Ruins of the Tower of Stauffen, HOHEN or High STAUFFEN, where Kaiser Barbarossa lived once, young and ruddy, and was not yet a MYTH, "winking and nodding under the Hill at Salzburg,"--yes, it is but a few miles to the right there, were this a deliberate touring party. But this is a rapid driving one; knows nothing about Stauffen, cares nothing.--We cannot fancy Friedrich remembered Barbarossa at all; or much regarded Heilbronn itself, the principal and only famous Town they pass this day. The St. Kilian's Church, your Highness, and big stone giant at the top of the steeple yonder,--adventurous masons and slater people get upon the crown of his head, sometimes, and stand waving flags. [Buddaus, _Lexicon,_ ii.? Heilbronn.] The Townhouse too (RATHHAUS), with its amazing old Clock? And Gotz von Berlichingen, the Town-Councillors once had him in prison for one night, in the "Gotz's Tower" here; your Highness has heard of "Gotz with the Iron Hand"? Berlichingens still live at Jaxthausen, farther down the Neckar Valley, in these parts; and show the old HAND, considerably rusted now. Heilbronn, the most famous City on the Neckar; and its old miraculous Holy Well--? What cares his Highness! Weinsberg again, which is but a few miles to the right of us,--there it was that the Besieged Wives did that astonishing feat, 600 years ago; coming out, as the capitulation bore, "with their most valuable property," each brought her Husband on her back (were not the fact a little uncertain!)--whereby the old Castle has, to this day, the name "WEIBERTREUE, Faithfulness of Women." Welf's Duchess, Husband on back, was at the head of those women; a Hohenzollern ancestor of yours, I think I have heard, was of the besieging party. [Siege is notorious enough; A.D. 1140: Kohler _Reichshistorie,_ p. 167, who does not mention the story of the women; Menzel (Wolfgang), _Geschichte der Deutschen,_ p. 287, who takes no notice that it is a highly mythical story,--supported only by the testimony of one poor Monk in Koln, vaguely chronicling fifty years after date and at that good distance.] Alas, thinks his Royal Highness, is there not a flower of Welfdom now in England; and I, unluckiest of Hohenzollerns, still far away from her here! It is at Windsor, not in Weinsberg, or among the ruins of WEIBERTREUE, that his Highness wishes to be.