When the Turks invaded Hungary and threatened Austria this castle was utilized as an asylum of refuge for women and children. In 1626 during the Peasants’ Revolt the insurgents got possession of Neuhaus, imprisoning the Countess-owner in the castle, and drew great chains across the river to intercept all boats and stop supplies from reaching Linz; but even cables of twenty pounds to a link failed, for the Bavarian boats broke through them. Beyond this old rocky stronghold the hills rapidly decrease in height as we near, on the right, Aschach, which was the headquarters of the Peasants’ Revolt. This is a pleasant little town stretching along the river bank close to the commencement of the flat stretch of country through which the river now passes for some miles. The not very lofty Pöstlingberg, ten miles away by Linz, can be seen from here. The story of this little town is the story of a succession of warlike troubles. In 1626 it was captured and plundered by the revolted peasantry, and again in another rising half a dozen years later. A century ago, too, the town is said to have suffered greatly from friend and foe alike in the Napoleonic wars. In the tenth century the Duke of Bavaria gave the monks of Krems-Münster certain vineyards at Aschach, and the town long had the reputation of being the most easterly point on the Danube for wine-growing. “The wine made in its neighbourhood is remarkable only for its badness, and is the standing joke of the inhabitants themselves; we must suppose, therefore, that it has either sadly degenerated since Thassilo made the vineyards a present to his friends at Krems-Münster, or that the fraternity were in want of an immediate supply of vinegar.” Behind is an extensive castle of the Schaumburgs, with a lofty tower, the chief seat of a powerful family at once dreaded and courted by neighbouring rulers. Tradition says that the river once ran by the walls of the castle, and also that it played a tragic part in the fate of one of the Counts, who, though invincible in battle or tournament, could not resist the charms of a fair maiden, “armed at both eyes,” the daughter of a miller in the valley of Aschach. One night as he was riding to a rendezvous with her, his horse started at the sudden appearance of a fiery dragon that rushed out of a thicket before him, and plunged with his master over a precipice into the swollen torrent below; the first objects that met the unfortunate maiden’s sight when she opened her casement in the morning, were the floating corses of her noble lover and his favourite steed. A stone pillar near a brook in the valley before the castle duly commemorated the tragic incident.