeval dense forests, now, however, extending over the little mining town of Gittelde and the picturesque mountain landscape to Osterode and the high-seated Schloss Herzberg.
The magic of this picture is greatly enhanced by the soft lights of sunset, and the dim, semi-transparent mists, which like a floating veil half hide its beauties, and fill the excited fancy with a mysterious presage of that poetic something we call the Past.
The mountain—on which are decaying bits of walls, where, until a few years ago, a strong square tower, eighty feet in height, with openings here and there, looked solemnly down on the vale—is cut off sharp on the east, west, and south sides from its wooded brethren that rise high above it, only on the north side sloping gradually to its base; and it is on this side one climbs to the spot where Kaiser Henry the Vogler, or Fowler, had a decoy for birds.
The halls trodden by royalty, the boudoirs where Beauty ruled eight hundred years ago, are fallen into green ruin; the death-owl hoots, and bats and lizards house among their overgrown stones.