Travellers in Wurtemburg may perhaps turn aside from glorious old Ulm, and the memories of the battlefields around it, to the romantic country round the Swabian mountains, through which descend the tributaries of the Danube. Here they may think themselves fortunate if they come upon a green valley, with a bright mountain torrent dashing through it, fresh from the lofty mountain, with terraced sides that rise sheer above. An old bridge, a mill, and a neat German village lie clustered in the valley; a seignorial mansion peeps out of the forest glades; and a lovely church, of rather late Gothic, but beautifully designed, attracts the eye so soon as it can be persuaded to quit the romantic outline of the ruined baronial castle high up on one of the mountain ledges. Report declares that there are tombs in the church well worth inspection. You seek out an old venerable blue-coated peasant who has charge of the church.
'What is yonder castle?'
'It is the castle of Adlerstein.'
'Are the family still extant?'
'Yea, yea; they built yonder house when the Schloss became ruinous. They have always been here.'
The church is very beautiful in its details, the carved work of the east end and pulpit especially so, but nothing is so attractive as the altar tomb in the chantry chapel. It is a double one, holding not, as usual, the recumbent effigies of a husband and wife, but of two knights in armour.
'Who are these, good friend?'
'They are the good Barons Ebbo and Friedel.'
Father and son they appear to be, killed at the same time in some fatal battle, for the white marble face of one is round with youth, no hair on lip nor chin, and with a lovely peaceful solemnity, almost cheerfulness, in the expression. The other, a bearded man, has the glory of old age in his worn features, beautiful and restful, but it is as if one had gone to sleep in the light of dawn, the other in the last glow of sunset. Their armour and their crests are alike, but the young one bears the eagle shield alone, while the elder has the same bearing repeated upon an escutcheon of pretence; the young man's hands are clasped over a harp, those of the other over a Bible, and the elder wears the insignia of the order of the Golden Fleece. They are surely father and son, a maiden knight and tried warrior who fell together?
'No,' the guide shakes his head; 'they are twin brothers, the good Barons Ebbo and Friedel, who were born when their father had been taken captive by the Saracens while on a crusade. Baron Friedel was slain by the Turks at the bridge foot, and his brother built the church in his memory. He first planted vines upon the mountains, and freed the peasants from the lord's dues on their flax. And it is true that the two brothers may still be seen hovering on the mountain-side in the mist at sunset, sometimes one, sometimes both.'
You turn with a smile to the inscription, sure that those windows, those porches, that armour, never were of crusading date, and ready to refute the old peasant. You spell out the upright Gothic letters around the cornice of the tomb, and you read, in mediaeval Latin,
'Orate pro Anima Friedmundis Equitis Baronis Adlersteini. A. D. mccccxciii'
Then turn to the other side and read -
'Hic jacet Eberardus Eques Baro Adlersteini. A.D. mdxliii. Demum'
Yes, the guide is right. They are brothers, with well-nigh a lifetime between their deaths. Is that the meaning of that strange Demum?
Few of the other tombs are worth attention, each lapsing further into the bad taste of later ages; yet there is one still deserving admiration, placed close to the head of that of the two Barons. It is the effigy of a lady, aged and serene, with a delicately-carved face beneath her stiff head-gear. Surely this monument was erected somewhat later, for the inscription is in German. Stiff, contracted, hard to read, but this is the rendering of it
'Here lies Christina Sorel, wife of Eberhard, xxth Baron von Adlerstein, and mother of the Barons Eberhard and Friedmund. She fell asleep two days before her son, on the feast of St. John, mdxliii.
'Her children shall rise up and call her blessed.
'Erected with full hearts by her grandson, Baron Friedmund Maximilianus, and his brothers and sisters. Farewell.'
