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Travellers in the Hartz, ascending the Brocken, are in certain atmospheres startled by the apparition of a shadowy figure, a giant image of themselves, thrown on the horizon by the dawn. Similar is the relation of Carlyle to the common types of his countrymen. Burns, despite his perfervid patriotism, was in many ways "a starry stranger."
On they came, nearer and nearer, gathering and massing beneath my feet and filling the Tenaya Canyon. Then the sun shone free, lighting the pearly gray surface of the cloud-like sea and making it glow. Gazing, admiring, I was startled to see for the first time the rare optical phenomenon of the "Specter of the Brocken."
Their foliage sprang into red-tinted life as if the witches of the Brocken had chosen a new meeting-place, and a crackling, tearing sound rent the air. "Oh!" screamed Sylvia, who chanced to be facing the mansion. "The house is on fire!" They were standing in a group, almost where Police Constable Farrow had stood at ten minutes past ten the previous morning.
At the summit of this shadow an aureole of rainbow light, a complete and glorious circle rested, in the midst of which his own image was flung, grotesque and gigantic. "The Shadows of the Brocken!" he exclaimed, in ecstasy, all his bitterness, his care, forgotten. "Now I understand Goethe's lines."
The Governor and Madame Solde first brought news of the complete escape of the prisoners. The two had fled through the hills by the Brocken Path, and though pursued after crossing, had reached the coast, and were taken aboard the Parroquet, which sailed away towards Australia.
His face worked, and the tears were in his eyes; then, as he partook of our breakfast, he cross-examined us on my statement, and even tried to persuade us that the phantom in the ruin was Emily; and on her observing that she could not have seen herself, he talked of the Brocken Spectre and fog mirages; but we declared the night was clear, and I told him that all the rational theories I had ever heard were far more improbable than the appearance herself, at which he laughed.
The summer in Quedlinburg was a delightful season of mingled work and pleasure. An Easter journey through the Hartz with some gay companions, which included an ascent of the Brocken already once climbed from Keilhau is among my most delightful memories. Like the Thuringian Mountains, the Hartz are also wreathed with a garland of legends and historical memories.
I was at the beginning of a deep gorge or valley, on one side of which was a steep sloping hill of grass and trees, and on the other a huge escarpment of mossed and jagged rocks. Then, farther up, the valley seemed to end in a huge promontory. On this great wedge grim shapes loomed in the mist, uncouth and shadowy and unnatural a lonely, mysterious Brocken, impossible to human tenantry.
Some of them spoke of having seen the "Spectre of the Brocken." I inquired of the landlord about the phenomenon; he says in winter it is frequently seen, in summer more seldom. The cause is very simple. It is always seen at sunrise, when the eastern side of the Brocken is free from clouds, and at the same time, the mist rises from the valley on the opposite side.
This moreover was enchanted ground. For on one side of the loftiest and most grotesque of the heights around Himri, there leans against it a level table rock of considerable extent which is perfectly desolate, and which the superstitious imaginations of the inhabitants of this aoul have made the scene of almost as much witchery as was ever located on the top of the Brocken.
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