United States or Saint Barthélemy ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Quite as legendary as historic, however; and perhaps that has made its charm in the eyes of foreigners even more than its national associations, dear to the native mind; and here, between Rolandseck, Nonnenwerth and Drachenfels, poetry takes precedence of history, and we do not want the antiquary to come and shatter the legend of Roland of Roncesval's fidelity to the Lady of Drachenfels, even after her vows in Nonnenwerth convent, with his pitiless array of dates and parade of obvious impossibilities.
Hammerstein Castle and Rheineck they floated under; Salzig and the Ahr confluence; Rolandseck and Nonnenwerth; Drachenfels and Bonn; hills green with young vines; dells waving fresh foliage. Margarita sang as they floated. Ancient ballads she sang that made the Goshawk sigh for home, and affected the Club with delirious love for the grand old water that was speeding them onward.
The Rhine sweeps around the foot of the Drachenfels, while, opposite, the precipitous rock of Rolandseck, crowned with the castle of the faithful knight, looks down upon the beautiful island of Nonnenwerth, the white walls of the convent still gleaming through the trees as they did when the warrior's weary eyes looked upon them for the last time.
'Guessed the work was going well; you sing so lightsomely to-day, Grete! Very pretty! And that's Drachenfels? Bones of the Virgins! what a bold fellow was Siegfried, and a lucky, to have the neatest lass in Deutschland in love with him. Well, we must marry her to Siegfried after all, I believe! Aha? or somebody as good as Siegfried. So chirrup on, my darling!
On a wooded slope alongside of our shooting-range there was a small piece of ground which had been cleared of wood, and which made an ideal halting-place; from it one could get a view of the Rhine over the tops of the trees and the brushwood, so that the beautiful, undulating lines of the Seven Mountains and above all of the Drachenfels bounded the horizon against the group of trees, while in the centre of the bow formed by the glistening Rhine itself the island of Nonnenwörth stood out as if suspended in the river's arms.
As you pass up the avenue you turn sharp round the corner of the court house, and on a steep hill before you you see a mediaeval castle. You think of the Rhine; the "castled crag of Drachenfels"; the Lorelei; and the vine-clad slopes of Germany. And German it is in every line of its architecture and design.
Now this only is left, my son; that thou bear living testimony to the truth of my statement, as I bear it to the folly! Farina promised, in the face of all, he would proclaim and witness to his victory on Drachenfels. 'That I may not be ranked an impostor! continued the Monk. 'And how great must be the virtue of them that encounter that dark spirit! Valour availeth nought.
Herr Kalm was enthusiastic in his admiration, moonlight over Drachenfels on the Rhine, or the midnight sun peering over the Gulf of Bothnia, reminded him of something similar, but of nothing so grand on the whole as the matchless scene visible from Cape Diamond worthy of its name. Lady de Tilly received her visitors with the gracious courtesy habitual to her.
You will go to Poppensdorf and to Kreitzberg, and then you will go to Gottesberg, and then you will go to Rolandseck, where there is a boat that will take you to Drachenfels, or to Koenigswinter." He said all this with so strong a German accent, and pronounced the barbarous words with so foreign an intonation, that no trace or impression whatever was left by them on Mr. George's ear.
The trachyte-conglomerate which seems to be associated with the upper beds of the brown coal strata is traversed by dykes of trachyte of later date; and though it is difficult to trace the line between the two varieties of this rock on the ground, Dr. von Rath has recognised the general distinction between them, which consists in the greater abundance of hornblende and mica in the trachyte of the Wolkenburg than in that of the Drachenfels.
Word Of The Day