Page:The Overland Monthly Volume 5 Issue 3.djvu/32



A DAY ON THE WESER.

OURISTS who pass through Europe in the old, beaten track, consiuer Germany sufficiently "done" when the Rhine has been navigated, and the larger cities—Berlin, Dresden, Munich —visited. Of the lovely scenery, lying a little apart from the highway of common travel, nothing is seen or said; and there are spots on the less well-known Weser River, that possess all the beauty and all the charm of romance and tradition, for which the river Rhine is so highly vaunted.

I have in my mind the territory lying on either side of the Weser River, from Nienburg upward to the pass of Porta Westphalica—an enormous cleft in the Weser Mountains, made there, centuries ago, by the water of the Weser breaking through the rocks, and pouring its volumes through this forced channel into the lower-lying land. Just below the pass is the ancient city of Minden, one of the strongest fortresses of modern times, and said to have been the residence of Wittekind, the old Saxon Chief, in the days of the dim, gray Past.

But of Wittekind and Minden, more anon: it is to an old, half-ruined, halfmodernized castle, on the banks of the Weser, that I wish to take you at present. Situated on the right of the river, as you come up from Nienburg, it is not more than six or eight miles from here to Minden. Jutting out into the stream, its vaults and dungeons built partly under the water, it is further encompassed by a moat, several hundred feet wide, on the north side, which still extends quite a distance beyond the present limits of the court-yard proper, ere it makes a sharp curve, and loses itself in the fields, which have been formed by filling in the

moat, during our "utilitarian" century. On the south side, the place was protected by immense walls, which, partly leveled years ago, have been transformed into terraced gardens, where the fragrant lilac, the gaudy tulip, and the sweetbreathed hyacinth nod, and wave, and dream, just above the loop- holes in the walls, that once echoed to the shout of the mailed vassal, or the moan of the shackled prisoner; but now peacefully hold the stores of grain, and gardenfruit, the rich acres bear to the present tenant of the old stronghold.

A passing glimpse that I caught of the round tower, at the north-west corner of the building, had shown me the figures "1549," in splendid Gothic characters, over the low-browed entrance-door; and this date alone, I thought, would warrant my attempt at a description of the place. A prince-bishop's seat originally, it was built at a time when the highest power of the state was in the hands of the prelates—the strength of this now ruined fortress, and the breadth and extent of the domains formerly under contribution to it, proving how mighty this, of all bishoprics, must have been. It is said that, at times, when the walls of Minden were not considered strong enough to withstand storm and attack of the enemy, to ¢Azs place were brought the prisoners and treasures the Lord- bishop was most anxious to hold. Under the terraces, that now give so picturesque an appearance to the south side of the castle, were the casemates, the magazines, and the stables for those mighty war-horses which we look upon with such delight, in the pictures still to be seen in the building. The loopholes that I have already noticed ap