Chapter V

Efferding.--Ottensheim.--Kloster-Willering.--Linz.--The Platz.--The Landstrasse.--The Schlossberg.--The Landhaus.--The Theatre.--The Bridge.--The Pöstlingberg.--View on leaving Linz.--Steyereck.--The River Traun.--Ebelsberg.--Luftenberg.--Monastery of St. Florian.--Tillysburg.--Spielberg.--Mauthausen.--Ens.--Origin and History of the City.--Antiquities discovered in its neighbourhood.

From Aschach to Ottensheim is one labyrinth of islands, through which few boats venture without a pilot, as the current of the river is continually changing its course, and the deep channel or ditch (_Graben_) as the boatmen here call it, through which they have safely steered a few days before, may upon their second visit be transformed into a sandbank, or blocked up with trunks and branches of trees, washed into it by the floods that so frequently occur in this part of the country. While passing through this archipelago, the banks of the river are seldom visible, but fortunately there is nothing upon them to make that circumstance a matter of regret. The whole country between Aschach and Willering is said to have been formerly the basin of one vast lake, cradled amongst the mountains of Bohemia, Moravia, and Upper Austria, and the name of Ilmersee, which appears in the thirteenth century, is quoted in confirmation of the tradition. The White Tower of Hartkirchen is shortly seen on the right bank. The Catholic minister of this church, and his cook-maid, were cruelly murdered here, by the revolted peasantry in 1626. Pupping, celebrated for a dead saint, and Bergheim for a beautiful brewer_ess_[40], whose strong beer and bright eyes distracted the heads and the hearts of her customers, and might have sorely tempted the holy St. Otmar himself, had the good man been living at the time.--Waschpoint, Wörth, and two or three other small villages on the same bank all passed, were ached Efferding, one of the oldest places on the Danube. The beautiful Chrimhilt, the heroine of the Nibelungen-lied, is said, in that poem, to have rested here upon her journey into Hungary. One of the Schaumbergs bought the little town from the Bishop of Passau in 1367, for four thousand florins; and at the extinction of that family, it came to the Starrhembergs, who built a castle here, still called the Burg. A rich and valiant family, of the name of Schifer, founded and liberally endowed an hospital here, as early as 1325, and expressly commanded that, when there was not a sufficient number of sick and poor in the town of Efferding to fill the hospital, the governor should send out “into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in.”

On the 1st of September, 1632, the combined peasantry burned the suburbs, and, on the 25th, defeated the nephew and namesake of the great and merciless Tilly, but, shortly afterwards, were themselves defeated by the Imperial troops with great slaughter. Upwards of three thousand of the unfortunate men, who fell at various periods in this neighbourhood, lie buried here, as did also their leader, Fadinger, till Herberstorf had the body disinterred, and carried to Seebach, where it was flung into a hole beneath the gibbet. The historian Kurz has preserved the receipt for the money paid to the ministers of this paltry vengeance. The Bavarians plundered Efferding in 1704 and 1742, and it suffered considerably during the last war, from the continual fighting in its neighbourhood. A dozen small villages are scattered on each bank, between Efferding and Ottensheim; and the Ihn, the Bösenbach, and the Rodel, wind amongst them to the Danube. At one of these little places, named Hartheim, dwelt in 1620 a lady of the family of Aspan, the fame of whose wealth, according to Hoheneck, determined a Prince of Saxony to make a personal proposal of marriage. Travelling incognito with only two attendants, he fell, near Efferding, into the hands of the rebel peasantry, who, taking the unfortunate suitor for a spy, put him and his domestics instantly to the sword. At length, we approached the square white tower, which had been for some time gleaming above the intervening islands; and as we issued from amongst them, the little market town of Ottensheim, with its chateau and church, all grouped as with an eye to effect, upon a gentle eminence projecting into the Danube, gradually glided into view. On a house in the market-place, is the figure of a child in a cradle, surmounted by a canopy, and underneath it are the following lines:

“Im 1208 Jahr.
Da Ottensheim noch nicht genannt war,
Ist Kaiser Otto Auserkohren
Alhier in diesen Haus geboren.”

What _Emperor_ Otto, the worthy composer of this distich intended us to believe was born here in 1208, I cannot pretend to determine, as the fourth and last emperor of that name was elected as early as 1197; and that the place was not called Ottensheim before that period, appears to be another equally unfortunate assertion.

Leopold II., Duke of Austria, who died in 1194, sold Wechsenberg, _Ottensheim_, Grein, and Hartenstein, to Otto von Schleung, “mit leuth und gut,” (with people and property,) for six hundred pounds of silver. In the fourteenth century, Heinrich von Neuhaus, Peter von Sternberg, and Ulrich von Landstein, laid waste this part of the country to the walls of Ottensheim, and began a feud, which desolated Upper Austria for upwards of one hundred years. In 1626, a body of the insurgents, under a leader named Christoph Zeller, established their head-quarters at Ottensheim; and the French plundered the town, both in their disastrous retreat in 1742, and their victorious march to Vienna in 1809. Ottensheim, however, has recovered from its many disasters, and drives a tolerably brisk trade in linen, wood and fruit, pit-coal and alum. Between Ottensheim and Kloster-Willering, which faces it, there is another rapid race of the river, that forms quite a little sea of billows. Kloster-Willering lies at the foot of the fir-crowned Kirnberg, which, rising on the right bank, extends its forest-covered masses as far as Linz. The Kloster was originally the castle of the Knights of Willering, descended from the old Counts of Kirnberg. Cholo and Ulrich of Willering, Barons of Weremberg, established some Cistertian monks here in 1146. Ulrich went to Palestine, from whence he never returned. With him his family became extinct, and the whole of his great possessions fell to the fortunate monks of Willering. They soon wheedled themselves into the confidence and favour of all the noblest and richest families of Upper Austria, many of the heads of which joined their fraternity. The Archdukes of Austria themselves highly patronized this Kloster, and freed it from all tolls and taxes; and it shortly became so powerful, that it assumed a species of jurisdiction over all the other establishments of its order, upon the banks of the Danube, as far as Engelhardszell. One of its abbots, in 1544, played it a scurvy trick. He was a Nürnberger by birth, and named Erasmus Villicus. Scarcely had he been raised to this enviable dignity, when he took unto himself a wife, and one fine night disappeared with the lady, and all the jewels of the Kloster! From that period, a chain of misfortunes seems to have attended it. It was twice or thrice plundered during the insurrections; nearly burned to the ground in 1733; suffered in an action between the French and Austrians, in 1742; and by an inundation in 1787, when the Danube overflowed its banks to the height of full seven fathoms.

After washing the walls of Kloster Willering, the Danube enters another beautiful valley, skirted on one side by the dark forests of the Kirnberg, and on the other by groves of a lighter green, interspersed with cottages and gardens, over which, in the distance, rise the spires of Pöstlingberg, announcing to the traveller the vicinity of Linz. On the brink of each bank runs a carriage-road, the one on the right being the high post-road to Regensburg and Nürnberg, and that on the left leading to Ottensheim, Grammetstetten, and Landshag. This beautiful valley is the favourite promenade of the Linzers, who flock on a fine summer afternoon through the woods on the right bank, to a hunting lodge in the Kirnbergerwald, near which stand the ruins of Helfenberg, the cradle of the old Counts of Kirnberg; and in the winter go in sledges to Willering, and the neighbouring places, to drink wine, beer, and coffee, smoke, knit, and hear music.

Having rounded the point of land overlooked by the lofty Pöstlingberg,--the city of Linz,--the capital of Upper Austria,--with its long wooden bridge, gradually makes its appearance. Beneath the rocks on the right bank, stands a long line of houses and chapels, some romantically situated in little clefts of the rocks, and surrounded by firs and pines. This place is called the Calvarienberg (Mount Calvary), and is the scene of numberless processions and religious ceremonies of the Catholic inhabitants of Linz.

Linz is a handsome, clean, and cheerful looking city, and the inhabitants may be said to partake the good qualities of their town. The Linzer women are famed for beauty, if we may believe the guide-books, and who would dare to doubt them upon such a subject?--honestly, however, I cannot say I remarked any extraordinary difference between the lasses of Linz, and their Bavarian neighbours. The young females of the lower and middling classes, throughout the south of Germany, are in general plump, good-humoured looking girls, with florid complexions, large laughing blue eyes, snub noses, and light hair. Amongst the nobility and gentry, indeed, are some of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, and more resembling our own sweet countrywomen than the females of any other nation in Europe. But, as honest Cowley says:

--“Beauty, thou wild fantastic ape,
Who dost in every country change thy shape:
Here black, there brown, here tawny, and there white,
Thou flatterer, who comply’st with every sight:
--Who hast no certain what nor where;
But vary’st still, and dost thyself declare
Inconstant as thy she-professors are!--”

Who shall define thee?--

Amongst the men a very visible alteration in person had taken place, even before we arrived at Linz. There appeared to me considerably more of the Greek and Italian than the German cast of feature in the Austrian countenance. Long aquiline noses, dark eyes and swarthy complexions were new objects to me in German faces. Civility, kindness, and good humour, however, reigned in the hearts and manners of both sexes; and after the gloomy pictures I have seen so frequently drawn in England, of the degraded and miserable condition of the people of Austria, it was curious enough to mark the content and gaiety that, at least, appeared to pervade every class of his Imperial Majesty’s subjects. Having tasted nothing since our single cup of coffee at Aschach, we hastened to the Golden Lion, the best inn we saw upon the Platz, and made a capital breakfast, in an apartment on the first floor, fitted up precisely like an English coffee-room, the windows commanding a good view of the Platz, which (it being a market morning) presented a lively and interesting appearance. It is a fine, spacious, oblong square, between eight and nine hundred feet in length, and upwards of three hundred broad[41], surrounded on three sides by handsome houses built of freestone, (some of these five stories high,) and ornamented with a twisted column, surmounted by a gilt glory, erected by the Emperor Charles VI., in 1713, in memory of a great plague. South of this column, the square was filled with market-people and purchasers. The ground was covered with their large flat baskets, containing all kinds of provisions. By the side of each stood the vendor, in his or her provincial costume; and amongst the motley crowd moved the mistresses and maidens of Linz, the former dressed “à la Française,” with the exception of short sleeves, and long gloves tied above the elbow, a fashion peculiar to Germany; and the latter in their little jackets, coloured petticoats, and splendid caps of gold brocade, entitled “Linzer hauben,” modelled, one would suppose, from the gorgeous crest of a Chinese or golden pheasant. Exactly facing our windows was a large house, where, over the _porte cochère_, the Austrian Eagle (that “rara avis in terris, nigroque simillima _cygno_” _with two necks_) sprawled upon a yellow board, all legs and wings, like a bird of prey on a barn door, and under it paraded a tall mustachoed Austrian grenadier sentinel, in white and black uniform, black gaiters, and portentous bear-skin cap, while half a dozen soldiers of other regiments lounged about the gateway of the Kaiserlich,--Königlich,--something or other, that I could not exactly make out, and added considerably to the picturesque effect of the whole scene.

Breakfast over, we repaired to the _polizey_, to reclaim our passports, exchanged on landing for a printed paper containing, in German, French, and Italian, an injunction, under certain pains and penalties, to present yourself to the police, within twenty-four hours after your arrival; those secured, we rambled over the town, which has nothing particularly worth notice in the way of buildings. There is a tolerably handsome church near the post-office, and polizey-direction; in a long airy street, (the landstrasse) that runs right out into the country; for, unlike continental towns in general, Linz has no gloomy gateways or frowning barriers; a light turnpike a little way out of the town on the high-road, painted, as they all are in Germany, with the colours of the empire or kingdom, and resembling, exceedingly, the now nearly exploded barber’s pole, alone indicates the spot where the land-traveller must exhibit his passport and pay the little weg-geld or road-toll, to an officer stationed for that purpose at a neighbouring cottage. A little arch, under which you pass into the Platz from the bank of the Danube, is dignified by the name of the Wasser-thor; and you are directed to the Haupt-thor, the Schmidt-thor, and the Land-haus-thor, as you might in London be directed to Ludgate, or to Holborn-bars, but the Thor itself has long vanished. Riesbeck, who travelled through Germany in 1780, speaking of Linz, says, “the city is open on all sides, and the town and country seem so united, that if my spirit of knight errantry would allow it, I would pitch my tent, and lay my travelling staff up, here;” and gives honourable testimony to “the industry, happiness, and prosperity of the eleven thousand inhabitants who dwell in it.” If the late wars have occasioned any decrease of its prosperity, they have either not had that effect upon its population, or the inhabitants have been singularly fortunate in repairing damages, since the peace. Their number is now, by two different accounts, estimated at sixteen, and twenty thousand. From the Schlossberg, on the west of the city, you have a fine view over the Danube and the surrounding country. Upon this rock anciently stood the citadel of Linz, in which Richard Cœur de Lion, it is said, was feasted as he returned from his long Austrian captivity. The Archduke frequently resided here, and Rodolph II. considerably enlarged it. The Emperor Ferdinand I. still further enlarged and beautified it. It was afterwards converted into barracks, and, finally, into an hospital, which was burned down in 1800. Upon its site a commodious workhouse has been erected; and the poor now eat their crumbs upon the spot where formerly stood “the rich man’s table.” There are many charitable establishments[42] and public schools in Linz, as well for Catholics as Protestants, and some considerable manufactories, one of which (the Imperial and Royal Woollen Cloth Manufactory) is a little town in itself.

The Landhaus, the Guildhall of Linz, (or rather, the Government House of Upper Austria, where the president and eight counsellors appointed for the administration of justice in the country above the Ens, hold their sessions,) stands on the promenade, and was originally a Franciscan convent, built, in 1287, by Eberhard von Walsee. From a window of this building, the shot was fired that mortally wounded the rebel captain, Stephen Fadinger. Near the Landhaus is the new theatre. The old one was destroyed by the fire in 1800, which reduced to ashes the greater part of this quarter of the town. The erection of the present building cost ninety-six thousand florins. Under the same roof, is the Redouten-Saal, or Assembly Room for masquerades, balls, etc.

The old chroniclers are not agreed as to the origin and foundation of Linz. Lazius would trace it to the Roman _Lentium_, or _Lentia_, destroyed by the Huns. Bruschius, in his rhyming panegyric, says,

“Hanc quis condidit primus, quo tempore et anno,
Nominis aut hujus quæ sit origo vetus;
Vix poterit dici: siquidem Germania fustos
Non tantâ scripsit religione suos,
Quanta vel Græci fecerunt laude, vel ipsi
Ausonii proceres Romuleique patres.”

Under Louis the Child, Linz was known as a toll-place on the Danube, and the seat of the Counts of Kirnberg. The last of this family sold, according to Lazius, the whole of his dominions to the Markgraves of Austria. When the Emperor Frederick II., “the pupil, the enemy, and the victim of the church,” was excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX. the second time, in 1236, Linz was besieged by the powers of the King of Bohemia, the Duke of Bavaria, the Patriarch of Aquileia, and the Bishops of Bamberg, Freysingen, and Passau. Frederick, however, assisted only by Albert, Count of Pogen, relieved the good city, and took one of the church militant, the Bishop of Passau, prisoner. During the reign of Rodolph of Hapsburg, Linz was plundered by Henry, Duke of Bavaria; and, in 1335, the Emperor Louis the Bavarian here invested the Dukes of Austria with Carinthia and the Tyrol, and entered into an offensive and defensive alliance, to secure the succession of those countries against the pretensions of the King of Bohemia and his heirs[43]. In 1481, the whole city was destroyed by fire, with the exception of the castle and one street. The Emperor Frederick III. caused it to be rebuilt and considerably enlarged, and declared it, in 1490, the capital of Upper Austria. He bought the village of Urfar, till then only inhabited by fishermen, and, flinging a wooden bridge over the Danube to it from Linz, it, in a short time, became a kind of suburb to the city. On the 19th of August, 1493, Linz lost its imperial benefactor. Frederick died in this city, of which he may almost be called the founder, at the advanced age of seventy-eight, and after a reign of fifty-three years, the longest of any emperor since the days of Augustus. He had been afflicted with a cancerous ulcer in his leg. As the only means of relief, he submitted to amputation; but, from the unskilfulness of the surgeon, and the vitiated state of his blood, a second amputation was necessary. He bore these painful operations with extreme fortitude, and gave a singular proof of his characteristic phlegm. Taking the severed limb in his hand, he said to those who were present, “What difference is there between an emperor and a peasant? or rather, is not a sound peasant better than a sick emperor? Yet I hope to enjoy the greatest good which can happen to man: a happy exit from this transitory life.” He seemed to be in a fair state of recovery, but his rigid observation of a fast, during which, in opposition to his medical attendants, he would take nothing but melons and water, brought on a dysentery, which, in his debilitated condition, became fatal. I agree with Schultes in thinking that an equestrian statue of this benefactor of Linz would be a more handsome and appropriate ornament for its principal square, than the column before mentioned. In 1521-2, the Archduke Ferdinand, afterwards emperor and founder of the German branch of the House of Austria, solemnized, at Linz, his nuptials with Anne, Princess of Hungary and Bohemia. Thrice, during the remainder of that century, was Linz visited with the awful scourge of pestilence. In 1620, the whole of Upper Austria was pledged to Bavaria; and, during the insurrections as already related, Linz was invested by the peasants under Fadinger, and its suburbs were reduced to ashes. Keppler, the famous astronomer, who at that time resided in them, lost some valuable MSS. in the flames. Linz was thrice stormed during those disturbances. In 1741, Linz was taken possession of by the allied French and Bavarian army, under Marshal Bellisle and the Elector, and in the three unsuccessful struggles of Austria against Napoleon in 1800, 1805, and 1809, it suffered, in common with other towns upon the Danube, the various _mis_fortunes of war.

The wooden bridge across the Danube, I have already said, was first built in 1490, but there is mention made of a bridge as early as 1106. It is conjectured, however, that it must have been a bridge of boats only, as the first regular bridge across to Urfar was certainly that thrown over by Ferdinand[44]. A stroll across this bridge, which is upwards of one thousand feet in length, through the little town of Urfar, (for though it merely looks like the suburb of Linz, it has risen to the dignity of a _markt_[45],) and up the steep Pöstlingberg, to the church and observatory on its summit, would, no doubt, repay any one for the trouble if he could afford the time, as far as an extensive and beautiful view goes; but, as my object was to travel through Austria, and not merely look over it, as a certain respectable personage is said “to look over Lincoln,” nothing but a view being to be gained by it, I declined the invitation; and having revictualled our bark, for we always dined on board, about twelve o’clock, we

“All got under weigh,
And bude a long adieu to”--

the capital of Upper Austria.

The retrospective view, after we had left Linz about a quarter of a mile behind us, was exceedingly beautiful, as beautiful, perhaps, as the view on leaving Passau, but of quite a different character. The city lay on our left, the beach before it crowded with people, and piled with merchandise,--a regiment of infantry marching out of the Wasser-thor, drums beating and colours flying; the bridge, alive with passengers, stretched across the gulf, from whence the Danube rushed panting out, and then spread itself, right and left, like a calm bright lake before us. In front, gradually rising from the water’s edge, and spotted with the white straggling buildings of the little town of Urfar, towered the majestic Pöstlingberg, cultivated to its summit, and crowned by its church and observatory. More to the right arose the Pfenningberg, equally lofty, and similarly chequered with corn and meadow land. Between them, lay a soft green valley, in the bosom of which nestled the old village of Magdalena, the spire of its ancient church just peeping above the trees. A cloudless deep blue sky formed the back ground of this rich and laughing picture, that gladdened the heart, and filled it “almost to overflowing” with love and gratitude to that ineffable spirit, the Great Architect and

“Author of this Universe,
And all this good to man! For whose well-being,
So amply, and with hands so liberal,
He hath provided all things.”

Looking forward on our course, a crowd of little villages appeared on the left bank of the river, which again meandered amongst woody islands, and received, just below a small hamlet called Furth, the tiny stream of the Kitzelbach. Farther on, upon the same bank, rose the half burned chateau of Steyereck, upon a small hill, in front of the forest-covered mountains which again line that side of the river. The little market-town of Steyereck is hidden behind the poplars of an island close to the shore. Steyereck was formerly a place of some commercial importance[46], but the Danube has receded of late years considerably from its walls; and the large sand-banks it has left behind it, prevents the lading or unlading of vessels, which now seek some more fortunate town. A little trouble and expense would, it appears, remove the sand, and restore the Danube to its original channel, thereby not only greatly benefiting Steyereck, but all the surrounding country, which is now, from the new course of the river, subjected to continual inundations, disasters that this work would greatly diminish in number, if not entirely prevent. No measures have as yet, however, been taken to effect this desirable purpose. The worthy Austrian would be considerably improved, could a little of the persevering industry of the Hollander be infused into his composition. Steyereck belonged originally to the monks of Kremsmünster, but, as early as 1136, it had fallen into the power of a family named Khuenringe, who lorded it over the greater part of the Nordwaldes. Albert, of Khuenringe, sold the Castle of Steyereck, in 1280, to Ulrich von Kapell, surnamed “The Long,” who, in the famous battle of Marchfield, between the Emperor Rudolph I. and Ottocar, King of Bohemia, rescued the valiant founder of the House of Hapsburg from a gigantic Thuringian knight, named Valens, who had unhorsed and wounded him, and, by his courage and exertions, decided the fortune of the day.

“Terra Rudolphus hostium cinctus globo
Multorum, et unus jam pedes vim sustinet.
Ulricus alis advolans Capellides,
Ceu sæva raptis ursa pro catulis nova
Irrumpit acie, ferro iter per inimicos secat,
Alio reservat Cæsarem statuens equo, etc.”

+Calaminus in Rudolpho Ottocaro.+

It remained in the family of the Kapellers till the extinction of the male branch in 1409, when the last daughter of that house married Heinrich von Lichtenstein. In 1569, one of the Lichtensteins sold Steyereck to Christopher Jörger, of Tolleth; and, in 1635, the town and castle were given as a dower with Elizabeth Jörger, to David Ungnad, Count of Weissenwolf, who built the present chateau. In 1770, the lightning fired the building, and a valuable library and collection of pictures were utterly consumed.

Nearly facing Steyereck, is the mouth of the green and beautiful river Traun, which, rising out of the Grundel-See in the romantic Steyermark, flows through the lakes of Hallstädter and Gmünden, and swelled by the Ager, the Alben, and the Krems, hurries, foaming under the bridge of Ebelsberg, into the Danube. Ebelsberg, or Ebersberg, which lies on the right bank of the Traun, and is visible from the Danube, is a place of great antiquity[47], and the scene of a desperate battle between the French and the Austrians, fought on the 3d of May, 1809. General Claparede’s division stormed Ebelsberg from the bridge across the Traun, under a tremendous fire of artillery directed against the bridge, by the Austrian Field-Marshal Hiller. Claparede succeeded in carrying the place, but with dreadful slaughter. Another column of French, who had passed the river higher up, upon entering the town, revenged the death of their comrades most fearfully upon the Viennese volunteers who had so bravely defended it, three hundred of whom were burned alive in the castle, the town having taken fire during the assault, and the rest cut to pieces, From twelve to sixteen thousand men fell in this terrible conflict; and the banks of the Traun, from Ebelsberg to the Danube, were literally covered with slain[48].

The Emperor Arnulph gave Ebelsberg, then called Eporesburg, to the monks of Kremsmünster, A.D. 893, together with the confiscated property of a Count Engelschalk, who carried off the Emperor’s natural daughter. Arnulph feigned forgiveness, and luring the Count back from Zwentibold, whither he had fled with the Princess, delivered him over to the diet at Ratisbon, who condemned him to lose his eyes, and his nephew Wilhelm, his head. In the year 900, Count Sighard (whose name is handed down to the modern traveller, by the little post town of Sighardskirchen, near Vienna) built a castle at Ebelsberg, which was destroyed on the defeat of the Germans by the Hungarians in 993. A new castle was built shortly afterwards on the same spot, and destroyed by Frederick of Austria in 1242, in consequence of the excesses committed by Rudiger, Bishop of Passau, who, in conjunction with the Lords of a castle at Obernberg on the Inn, kept the whole intervening country in a state of terror. It was again rebuilt, and Rodolph of Hapsburg defeated here one hundred and twenty knights, previous to his battle with Ottocar. In 1586, this third castle was destroyed by fire. Stephen Fadinger established his head-quarters here in 1626, and arrested the Imperial Commissioners. In the August of that year the peasants were defeated at Ebelsberg, with the loss of two thousand men.

Below Steyereck, the left bank alone is hilly; the right resumes the flat, sedgy appearance it presented from Regensburg to Straubing. Luftenberg, an old place upon the left bank, commanding a fine view over the opposite country, is principally remarkable as the spot where the fanatical visionary Laimbauer held forth in 1635-36. He entrenched himself, with the wretched enthusiasts who followed him, in the church of Frankenberg, and after wounding and killing many of the officers sent to apprehend him, from its windows, left his disciples to be burnt alive. He was, however, taken in his attempt to escape the flames, and executed at Linz. The monastery of St. Florian now appeared on our right, and shortly afterwards the chateau called Tilly’s Burg. St. Florian, to whose honour the monastery was erected, suffered martyrdom A.D. 303, at Lorch on the Ens, where, by order of a commander named Aquilinus, he was thrown from the bridge into the river, with a stone round his neck. His spirit appeared to a matron, and directed her where to find and where to bury his body; and over his grave, as the story runs, an altar was first erected, then a church, and lastly a kloster. Stephen Fadinger had his head-quarters here in 1626.

Tilly’s Burg is a large square building with four towers, and said to contain as many windows as there are days in the year, a peculiarity attributed to at least a dozen places in England, and I believe generally reported of every mansion with more windows than one would take the trouble to count. On the spot where this chateau now stands, once arose the tower of the castle of Volkerstorf, the seat of one of the most ancient and powerful families in Austria. Some warriors of that name fought at Constanz as early as 948. In 1146 a Volkerstorf accompanied Duke Leopold to the tournament at Zurich. Ortolph von Volkerstorf stabbed Henrich Wittigo, secretary to the Emperor Frederick II., in the monastery of St. Florian, for which deed he and his brother were banished, their property confiscated, and their castle destroyed. In the Diet of Augsburg, A.D. 1275, Bernhard von Volkerstorf spoke vehemently against Ottocar, King of Bohemia, whom he openly accused of attempting to poison his own wife, and of tyrannising over Austria. Under the protection of the House of Hapsburg, the Volkerstorfs returned to their native country, and rebuilt their castle in 1331. In 1558 it suffered materially by fire, and the last of the family having embraced the Lutheran faith, the whole of his property was confiscated in 1620, and the castle given, three years afterwards, by the Emperor Ferdinand, to the famous Count Tserclas von Tilly[49]. In 1630-32, he built the present chateau, on the site of the old castle, and in the appellation of Tilly’s Burg buried all recollection of the ancient Lords of Volkerstorf, whose once dreaded name is now only known to the peasant of Austria, as that of a little insignificant village in the neighbourhood of Ens. The last female of Tilly’s family, the Countess Montfort, sold the Burg in 1730, to the Bavarian Baron von Weichs.

Near Tilly’s Burg is the old village of Kronau, known as early as the times of Thassillo, Duke of Bavaria, by the name of Kranesdorf, and on the left bank lie Hof-im-Schlag, Himberg, Auwinden, St. Georgen, and two or three other small places, remarkable only for their great antiquity. To the north of St. Georgen lies Frankenstein, where the miserable followers of Laimbauer met their horrible fate.

We now approached the old square tower of Spielberg, which, together with the steeples of the city of Ens, we had for some time seen in the distance, backed by the glittering and rugged line of the Styrian Alps. The ruin of Spielberg stands upon an Island near the right bank of the Danube, and just in the angle formed by the stream, which, having stretched away boldly to the south-east, here turns sharply off to the north, and washes the walls of the market town of Mauthausen, which is seen through a vista of islands at the extremity of a distant point of land. Spielberg is admirably situated for a Raub-schloss, which was of course its original character. Otto and Eckbert von Spielberg were slain in Frederick Barbarossa’s Italian expedition, A.D. 1156, and one Dittmar von Spielberg was present at the siege of Milan in 1158. In 1328, the family of Spielberg became extinct, the last of that name, Eberhard, having previously sold the city and castle of Ens to the Emperor Rudolph I., for six hundred marks. Reinprecht von Walsee possessed Spielberg in 1329, and after passing through several hands, it finally formed part of the dower brought by the Countess of Weissenwolf to her husband in 1635. There is a small fall of the river here, which was at one time considered dangerous by the timid boatmen on the Danube, and has been confounded by some writers with the celebrated Strudel, probably from one of the names given to it by the schiffers, viz. Der Saurüssel[50]. It is also called by some, the Neubruch: small boats seldom venture through it, though a slight tossing would, I should imagine, be the only consequence. My companion and I often laughed, to think how a smart English six-oared cutter would astonish the natives here, who are certainly the clumsiest and most fearful navigators in Europe. Mauthausen is said by the boatmen to be half of Aschach, which, carried away by an inundation of the Danube, floated with the current down to this spot,--a strange tradition, which it is supposed has arisen from a fancied resemblance between the two towns. Howsoever it came, it stands in a very pleasant situation, directly opposite to the mouth of the Ens, and looking up that river upon the city of Ens, and the far-distant peaks and glaciers of the Styrian Alps. There was a bridge of boats here in 1809, but it was destroyed by the Bavarians. The neighbouring tower of Pragstein was occupied by the French in 1742. Mauthausen suffered severely in the war between Rudolph and Matthias, and in the insurrections during the reign of Ferdinand. There is a woollen-stocking and a leather manufactory here, a dye-house of some celebrity, and a salt-market, from whence the greater part of Bohemia is supplied.

The city of Ens is supposed to have been originally constructed out of the ruins of the Roman Lorch, (indifferently called Laureacum, Lavoriacum, Blaboriacum, Loriacte,) the station of the second Italian legion, upon the site of which is still a little village of the name. Ammianus Marcellinus is the oldest historian who makes mention of Laureacum. Bruschius, Hansiz, and Aventine assert, that Lorch was destroyed by Attila, on his march to Gaul; but the biographer of St. Severin states, that two years after the passage of Attila, that holy person arrived at Lorch from the neighbourhood of Vienna, and found it flourishing, and a Christian priest established therein. The Huns might have taken the left bank of the Danube, particularly as it was their nearest road. From an inscription on the walls of Ens, it would appear that two of the holy Evangelists themselves took the city under their especial protection, and converted the people to Christianity[51].

St. Peter himself is also said to have preached the gospel here in the year 49. In 454, Lorch is reported to have been preserved by the prayers of St. Severin, but was afterwards destroyed by the Barbarians, according to his own prediction in 737, when Bibilo, bishop of Lorch, fled with his monks to Passau, as I have already mentioned in my notice of that city. The authentic history of Ens, however, commences during the reign of Charlemagne, when that Emperor, aware of the importance of such a situation, pitched his tents at the mouth of the Ens, which formed at that time the line of demarcation between Bavaria and the lands of the Avars or Huns of Pannonia, that people having, during the sixth and seventh centuries, “spread their permanent dominion from the foot of the Alps to the sea-coast of the Euxine[52].” Here, on the 5th of September, 791, he encamped, and, after fasting and praying for three days, proceeded on his expedition. The troops on the left bank of the Danube were commanded by the Counts Thederich and Meginfried; those on the right by the Emperor in person; and between the two hosts upon the river floated a third body, with provisions and necessaries for the whole army. In fifty-two days he penetrated to the river Rab, destroying the rings or wooden fortifications of the Avars, the first of which he found upon the Riederberge, by Tuln; and would have carried his victorious arms still farther, had not a contagious disorder killed nearly all his horses. In 805, we still hear of Lorch, which, under the names of Lorahha and Loracha, is designated as a villa regia, and mention is made of its market-place and of an imperial judge, one Warner or Warnhar. After the death of Arnulph the Bastard, the Hungarians burst into the country, and devastated it beyond the Ens. The Bavarians rallied, and beat them back; and Leopold, then Grenz-graf, or Count of the frontier, in the year 900, slew upwards of 3000 of them on the left bank of the Danube. In the same year, as a stronger check to their inroads, he erected on the Ens a strong fortress[53] which he called Ensburg (Anasiburgum.) Buildings gradually rose around it; and in proportion as the old Roman city of Laureacum declined, its rival prospered, till their names became confounded, and that of the new city predominating, a small village, probably on the actual site of the Roman town, alone retains the ancient appellation of Lorch. Richar, bishop of Passau, persuaded Louis the Child, that the fortress of Ensburg stood upon ground belonging to the monastery of St. Florian, and it was consequently ceded by the sovereign to that establishment. The Hungarians snatched it from its holy possessors in 907, when they defeated Louis, and slew the valiant markgraf Leopold, brother-in-law to Carloman, the bishops of Salzburg, Freysing, and Seben, three abbots, and nineteen counts. Leopold’s son, Arnulf, defeated the Barbarians on the Inn, in 912, and Conrad I. bribed them back over the frontiers in 918. After Arnulf’s death, the Barbarians again invaded Bavaria, but were ultimately, at the close of the tenth century, driven out of the country by the Markgraves, Leopold the Babenberger, and Burkhard, who carried the war into the enemy’s territories as far as Krems and Mölk. In a deed of the time of Otho II., Ensburg is still spoken of as distinct from Lorch or Lorach, and mention is made in the same deed of the church of St. Laurentius, situated without the walls of Lorch. Now there is a church of St. Laurence standing to this day, within ten minutes’ walk of the city of Ens; and though it was built as late as the time of Maximilian I., it is not improbable that it stands upon the site of the ancient edifice[54]. In the important deeds by which Ottocar VI. made over the steyermark to Leopold of Austria, Ens is called by one party a markt, and by the other a village; and it is asserted by some writers that Ens was first made a fortified town by Leopold, who built its walls with the ransom of Richard Cœur de Lion![55] However this may be, and if true, it is a very interesting circumstance, Ens certainly dates its existence as a city from somewhere about this period, as, at the close of the twelfth century, the Enser-fair was almost as much celebrated in Germany as that of Leipzig is at present. Rudolph of Hapsburg received the keys of Ens from the hands of a lord of Sumerau, and afterwards bought the city, for six hundred marks, of Eberhard von Spielberg.

Duke Albert the Lame concluded here, in 1336, the peace with John, king of Bohemia, which gave Carinthia to Austria, and the Tyrol to Charles, the son of that monarch, afterwards Charles IV. The victorious army of Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary, penetrated as far as Ens during the war with the Emperor Frederick III., and in 1532, the Turks, who had burst into Hungary and Austria, headed by the Sultan himself, pushed forward some troops to the walls of this city, between whom and the burghers a desperate conflict took place upon the bridge. In the insurrections of 1624, Stephen Fadinger summoned the town, and another rebel-chief, named Wurm, cannonaded it, but it stood out against both till relieved by Colonel Löbel, who defeated the peasants, and burned their camp. In 1683, while Cara Mustapha lay before Vienna, several flying parties of the Turks scoured the country around Ens, and penetrated nearly to Linz. On the 4th of May, 1809, Napoleon had his headquarters here, and received a deputation from the townspeople of Mauthausen, which place he had threatened with bombardment.

In the centre of the Platz stands a tall bell or clock tower built by Maximilian I. Some years ago a rib-bone was shown in it as that of a giant. It had most probably formed part of the stock in trade of an elephant, and was thought sufficiently curious to be removed to Cuvier’s museum in Paris. Many Roman antiquities have been discovered in Ens and its vicinity; some gold coins of the Emperor Probus, several marble busts, and inscribed stones. Some of the latter are still to be seen in the old Burg of Enseck.

Two large stone coffins without any inscription were dug out of the Aichberg, a short distance from the town, in 1808. Some monumental busts were also found, but they had been cut out of very bad sandstone, and were much injured by time.

FOOTNOTES (CHAPTER V.)

[40] Our language is sadly off for feminine terminations. The German, brauerinn, köchinn, gartnerinn, etc. are most badly translated by female brewer, cook-maid, and woman gardener.

[41] The old rhyming chronicler, Bruschius, says,

“Passibus in longum patet area tota trecentis,
In latum centum passibus atque decem.”

[42] A tailor of Linz, named Kellerer, established an asylum for thirty orphans; and in 1734, another tradesman, named Adam Pruner, bequeathed one hundred and eighty-one thousand florins to the poor of the town, the interest of which supports twenty-seven children, twenty-seven men, and twenty-seven women. The Emperor Joseph II. and the Empress Maria Theresa have also founded charities here.

[43] The Dukes of Austria were afterwards compelled to cede the Tyrol, but Carinthia has ever since that period continued in the possession of their House. Coxe’s Hist. i. 155, Pelzel, Schmidt, Struvius, etc.

[44] Bruschius tells us of a capuchin, named Waltherus,

“Qui nondum vinclis conjunctum aut pontibus Istrum
Emensus sicco dicitur esse pede.”

Perhaps the river was frozen at that time.

[45] In the campaign of 1809, damage was done in this little town alone to the amount of 1,326,621 florins.

[46] Steyereck was once famous for its potteries; but the manufactories have fallen to decay, notwithstanding the fine clay which is still to be found in its neighbourhood.

[47] In 1787, a stone coffin was dug up in the neighbourhood of Ebelsberg, five feet long, and one foot two inches wide. On the breast of the skeleton within lay a golden ring, of rather an oval shape, and rude workmanship; at its feet was a drinking glass, which had contained some clear liquid, but it was unfortunately broken, and the liquid spilt, in the opening of the coffin. Vide _Kurz’ Beträge_, 3 Th. S. xvii.

[48] General Jominy gives the following account of this sanguinary affair, in his Political and Military Life of Napoleon. “Hiller had abandoned the barrier of the Inn without fighting, but he resolved to defend the passage of the Traun at the formidable position of Ebersberg. A wooden bridge, thirty fathoms long, presented a more fearful obstacle than that of Lodi, it being terminated by a walled town, commanded by a castle, and crowned by heights of very difficult access. To cross this bridge, in the face of thirty thousand men and eighty pieces of cannon, was not an easy matter. Massena was not ignorant of Napoleon’s intention to turn this impregnable post by Lambach, but the impetuous valour of General Cohorn hurried him into a sanguinary enterprise. Three Austrian battalions, that had been imprudently left in front of the bridge, were overthrown, and driven, at the point of the sword, to the gates of the town, which were closed against them. Cohorn forced the gates, and penetrated into the principal street. Massena supported him first by the rest of Claparede’s division, and then by that of Legrand. A desperate conflict was kept up from street to street, and from house to house. Claparede had just possessed himself of the castle, when Hiller threw four fresh columns into the town, who opened themselves a passage with the bayonet. A horrible slaughter ensued; several houses took fire that were filled with wounded and with combatants, whom the crowded state of the streets prevented from escaping. War never presented a more cruel scene. At length, tired with carnage, the Austrians abandoned Ebersberg, and our troops debouched against the heights, where a still more unequal combat commenced. The arrival of Durosnel’s division of cavalry by the right bank, and the certainty that his position would be turned by Lannes, decided Hiller at length to fall back with all speed upon Enns.... This vigorous blow was still more honourable to the French troops, as the greater part engaged in this business was composed of soldiers who had never before seen a battle. It cost Hiller from six to seven thousand men. We had to regret the loss of from four to five thousand brave fellows, a great number of whom had fallen a prey to the flames.”--_Vie Politique et Militaire de Napoléon._ 8vo. Paris, 1827, tom. iii. pp. 181-3.

[49] This extraordinary man, the founder of the Bavarian army, and the terror of the Protestants, used to boast before the battle of Leipsig, of three things--viz. That he had never known woman, never been drunk, and never lost a battle. “His strange and terrific aspect,” says Schiller, “was in unison with his character. Of low stature, thin, with hollow cheeks, a long nose, a broad and wrinkled forehead, large whiskers, and a pointed chin, he was generally attired in a Spanish doublet of green with slashed sleeves, with a small and peaked hat on his head, surmounted by a red feather, which hung down his back. His whole aspect recalled to recollection the Duke of Alba, the scourge of the Flemings, and his actions were by no means calculated to remove the impression.”--_Thirty Years’ War_, book ii. The author of L’Histoire de Gustave Adolphe gives a similar account of his dress and person, and adds, that the Maréchal de Grammont, going to see him out of curiosity, met him at the head of his army, attired as described, and mounted on a little grey hackney, with one pistol only at his saddle-bow. “Lorsque le Maréchal s’approcha pour lui faire la révérence, Tilly, croyant remarquer qu’il s’étonnoit de le voir dans cet équipage, lui dit, Monsieur, vous trouvez peut--être mon habillement extraordinaire; j’avoue qu’il n’est pas tout à fait conforme à la mode de France, mais il est a mon gré, et cela me suffit. Je pense aussi que ma haquenée, et ce pistolet tout seul, vous surprennent pour le moins autant que mon accoûtrement; pour que vous n’ayiez pas mauvaise opinion du Comte de Tilly, à qui vous faites l’honneur de rendre une visite de curiosité, je vous dirai que j’ai gagné sept batailles décisives, sans avoir été obligé de tirer une seule fois le pistolet que vous voyez là; et mon petit cheval ne m’a jamais abandonné et n’a jamais balancé à faire son devoir.”--p. 173.

[50] There being a place so called in the vicinity of the Strudel.

[51]
“Zu Enns St. Marx und Lucas lehrt
Das volck zu Christi Glaub bekehrt.
Hie ward versenkt St. Florian
In D’Enns der edle Rittersmann,
Maximilian da Bischoff war,
Mild gegen Armen immerdar;
Diess langt zu sondern Ruhm der Stadt
Die Gott also begnadet hat.”

[52] Gibbon, when speaking of this expedition, calls it “the triple effort of a French army that was poured into their (the Avars’) country, by land and water, through the Carpathian mountains, and along the plain of the Danube.” _Decline and Fall_, vol. ix. p. 184.

[53] This building is still standing in the north-east quarter of the city. It is now the property of Baron Rumeskirchen.

[54] In the Niebelunglied, which was compiled about this period, we find Ens mentioned, by its present name, as one of the places visited by Chrimhilt, on her journey into Hungary.

“Da sie uber die Traun kamen, bey _Ense_ auf das feld.”

[55] According to an old German writer quoted by Schultes, Ens was a walled city as early as the year 900, and already of some consequence. “Bavari citissime in id ipsum tempus (+A.D.+ 900) pro tuitioni illorum regni validissimam urbem in littore Anesi fluminis muro obposuerunt.” But, in this case, why is it called a village by Leopold, in the twelfth century?