llowing sad intelligence to his beloved. The Emperor Albrecht had
summoned the nobles to do battle against the Swiss confederates, who
had renounced their allegiance, driven the imperial representatives
from their land, and finally declared war against their overlord. The
knights of the Rhineland were called upon to suppress the flames of
rebellion. On receiving the pressing call of the Emperor, Broemser did
not hesitate for a moment but resolved to obey his feudal superior.

At first the young bride wept, but when her lover comforted her with
words of endearment, and her father praised the soldierly resolution
of the young man, the maiden calmly submitted to the will of God.
Before the young knight rode off he took a young linden-tree which he
had pulled up in a grove, and having removed the soil with his sword,
he planted the sapling in front of the castle. Then he spoke as
follows to his bride. "Tend this budding linden which I have planted
here to the honour of my patron saint. You shall keep troth with me so
long as it flourishes, but if it fade (and may St. George in his grace
prevent it) then you may forget me, for I shall be dead." The weeping
bride threw herself in her lover's arms, and while he enfolded her
gently with his right, with his left he raised his sword, and showed
her engraved upon it in ancient letters, for daily repetition, the
words: "Preserve O everlasting God, the body here, the soul hereafter.
Help, knight St. George." Then, after receiving many kind wishes from
his sorrowing friends, the young soldier rode in the morning mist down
through the woods to join the imperial forces.

Several months passed. Then the melancholy news got abroad in the
German land that something disastrous had happened in the campaign
against the Swiss peasants. At last came a trustworthy report to the
effect that a bloody defeat had overtaken the proud army of Albrecht.
It was at Morgarten, where the noble hero called Arnold of Winkelried
had opened up to his countrymen a pathway to freedom over his
spearpierced body. Many counts and barons found on that day a grave in
the land of the Swiss, and sounds of mourning were to be heard in many
a German castle. But to Castle Rheinfels no traveller brought any
tidings either of weal or woe, and we can imagine with what sickness
of heart the maiden waited, and how her hope faded as the days and
weeks slipped past. It was so long since the ill-fated army had set
out against t