A Tramp Abroad

by Mark Twain

  CHAPTER XIX

  [The Deadly Jest of Dilsberg]

  However, I wander from the raft. We made the port of Necharsteinach ingood season, and went to the hotel and ordered a trout dinner, the sameto be ready against our return from a two-hour pedestrian excursion tothe village and castle of Dilsberg, a mile distant, on the other sideof the river. I do not mean that we proposed to be two hours making twomiles--no, we meant to employ most of the time in inspecting Dilsberg.

  For Dilsberg is a quaint place. It is most quaintly and picturesquelysituated, too. Imagine the beautiful river before you; then a few rodsof brilliant green sward on its opposite shore; then a sudden hill--nopreparatory gently rising slopes, but a sort of instantaneous hill--ahill two hundred and fifty or three hundred feet high, as round as abowl, with the same taper upward that an inverted bowl has, and withabout the same relation of height to diameter that distinguishes abowl of good honest depth--a hill which is thickly clothed with greenbushes--a comely, shapely hill, rising abruptly out of the dead levelof the surrounding green plains, visible from a great distance down thebends of the river, and with just exactly room on the top of its headfor its steepled and turreted and roof-clustered cap of architecture,which same is tightly jammed and compacted within the perfectly roundhoop of the ancient village wall.

  There is no house outside the wall on the whole hill, or any vestige ofa former house; all the houses are inside the wall, but there isn't roomfor another one. It is really a finished town, and has been finished avery long time. There is no space between the wall and the first circleof buildings; no, the village wall is itself the rear wall of the firstcircle of buildings, and the roofs jut a little over the wall andthus furnish it with eaves. The general level of the massed roofs isgracefully broken and relieved by the dominating towers of the ruinedcastle and the tall spires of a couple of churches; so, from a distanceDilsberg has rather more the look of a king's crown than a cap. Thatlofty green eminence and its quaint coronet form quite a strikingpicture, you may be sure, in the flush of the evening sun.

  We crossed over in a boat and began the ascent by a narrow, steep pathwhich plunged us at once into the leafy deeps of the bushes. But theywere not cool deeps by any means, for the sun's rays were weltering hotand there was little or no breeze to temper them. As we panted up thesharp ascent, we met brown, bareheaded and barefooted boys and girls,occasionally, and sometimes men; they came upon us without warning, theygave us good day, flashed out of sight in the bushes, and were goneas suddenly and mysteriously as they had come. They were bound for theother side of the river to work. This path had been traveled by manygenerations of these people. They have always gone down to the valley toearn their bread, but they have always climbed their hill again to eatit, and to sleep in their snug town.

  It is said that the Dilsbergers do not emigrate much; they find thatliving up there above the world, in their peaceful nest, is pleasanterthan living down in the troublous world. The seven hundred inhabitantsare all blood-kin to each other, too; they have always been blood-kin toeach other for fifteen hundred years; they are simply one large family,and they like the home folks better than they like strangers, hence theypersistently stay at home. It has been said that for ages Dilsberghas been merely a thriving and diligent idiot-factory. I saw no idiotsthere, but the captain said, "Because of late years the government hastaken to lugging them off to asylums and otherwheres; and governmentwants to cripple the factory, too, and is trying to get theseDilsbergers to marry out of the family, but they don't like to."

  The captain probably imagined all this, as modern science denies thatthe intermarrying of relatives deteriorates the stock.

  Arrived within the wall, we found the usual village sights and life. Wemoved along a narrow, crooked lane which had been paved in the MiddleAges. A strapping, ruddy girl was beating flax or some such stuff ina little bit of a good-box of a barn, and she swung her flail with awill--if it was a flail; I was not farmer enough to know what she wasat; a frowsy, barelegged girl was herding half a dozen geese witha stick--driving them along the lane and keeping them out of thedwellings; a cooper was at work in a shop which I know he did not makeso large a thing as a hogshead in, for there was not room. In the frontrooms of dwellings girls and women were cooking or spinning, and ducksand chickens were waddling in and out, over the threshold, picking upchance crumbs and holding pleasant converse; a very old and wrinkledman sat asleep before his door, with his chin upon his breast and hisextinguished pipe in his lap; soiled children were playing in the dirteverywhere along the lane, unmindful of the sun.

  Except the sleeping old man, everybody was at work, but the place wasvery still and peaceful, nevertheless; so still that the distantcackle of the successful hen smote upon the ear but little dulledby intervening sounds. That commonest of village sights was lackinghere--the public pump, with its great stone tank or trough of limpidwater, and its group of gossiping pitcher-bearers; for there is no wellor fountain or spring on this tall hill; cisterns of rain-water areused.

  Our alpenstocks and muslin tails compelled attention, and as we movedthrough the village we gathered a considerable procession of little boysand girls, and so went in some state to the castle. It proved to be anextensive pile of crumbling walls, arches, and towers, massive, properlygrouped for picturesque effect, weedy, grass-grown, and satisfactory.The children acted as guides; they walked us along the top of thehighest walls, then took us up into a high tower and showed us a wideand beautiful landscape, made up of wavy distances of woody hills, anda nearer prospect of undulating expanses of green lowlands, on the onehand, and castle-graced crags and ridges on the other, with the shiningcurves of the Neckar flowing between. But the principal show, the chiefpride of the children, was the ancient and empty well in the grass-growncourt of the castle. Its massive stone curb stands up three or four feetabove-ground, and is whole and uninjured. The children said that in theMiddle Ages this well was four hundred feet deep, and furnished all thevillage with an abundant supply of water, in war and peace. They saidthat in the old day its bottom was below the level of the Neckar, hencethe water-supply was inexhaustible.

  But there were some who believed it had never been a well at all, andwas never deeper than it is now--eighty feet; that at that depth asubterranean passage branched from it and descended gradually to aremote place in the valley, where it opened into somebody's cellar orother hidden recess, and that the secret of this locality is now lost.Those who hold this belief say that herein lies the explanation thatDilsberg, besieged by Tilly and many a soldier before him, wasnever taken: after the longest and closest sieges the besiegers wereastonished to perceive that the besieged were as fat and hearty as ever,and were well furnished with munitions of war--therefore it must bethat the Dilsbergers had been bringing these things in through thesubterranean passage all the time.

  The children said that there was in truth a subterranean outlet downthere, and they would prove it. So they set a great truss of straw onfire and threw it down the well, while we leaned on the curb and watchedthe glowing mass descend. It struck bottom and gradually burned out. Nosmoke came up. The children clapped their hands and said:

  "You see! Nothing makes so much smoke as burning straw--now where didthe smoke go to, if there is no subterranean outlet?"

  So it seemed quite evident that the subterranean outlet indeed existed.But the finest thing within the ruin's limits was a noble linden, whichthe children said was four hundred years old, and no doubt it was. Ithad a mighty trunk and a mighty spread of limb and foliage. The limbsnear the ground were nearly the thickness of a barrel.

  That tree had witnessed the assaults of men in mail--how remote such atime seems, and how ungraspable is the fact that real men ever did fightin real armor!--and it had seen the time when these broken arches andcrumbling battlements were a trim and strong and stately fortress,fluttering its gay banners in the sun, and peopled with vigoroushumanity--how impossibly long ago that seems!--and here it stands yet,and possibly may still be st
anding here, sunning itself and dreaming itshistorical dreams, when today shall have been joined to the days called"ancient."

  Well, we sat down under the tree to smoke, and the captain deliveredhimself of his legend:

  THE LEGEND OF DILSBERG CASTLE

  It was to this effect. In the old times there was once a great companyassembled at the castle, and festivity ran high. Of course there was ahaunted chamber in the castle, and one day the talk fell upon that. Itwas said that whoever slept in it would not wake again for fifty years.Now when a young knight named Conrad von Geisberg heard this, he saidthat if the castle were his he would destroy that chamber, so that nofoolish person might have the chance to bring so dreadful a misfortuneupon himself and afflict such as loved him with the memory of it.Straightway, the company privately laid their heads together to contrivesome way to get this superstitious young man to sleep in that chamber.

  And they succeeded--in this way. They persuaded his betrothed, a lovelymischievous young creature, niece of the lord of the castle, to helpthem in their plot. She presently took him aside and had speech withhim. She used all her persuasions, but could not shake him; he said hisbelief was firm, that if he should sleep there he would wake no more forfifty years, and it made him shudder to think of it. Catharina began toweep. This was a better argument; Conrad could not hold out against it.He yielded and said she should have her wish if she would only smile andbe happy again. She flung her arms about his neck, and the kisses shegave him showed that her thankfulness and her pleasure were very real.Then she flew to tell the company her success, and the applause shereceived made her glad and proud she had undertaken her mission, sinceall alone she had accomplished what the multitude had failed in.

  At midnight, that night, after the usual feasting, Conrad was taken tothe haunted chamber and left there. He fell asleep, by and by.

  When he awoke again and looked about him, his heart stood still withhorror! The whole aspect of the chamber was changed. The walls weremoldy and hung with ancient cobwebs; the curtains and beddings wererotten; the furniture was rickety and ready to fall to pieces. He sprangout of bed, but his quaking knees sunk under him and he fell to thefloor.

  "This is the weakness of age," he said.

  He rose and sought his clothing. It was clothing no longer. The colorswere gone, the garments gave way in many places while he was puttingthem on. He fled, shuddering, into the corridor, and along it tothe great hall. Here he was met by a middle-aged stranger of a kindcountenance, who stopped and gazed at him with surprise. Conrad said:

  "Good sir, will you send hither the lord Ulrich?"

  The stranger looked puzzled a moment, then said:

  "The lord Ulrich?"

  "Yes--if you will be so good."

  The stranger called--"Wilhelm!" A young serving-man came, and thestranger said to him:

  "Is there a lord Ulrich among the guests?"

  "I know none of the name, so please your honor."

  Conrad said, hesitatingly:

  "I did not mean a guest, but the lord of the castle, sir."

  The stranger and the servant exchanged wondering glances. Then theformer said:

  "I am the lord of the castle."

  "Since when, sir?"

  "Since the death of my father, the good lord Ulrich more than fortyyears ago."

  Conrad sank upon a bench and covered his face with his hands while herocked his body to and fro and moaned. The stranger said in a low voiceto the servant:

  "I fear me this poor old creature is mad. Call some one."

  In a moment several people came, and grouped themselves about, talkingin whispers. Conrad looked up and scanned the faces about him wistfully.

  Then he shook his head and said, in a grieved voice:

  "No, there is none among ye that I know. I am old and alone in theworld. They are dead and gone these many years that cared for me. Butsure, some of these aged ones I see about me can tell me some littleword or two concerning them."

  Several bent and tottering men and women came nearer and answered hisquestions about each former friend as he mentioned the names. This onethey said had been dead ten years, that one twenty, another thirty. Eachsucceeding blow struck heavier and heavier. At last the sufferer said:

  "There is one more, but I have not the courage to--O my lost Catharina!"

  One of the old dames said:

  "Ah, I knew her well, poor soul. A misfortune overtook her lover, andshe died of sorrow nearly fifty years ago. She lieth under the lindentree without the court."

  Conrad bowed his head and said:

  "Ah, why did I ever wake! And so she died of grief for me, poor child.So young, so sweet, so good! She never wittingly did a hurtful thing inall the little summer of her life. Her loving debt shall be repaid--forI will die of grief for her."

  His head drooped upon his breast. In the moment there was a wild burstof joyous laughter, a pair of round young arms were flung about Conrad'sneck and a sweet voice cried:

  "There, Conrad mine, thy kind words kill me--the farce shall go nofurther! Look up, and laugh with us--'twas all a jest!"

  And he did look up, and gazed, in a dazed wonderment--for the disguiseswere stripped away, and the aged men and women were bright and young andgay again. Catharina's happy tongue ran on:

  "'Twas a marvelous jest, and bravely carried out. They gave you a heavysleeping-draught before you went to bed, and in the night they bore youto a ruined chamber where all had fallen to decay, and placed these ragsof clothing by you. And when your sleep was spent and you came forth,two strangers, well instructed in their parts, were here to meet you;and all we, your friends, in our disguises, were close at hand, to seeand hear, you may be sure. Ah, 'twas a gallant jest! Come, now, and makethee ready for the pleasures of the day. How real was thy misery for themoment, thou poor lad! Look up and have thy laugh, now!"

  He looked up, searched the merry faces about him in a dreamy way, thensighed and said:

  "I am aweary, good strangers, I pray you lead me to her grave."

  All the smile vanished away, every cheek blanched, Catharina sunk to theground in a swoon.

  All day the people went about the castle with troubled faces, andcommuned together in undertones. A painful hush pervaded the place whichhad lately been so full of cheery life. Each in his turn tried to arouseConrad out of his hallucination and bring him to himself; but all theanswer any got was a meek, bewildered stare, and then the words:

  "Good stranger, I have no friends, all are at rest these many years;ye speak me fair, ye mean me well, but I know ye not; I am alone andforlorn in the world--prithee lead me to her grave."

  During two years Conrad spent his days, from the early morning till thenight, under the linden tree, mourning over the imaginary grave of hisCatharina. Catharina was the only company of the harmless madman. He wasvery friendly toward her because, as he said, in some ways she remindedhim of his Catharina whom he had lost "fifty years ago." He often said:

  "She was so gay, so happy-hearted--but you never smile; and always whenyou think I am not looking, you cry."

  When Conrad died, they buried him under the linden, according to hisdirections, so that he might rest "near his poor Catharina." ThenCatharina sat under the linden alone, every day and all day long, agreat many years, speaking to no one, and never smiling; and at last herlong repentance was rewarded with death, and she was buried by Conrad'sside.

  Harris pleased the captain by saying it was good legend; and pleased himfurther by adding:

  "Now that I have seen this mighty tree, vigorous with its four hundredyears, I feel a desire to believe the legend for _its_ sake; so I willhumor the desire, and consider that the tree really watches over thosepoor hearts and feels a sort of human tenderness for them."

  We returned to Necharsteinach, plunged our hot heads into the trough atthe town pump, and then went to the hotel and ate our trout dinner inleisurely comfort, in the garden, with the beautiful Neckar flowing atour feet, the quaint Dilsberg looming beyond, and t
he graceful towersand battlements of a couple of medieval castles (called the "Swallow'sNest" [1] and "The Brothers.") assisting the rugged scenery of a bendof the river down to our right. We got to sea in season to make theeight-mile run to Heidelberg before the night shut down. We sailed bythe hotel in the mellow glow of sunset, and came slashing down withthe mad current into the narrow passage between the dikes. I believed Icould shoot the bridge myself, and I went to the forward triplet of logsand relieved the pilot of his pole and his responsibility.

  1. The seeker after information is referred to Appendix E for ourcaptain's legend of the "Swallow's Nest" and "The Brothers."

  We went tearing along in a most exhilarating way, and I performed thedelicate duties of my office very well indeed for a first attempt;but perceiving, presently, that I really was going to shoot the bridgeitself instead of the archway under it, I judiciously stepped ashore.The next moment I had my long-coveted desire: I saw a raft wrecked. Ithit the pier in the center and went all to smash and scatteration like abox of matches struck by lightning.

  I was the only one of our party who saw this grand sight; the otherswere attitudinizing, for the benefit of the long rank of young ladieswho were promenading on the bank, and so they lost it. But I helped tofish them out of the river, down below the bridge, and then described itto them as well as I could.

  They were not interested, though. They said they were wet and feltridiculous and did not care anything for descriptions of scenery. Theyoung ladies, and other people, crowded around and showed a great dealof sympathy, but that did not help matters; for my friends said they didnot want sympathy, they wanted a back alley and solitude.