verently raised by the attendants, and conveyed on a rude bier of branches to the Convent of Rosenthal, where it was committed to the earth. Imagina, distracted with sorrow and remorse, believing that the overthrow of her lover was the punishment of their transgression, refused all sustenance, and was, after a few days, found dead upon his grave.

The Empress Imogine was a prey to the most poignant affliction; but for legitimate cause, her sorrow deserved unmingled respect. Clad in deep mourning, she repaired to Nuremberg, and kneeling on the steps of the throne, whereon sat Albert and Elizabeth, the new emperor and empress, she implored the liberation of her son, who was in a dungeon in fetters. Elizabeth, full of pity, seconded her petition; but Albert looked on her with an unforgiving eye, and told her coldly, that her son was prisoner to the Archbishop of Mentz, but he would endeavour to prevail with the prelate on her behalf. Imogine felt this was equivalent to a refusal, and again appealed to the compassion of Elizabeth, exclaiming, amid a torrent of tears, "Give me back my child; so may heaven spare you from experiencing for your husband the anguish I have lived to endure for mine." These words were remembered on the murder of Albert by his nephew in ten years afterwards, and deemed an unconscious prophecy. This scene was remarkable; the fallen empress was fain to supplicate the compassion of her who had superseded her on the throne, and to kneel at the feet of him whose love she had rejected in her youth. But when she looked on his hideously-disfigured countenance, and felt the coarseness of his manners, her heart must still have preferred in memory her once brilliant husband in his bloody grave.

Tradition says that the imperial widow, after the agitation of this painful interview, in the bitterness of her agony implored the vengeance of heaven on the authors of her husband's death and her own sufferings; and it was subsequently observed, that the majority of those persons either died violent deaths, or endured great trou bles, or their male lineage became extinct: circumstances popularly ascribed to "the curse of Imogine."

After repeated solicitations on the part of the afflicted mother, the hard

His

hearted archbishop liberated her son, but not till he had extorted from her a heavy ransom. Of the family of Adolphus we will only add, that his eldest son, Gerlac, married the daughter of the Landgrave of Hesse, and founded the line of Nassau-Saarbruck. daughter, Matilda, was the wife of the Count Palatine; and another daughter became prioress of the Convent of Klarenthal (founded by her mother), where Imogine was subsequently interred. The Counts of Nassau sequestrated the convent in the last century, and Imogine's tomb was removed to the parish church of Wiesbaden.

Albert offended the Archbishop of Mentz, by depriving him of some tolls and customs on the Rhine, and considerably curtailing his revenues. The turbulent cleric conspired against him, being supported by some of the German powers and by the Pope, who denounced Albert as the treasonable murderer of his lawful sovereign; for the fall of Adolphus was less like death in fair fight than assassination, so malignantly had he been persecuted by his rival. On a hunting-party the archbishop taunted Albert,

'I have but to blow my horn, and another emperor will make his appearance.' The prelate was, however, deserted in the end by his allies, and subdued and humbled by Albert. The latter endeavoured to possess himself (like Adolphus, whom he had condemned) of the territories of the Thuringian brothers, and invaded their country; but he incurred general censure, and many of the German states joined Frederick the Bitten, who defeated the forces of the Emperor, and maintained his ground. In 1308, Albert was murdered by John of Hapsburg, his nephew and ward, whom he had robbed of his inheritance.

The Empress Imogine erected a memorial of her husband on the spot where he expired. It consisted of a short solid stone wall, on which was sculptured a crucifixion; at the foot of the crucifix, the lion of Nassau and the imperial eagle; and on a tablet, the following inscription :-"Adolphus a Nassau, Romanorum Rex, interficitur a Gellinheim" (Adolphus of Nassau, King of the Romans, slain at Gelheim). The rest was illegible, when, in 1611, Count Lewis of Nassau renovated the weather-beaten monument and added, "Anno milleno trecentis

bis minus annis in Julio mense Rex Adolphus cadit ense. Renovatum hoc monumentum sub Ludovico Comite Generalissimo a Nassau, Anno 1611 (in the year 1298, in the month of July, here King Adolphus* fell by the sword. This monument was repaired by the reigning Count Lewis of Nassau, 1611). It was further repaired in 1828, and is still in good preservation.

The body of Adolphus was removed from its humble resting-place at Rosenthal by his kinsman, the Emperor Henry VII. (Duke of Luxemburg), who was elected after the murder of Albert; and it was ceremoniously interred among the other emperors in the Cathedral of Spire; where in 1824, the Grand Duke of Nassau erected to his memory a marble sarcophagus, with four winged lions at its corners, and on its top a kneeling figure in full knightly panoply, the effigy of the Emperor Adolphus of Nassau.

Albert found the crown which he had torn from his rival's head to be lined with thorns; and it was dashed from his own in turn, by bloody hands, after he had worn it but ten years. He was embroiled with the Pope, who, at first, denied his claim to the Imperial throne; he was baffled in many cherished and strenuously attempted schemes of ambition, and his Helvetic subjects, under Tell and his brother patriots, successfully revolted against his tyranny, and destroyed the power of Austria in Switzerland. Albert was about to lead an army to subdue that country, when he was cut off by a violent death, the consequence of his own avarice and injustice.

The Emperor Rodolph had bequeathed to John of Hapsburg, son of his youngest son Rodolph, the County of Kiburg, with some other lands; and had left the boy under the guardianship of his Uncle Albert, who unscrupulously possessed himself of his ward's inheritance, and treated with contempt all John's entreaties to be restored to his appanage, after he had attained his majority; and kept the youth in a state of vassalage and dependence, at which John became

indignant, and his feelings were exasperated by the representations of some of the Swiss nobles who were disgusted with Albert's stern despotism. At length, when Albert was about to invade Switzerland, John, who was in his suite, took an opportunity at Baden,t where they had halted for refreshment on their route, to renew his solicitations for the restoration of his inheritance. But Albert took a wreath of flowers from the decorations of the supper-table, and twined it in derision round his nephew's head, telling him that he was more fitted for revelry and feasting than for the cares of government. John burst into tears of mortification, flung down the chaplet, and withdrew. He conferred with three Swiss, of high birth, Walter Von Eschenbach, his governor Rodolph Baron Von Balm, and Rodolph Von der Wart; and it was determined that they should assassinate the Emperor.

The latter proceeded with his suite to cross the ferry of the river Reuss, opposite to Windish (the ancient Roman camp and town of Vindonissa). John, with the conspirators, crossed first, having previously advised Albert to follow them, with only one atttendant, to avoid over-burdening the boat; an insidious advice that he adopted, leaving his son Leopold with the suite behind him. He landed within sight of the mountain-tower of Hapsburg, the cradle of his illustrious house. He was attacked by the confederates. John struck him with a lance in the throat, exclaiming, "This is the reward of injustice. Now, will you give me my inheritance?" Balm pierced him with his sword, and Von Eschenbach clove his head with a sabre. Von der Wart stood motionless, struck with a panic. The attendant fled in dismay; the Emperor fell to the ground, under a large tree. A poor woman, who had seen the transaction, ran forward, and stooping over him held him in her arms till he expired. The murderers hurried away from the scene of blood. Leopold and his men, on the other bank of the river, were helpless spectators of the assassination; `and when they were able to cross over, they found their sovereign beyond help.

Terror at first seized the family and subjects of the House of Hapsburg, as the murder appeared to be the explosion of an extensive and well-arranged rebellion. But a short time proved that the conspirators had no plan and no accomplices. The deed was a sudden impulse of hatred, aimless beyond the death of the victim; the confederates had made no preparations even for their own safety, which they sought only to secure by flight. But fearfully, horribly was the assassination avenged on the innocent. Albert, though a severe tyrant to his people, was tender and affectionate to his wife and children, and was strongly beloved by them; and his son and daughter, Leopold, and Agnes, widow of Andrew King of Hungary, were filled with a burning thirst of vengeance; but more especially Agnes, whose revolting barbarities, as related by the German historians, seem the more unnatural when we remember that she was a woman gently reared, beautiful and young (being but twenty-six), and had always made a profession of extraordinary piety. All persons who were related in the fourth degree to the conspirators, all who were allied to them by marriage, all who were connected with them, even in mere acquaintanceship, were put under the ban of the empire, a price set on their heads, and their possessions forfeited. Everyone who harboured them was similarly outlawed. Troops were sent to destroy the castles of the proclaimed persons, and to slay all the inmates, and all found in the neighbourhood, even servants, dependants, and infants. Sixty-three castles were reduced to ruins, and upwards of a thousand innocent persons murdered. Agnes headed these bloody expeditions in person, stimulated her soldiers to carnage, and reproached them if they showed any sign of pity. When the castle of Baron Von Balm was taken, she caused sixty gentlemen to be butchered in her presence, to not one of whom the slightest suspicion of guilt could attach. At the fall of the Castle of Farwangen, such numbers were slain that the ground was covered with a sea of blood, through which she walked to and fro, splashing it about her with her feet, and exclaiming, "Now I am bathing in May dew!" When she took the Castle of Eschenbach, she put to death (among others) seven brothers of that name. In the

library at Zurich is an old painting, representing the seven victims on their knees, vainly entreating mercy. She saw the infant son of Walter Von Eschenbach in its cradle, and dragged it out to dash its head against the wall; but her arm was seized by some of her own soldiers, unable to endure such atrocity, and even with tears they craved her pity for the babe, whom she reluctantly consented to spare, and whom she subsequently adopted, but changed his name to Schwartzenburg, an appropriate memento of the dark scenes enacted at his father's castle, for the name signifies black castle.

But where were the conspirators? The Baron Von Balm escaped to Basle, and took refuge under a feigned name in a monastery, wherein he died. Von Eschenbach, in the disguise of a peasant, lived in an obscure nook of Switzerland as a hired shepherd for thirty-five years. On his death-bed he revealed his name and rank, and was buried as a noble. Von der Wart attempted to fly to the Pope for absolution; but on his way was betrayed to his pursuers by an Italian kinsman of his wife, who was a lady of the house of Balm. He was arraigned before a judicial assembly at Brugh, in the Aargau, for having been a spectator of the Emperor's murder, and was condemned to be broken alive on the wheel. His wife, Gertrude Von der Wart, threw herself at the feet of the implacable Agnes, imploring in vain for her husband, if not pardon, at least a death of a less excruciating kind, especially as it was proved that he had never raised his hand against the Emperor; but the merciless Queen spurned the weeping woman from her presence. When Von der Wart was taken to the place of execution, he said it was unjust that he should die for Albert, who was not a sovereign, but a faithless tyrant that had slain his own Master, Adolphus of Nassau. His faithful Gertrude accompanied him to the last, and had the fortitude to remain with him as he lay mangled and slowly dying on the wheel. She continued beside him without food, shelter, or repose for three days and nights, encouraging, exhorting, and soothing him, till death released him from his agonies. He told her with his last breath that he felt her fidelity far more than he felt his torture. When he died, she went on foot to

Basle, where she found an humble refuge, soon pined away, and sunk into the grave. Gertrude Von der Wart is celebrated by Mrs. Hemans in her "Records of Woman."

John of Hapsburg, the author of all these varied sufferings, found refuge at first in the convent of Einsidlin, and afterwards lurked about in hiding-places among woods and mountains, where, however, his lot was ameliorated by the fidelity and affection of a peasant girl, who attached herself to his miserable fortunes, and by whom he had a son. He finally escaped to Pisa in the garb of a friar; and being goaded by remorse, he surrendered himself to Pope Clement V., who gave him absolution, but caused him to be confined in the Augustinian Convent at Pisa, where he died in 1313, three years after the murder. His son was seen at Vienna, when at an advanced age, blind, and a beggar, living in a small hut he had built with his own hands. Thus the crime of the confederates produced nothing but utter ruin, not merely to themselves but to many hundreds of guiltless persons, men, women, and children. The peasantry of Germany and Switzerland long connected with the traditional "Curse of Imogine" those dreadful tragedies, that of the death of Albert, and its bloody consequences among his own subjects.

Agnes, to perpetuate the memory of her grief for her father, founded on the scene of his death a large convent called Konigsfelden (the King's field), in laying the foundations of which the ruins of the Roman Vindonissa* were discovered. The convent contained forty nuns and twenty monks, who prayed alternately before the high altar for the soul of Albert. Agnes and her mother, the Empress Elizabeth, both retired thither, and died

in religious retirement. Agnes wrote herself the rule for her convent; it is still extant. She lived there fiftyseven years, in the practice of such austerities and the display of so much zeal, that she was accounted a saint, and miracles were said to have been wrought by her! The cell she occupied is still shown-a room twentyfive feet square on the ground floor, and containing a ponderous iron-bound chest, made from the trunk of the tree under which her father expired. She was buried in a marble tomb in the choir, where also several princes of the house of Hapsburg were interred; but their remains were removed to Austria about 1770. Konigsfelden lies one mile from the castle of Hapsburg, of which only one square tower, seventy feet, is extant. On the mountains near Koenigsfelden (which we should have said was built with the plunder of the confiscations), one Bertrand of Offtringen had built for himself a hermitage. He had been an old soldier of the Emperor Rodolph's, but had devoted his latter years to religion. Agnes was anxious that a man of his reputation should take up his abode at Koenigsfelden, and she visited him in his hermitage, in order to prevail upon him. But the old man remembered her cruelties, and did not consider them consistent with the piety she professed. He repulsed her with severity, and said to her-" Woman! God is ill served with the shedding of innocent blood, and rejects offerings which are the fruit of rapine and violence he loves mercy." But this excellent speech had not its due effect on Agnes, who never repented of her barbarities; and who, at her dissolution (which took place when she was about eighty-four), died exulting in a consciousness of superlative sanctity. M. E. M.

THE British mind is not eminently of the type geographic. However acquisitive or "æsthetic" that mind in other respects, it suffices for most purposes of commerce or conversation, money-making or article-making, and even of commercial treaty-making, to know that there are certain places; but to know where they are is rather matter of curiosity to the idle, and of supererogation to the busy. Despite the map department of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, only ten years ago the only living teacher of geography, the only "schoolmaster abroad on this somewhat extensive field of operations, was the noble Lord, who, having now transferred his universal genius from the interests of the earth's surface to those of its substrata, is shaking with his trident the time-hallowed Cloacine Vaults, not exactly of Ancus and the Early Pelasgi, but of their very "good friends and brothers" the Corporation of the City of London. But a few years since the noble lord, then Secretary for Foreign Affairs, had to inform the Opposition, in that neglected branch of their education, that, until they read the names in his despatches in the Blue Books, they did not know whether Cabul and Ghuznee were seaports or inland towns; and at a later period he condescended to repeat the same course of instruction, by apprising them that British ships of the line could not bring their broadsides to bear upon Cracow!

A new era has, however, appeared. The schoolmaster "abroad" has become the schoolmaster "at home." Geography, now, does everywhere flourish and abound. Ghuznee, Cabul,

Cracow! Every snuff-box has now a plan of Cronstadt or Sebastopol. Maps of the Baltic and the Black Sea are carried in every pocket, on shilling pocket-handkerchiefs. The very muffin-boys of Windsor, whom the Times has taken under its patronage, would scorn to say "Non mi ricordo," if asked to lay the finger on Abo, Akerman, Helsingfors, Hermanstadt, Peterozvodsk, or Simferopol.

The Danube, then, that long-neglected river-god, who, since the days of Trajan, has found no friend, and since Övid no poet, may reasonably be rubbing up his long-forgotten urn. With his once mighty compeer, but now equally ill-used friend, Nilus,† they may be recounting their ancient glories of Darius or of the Pharaohs, Alexander or the Ptolemies; and though both full long in evil case like Ugolino in his prison, may recall days when the wealth of Europe and Asia flowed through their channels; while Ister may remind his upstart barbarian neighbours Dniepers and Dniesters, Dons and Bogs-that every dog has his day, and they have had theirs.

The face of the earth presents not such a field of enterprise, such a scene of fertility, such a mine of resources, such a concentration of facilities - of enterprise neglected, of fertility thrown to waste, of resources undeveloped, of facilities obstructed-every gift of nature trodden down, every condition of Providence reversed as the valley of the Danube :

"The capacities of this great river as a commercial highway are certainly unequalled by those of any other European stream; and their full development would be of incal