Many were the old methods of accounting for the Wirbel. A sixteenth century cosmographer declared “they have often sounded in this place, but the abyss is so deep that they can touch no ground. It is bottomless. What falls therein, remains under and never comes up again.” This was the kind of marvel beloved in the olden, credulous times, and other marvels no less wonderful were associated with the Wirbel. One learned author declared that there was a hole in the river bed here which received the whirling waters that after a long subterranean journey reached the great Hungarian lake known as the Plattensee, and in proof of the theory it was gravely asserted that some bold experimentalists had a vessel wrecked in the Wirbel--and in course of time a hammer that had belonged to a cooper on board was found (_floating_, says one account) in the Plattensee. The tradition of “unfathomable depth,” received a rude shock in the middle of the eighteenth century when a barge laden with pottery sank in the Wirbel, and the roof of the hut aboard remained visible! Even as stories gathered about the whirlpool so did they around the neighbouring ruins, and especially in connexion with the towers that stood on the Hausstein, and a neighbouring rock--both of which have been done away with by the navigation improvements. It is not surprising that these various ruins--half a dozen within a mile or so--became the centres of legendary lore among the credulous peasantry. To quote from Dr. Beattie’s summary: “Each of these mouldering fortresses was the subject of some miraculous tradition, which circulated at every hearth. The sombre and mysterious aspect of the place--its wild scenery and the frequent accidents which occurred in the passage, invested it with awe and terror; but above all, the superstitions of the time, a belief in the marvellous, and the credulity of the boatmen, made the navigation of the Strudel and the Wirbel a theme of the wildest romance. At night, sounds that were heard far above the roar of the Danube issued from every ruin. Magical lights flashed through their loopholes, and casements--festivals were held in the long deserted halls--maskers glided from room to room--the waltzers maddened to the strains of an infernal orchestra--armed sentinels paraded the battlements; while at intervals the clash of arms, the neighing of steeds, and the shrieks of unearthly combatants smote fitfully on the boatman’s ear. But the tower in which these scenes were most fearfully enacted, was that on the Longstone, commonly called the Devil’s Tower, as it well deserved to be--for here, in close communion with his master, resided the Black Monk, whose office it was to exhibit false lights and landmarks along the gulf, so as to decoy the vessels into the whirlpool, or dash them against the rocks. He was considerably annoyed in his quarters, however, on the arrival of the great Soliman in these regions; for to repel the turbanned host--or at least to check