in attempting to use my staff. It was at that
moment, thoughts of my home came full and forcibly before me; the little
chamber where I used to sit for hours in happy occupation; my seat
beside the hearth; my place at my mother's wheel, for she used to spin
during the hazy days of winter; and, in my despair, I burst into a flood
of tears. The excess of grief passed off, and there now succeeded a
dogged resolve to accomplish my first purpose, and I again set out for
the summit.

I had not proceeded far, when on looking upward towards the sky I saw,
or thought I saw, a light twinkling through the trees above me. The
foliage was dense and thick, and grew around the base of the rock which
formed the immediate foundation of the castle, so that it was only at
certain spots a light, if such there was, could be visible. Onward I
pushed now, with a new impulse given by hope; and to my inexpressible
joy, as I rounded the corner of a crag, I came full in sight of the old
tower, and saw, from one of the narrow windows, the sparkle of a bright
light that, streaming forth, formed a long line upon the grass.

The window was fully twenty feet from the ground, nor was the entrance
door more than a few feet lower,--being one of those fastnesses to which
access was had by a ladder, drawn up for safety after entering. Many
of these ruined castles in the valley of the Reichenau were, I
knew, occupied by the shepherds; some indeed had been converted into
refuge-houses for lost travellers, and supplied by the government of the
canton with some few appliances of succor. The situation of this one,
however, refuted all such possibility, since its very difficulty of
approach would have rendered it unavailable for either purpose. As I
stood on the little level tableland in front of the old ruin, and gazed
upwards at the narrow window from which gleamed the light, all my former
superstitious terrors returned, and I felt that cold shrinking of the
heart that comes of a danger undefined and incomprehensible; nor am
I certain that I would not rather have looked upon the ruin dark and
desolate, than with that yellow streak that told of some inhabitant
within.

The northern side of the Alpine ranges have few, if any, traditions of
robbers. The horrors with which they are peopled are all those of an
immaterial world, so that my mind ranged over the tales of wood-demons,
Kobolds, and mountain imps, without one single thought of the perils
of banditti;