“‘Ei; by St. Martin there were lively times in your Grace’s grandfather’s day--Graf Ludwig’s, I mean! Feud all the year long,--cutting down of beech trees, houghing of cattle, a good many peasants slaughtered, once a merry passage at arms in which we lost six stout men and they eight. But all is quiet now. The present Graf loves his beer and his hunt too well for long quarrels; and again, the Duke of Brunswick might interfere. Your Grace has nothing to dread. Besides, we have these.’ He pointed significantly to ‘Wake-up’ and ‘Roaring-Mol’--two bell-mouthed wall-pieces that grinned harmlessly over the parapet. “‘We shall not use them. I am entirely satisfied to have a nobleman of old family for neighbor. And has he no wife and family?’ “‘The Graf von Blankenburg,’ replied Adolf, as if under some constraint, ‘is a very peculiar lord. Your Grace will learn his habits later. His son Moritz is a most worthy young ritter, and his unmarried daughter, my Lady Ilsa, is reported pious and comely.’ “‘My Lady Ilsa,’ cried I with a laugh. ‘Excellent; I see the beginnings of a pleasant adventure already!’ “But here the blowing of a horn warned me of the visit of a Hamburg pedlar to the castle to chaffer for pins and ribbons with the maids, and I made haste to indite this letter that he might start it on its southward journey. Salute Madonna Marianna for me, and tell her I stand in no danger of this ‘pious and comely’ Graf’s daughter, and I pray you also to commend me to all my many friends at Rome.” CHAPTER VI ILSA OF THE HARZ I will quote no more letters to Rocca. Truth to tell, by my praises addressed to him of the beauty of the land and by my hints of admiration for the rough virtues of the people, I was but heartening myself up, as do men when they sing lustily ere plunging into the battle. Seldom have I spent three more heartsick, homesick weeks than the first three that crept by at Schloss Regenstein, after the novelty had waned. Some excitement there was on the second day when I had uncovered a deep but dry well, and we found a goodly quantity of bones at the bottom--relics no doubt of obstinate merchants who withheld their proper ransoms. But the tingle of discovery soon passed. My eyes were offended with a thousand uncouth domestic sights, my ears by the constant gutturals of my vassals’ dialect, my nose--enough that good Herr Adolf and his fellow myrmidons had many things to learn,--at least I forced them to remove the great dung heap that was stacked right under my chamber windows. Ah! Marianna--if you would have seen my loyalty and longing for the south rekindle, you should have seen me then!