Part 5

All three stood and prayed a little time before the cross, where the herd soon after gaily arrived, and the pious mother said joyfully to her son, “Look, dear child, he who is with God is everywhere safe, and no Orco or other evil spirit can harm him.”

* * * * *

From the village of St. Kassian a young fellow went one evening to a distant farm to visit his sweetheart, and it was getting already dark. The youth heard several times the Orco calling out from a distance, but he paid no attention to it, and continued quietly his way. All at once he saw a little empty cart, dragged by four cats, run across the road; at this sight he was rather frightened, but still continued his way, not being able to make out what it all meant, when, on a sudden, there arrived a big black dog, with fiery lynx eyes, which grew bigger and bigger the nearer he came. “That is the Orco,” thought the boy; so he crossed himself, and ran home as fast as his legs could carry him.

The dog bounded constantly after him for about a distance of three miles, and his fiery tongue hung for more than half a yard out of his jaws. The saliva which dropped from his mouth was like blue flaming fire, and burned like sulphur, filling the air around with a suffocating smell. The boy reached home, unharmed by the dog; but he had run so hard that his lungs became diseased, and he was always suffering, till death released him a few months afterwards.

“The cats which dragged the cart over the road,” said the people who recounted this legend, “were hags, of whom there were thousands about at that time.”

* * * * *

One day two young men of Ornella, in the Buchenstein valley, started on a brilliant night to pay a visit in a neighbouring village to their loves. They had scarcely left home when they noticed that they were followed by the gigantic Orco, in the form of a wild bull, who first walked quietly behind them, and then, as they began to run, changed himself into a huge ball, which rolled after them, bounding over high rocks, and alighting again on the ground close to them, with so much force and such a terrible noise that they were afraid of being crushed to death.

In their anxiety, they took the way over the meadows to the village of Valazzo, and jumping over the fence, which they had no time to open or break down, fell into the yard, at the foot of a large crucifix, which stands there, and embraced the cross, in a dying condition, with their arms. The Orco appeared at the fence, though now in human form; but the poor youths were so terrified that they dare no longer regard him, and therefore were unable to describe his appearance. He beat with his hands upon the fence-bars so furiously, that the marks of his blows remained for years afterwards, as though they had been branded in by red-hot irons, until the wood decayed and a new fencing had to be put up; but the saving cross still stands upon the same spot.

* * * * *

A peasant boy of Enneberg, walking through the deep and vast forest of Plaiswald, heard from afar the voices of men shouting, and took them for woodcutters, so, according to the usage of the country, he answered them, and shouted several times just in the same tones as the voices he had heard. But then the horrible idea rushed into his mind that it might have been the Orco, and, at the same instant, he heard it quite close, for if one imitates the Orco, the monster arrives as fast as lightning. The youth tried to run away, but he felt as though petrified; all around him became darkness, and he fell senseless to the ground.

On the following day, when he came to himself, he discovered that he was in the forests of Wellschellen, on the highest peak of the mountain, and it became clear to him that the Orco had carried him there, although the forests of Wellschellen were on the other side of terrifically deep chasms and precipices, into which the Orco would most certainly have thrown him, had the peasant boy been a godless fellow. He returned home, covered with bruises and scratches, for Orco had torn him in such a terrible manner that to the end of his days he never attempted again to imitate the voice of any one in the forests. The way over which the Orco dragged the peasant is a good seven miles.

_BIENER’S WIFE._

In the ancient castle of Büchsenhausen, which stands just above Innsbruck, still wanders about the apparition of one of its former possessors. The legend does not say to whom the castle originally belonged, but old chronicles relate that it passed, in the sixteenth century, into the hands of the celebrated iron-founder, Gregor Löffler, who gave it the name of “Büchsenhausen” (home of guns), because he had established there a gunfoundry. Later on it fell into the power of the reigning family of Austria, and the Archduchess Claudia presented it to her favourite Chancellor, Wilhelm von Biener, a liberal-minded nobleman, gifted with the doubtful talent of writing the most cutting satires, whose venomous point he turned against the nobility and church, and, for this reason, he brought upon himself the hatred of all those against whose opinion he wrote; but the favour of the Archduchess protected the talented statesman, who was most faithfully devoted to her interests.

On the 2nd of August, 1648, the Archduchess died, and then the enemies of Herr von Biener set to work so energetically that, after a short time, they succeeded in turning him out of his position, and imprisoned him on the 28th of August, 1650. A royal commission of noblemen, consisting of Biener’s greatest enemies, hastened down to Büchsenhausen, and claimed from his wife all his papers and documents, amongst which they discovered satires, which were most useful to their purpose. He was accused of high-treason, and, as his enemies were both his accusers and judges, he was condemned to death. His wife visited him while he was in prison, and he, who knew himself to be guiltless of any crime, always consoled her with these words:--“There can be no God in Heaven if they are allowed to murder an innocent man.”

On the 17th of July, 1651, Herr von Biener was executed in public. The sword which was used on the occasion is still to be seen in the castle of Büchsenhausen. His wife had sent a messenger to the Emperor to pray for a reprieve, which he had granted; but one of Biener’s most deadly enemies, President Schmaus, of the Austrian Court, stopped the messenger, and of course the execution ensued.

A few days afterwards, the rascal who had stopped the merciful errand of the Emperor was found dead through the judgment of God. Frau von Biener went raving mad; through the whole house she tore from room to room, crying, “There is no God; there is no God.” At last she climbed up the peak behind the Martinswand, and threw herself over a precipice into a deep chasm, out of which she was carried a corpse to Höttingen, where she was buried on the left-hand side of the altar, under a plain tombstone bearing no inscription, and with only a cross cut upon it.

Since her death she has appeared very often as a wandering ghost to a great number of persons, and the inhabitants of the surrounding country have given her the name of the “Bienerweibele” (Biener’s Wife). Clad in long black robes, slowly and solemnly she walks along through all the rooms in the castle, passes through firmly locked doors, stops with a woeful look at the bedside of peacefully sleeping people, appears to each proprietor and his wife before their death with wonderful consolation, always foretelling the immediate approach of the “Dreaded Spirit,” and never harms those who have never done her any injury. But in the year 1720, it happened that a descendant of one who had been instrumental in her husband’s death, who was sleeping in the castle, was found dead in his bed on the following morning, with a most fearfully contorted neck. The ghost appears in a black velvet mantle, and bears on her head a little bonnet, called in the dialect of the country, “Hierinnen,” embroidered with black lace, and on the back of her head a beautiful little golden crown, which is fastened on her hair by the means of a silver pin. People say that in former times the apparition was quite black, but at present it is more grey, and every day she is becoming more light, until at last her unhappy spirit will be redeemed.

_THE LENGMOOS WITCHES._

A rich peasant of Lengstein had a son who had travelled a great deal, and, on returning home, he laughed at the repeating of the rosary, which all the good peasants are in the habit of saying every evening. His mother was very anxious about the profane ideas and behaviour of her son, for he mocked just as much at every other usage of the holy church, which he was pleased to designate as “jokes of the priests.”

One day several of his companions were sitting with him at the inn called “Zu dem Ritter,” and there some one of them recounted that on every Thursday night hags had been seen dancing, and carrying on their diabolical practices on the Birchboden, which was close by; they were seen arriving on the mountain from all parts, riding on black bricks, and holding there their unholy Sabbath. On hearing this, the rich peasant’s son laughed loudly, and said, “Wait, there I will dance with them;” for it was just Thursday evening. His friends advised him not to do so, but, in spite of their warnings, he set off, and they accompanied him up to the Mittelberg, where stands the Kebelschmiede, and where the wild stream of the Finsterbach rushes through a fearful gully. From thence, the young fellow ran singing gaily through the forest to where there is an open spot, called the Birchboden, and where numberless pyramids of porphyry rise to the height of twenty and thirty feet above the ground.

There he saw the frantic witches dancing and jumping together, and performing all sorts of tricks. This pleased the mad young man, and he ran to take part in their unholy dance; but when the huge clock of the magnificent monastery of Lengmoos struck _one_, the Finsterbach foamed wildly up, and the pyramids of porphyry tottered to their very base. This the friends of the peasant, who were waiting for him, saw perfectly well, and a wild storm of wind and hail came suddenly on, so that they were obliged to take refuge in the hut of the Kebelschmid (Kebelsmith). There they waited until the morning Angelus had rung, at which moment they knew that the hags’ power would come to an end, and then they went to the witches’ ground. But how terrified were they when they found their wicked comrade transformed into a stone, and fixed firmly into the earth, so that only three-quarters of him could be seen. His stone form still remains on this dreadful spot, and no green--not even an atom of moss--will grow over the head, body, hands, or feet of the “Witch-dancer.”

After nightfall no one dares to approach the scene of this terrible retribution, where stands so fearful a warning to all mockers and despisers of religion.

_BINDER-HANSL._

In the hamlet of Wälsch’nofen, about ten miles from the village of Völs, lived a certain Binder-Hansl. He was a broom-binder, and, as his name was Hans (or John), they called him the “Binder-Hansl.”

He died in the year 1824, and was regretted all over the country, for he was a noted peasant doctor, or “Wonder Doctor,” as they called him. Besides curing all sorts of maladies of man and beast, he had a charm against sorcery and witchcraft, and where any suspicious circumstance took place in house or stable, Hans was called, and never failed to help.

One day, in the time of war, the Binder-Hansl went to the village of Botzen, and on the route, near the lane called Kuntersweg, he met the smith of the village of Kartaun, who had been forced by the French troops to carry their big drum, which was very heavy, and when the smith complained very bitterly about it to his friend, Hans said laughingly, “I should send the drum to the devil, and then I should be rid of it.” At this the French punished him for his boldness, by forcing him to march with them, carrying at his turn the drum on his back. So he was obliged to carry it up to the Feigenbrücke, near Blumenau; but when he had arrived there, he set the drum on the ground, and said, “By this way I have come, and by this way I will return;” while a Frenchman, who spoke German perfectly well, said, “Churl, take up the drum, or--” and he lunged at him with his naked sword. But the Binder-Hansl laughed at him, and replied, “We shall see;” and at the same moment he stretched out his hand over the Frenchmen, and they became all as motionless as stones.

There he left them standing and went laughing from the Feigenbrücke, over the steep mountain lane, which is called the “Katzenleiter” (Cat’s Ladder). After he had climbed to the summit of the mountain, he shouted, “Be off, fools, now you have seen my power,” and making again a sign with his hand, they all came to life, and taking up their drum they ran off, as only Frenchmen can.

_THE GOLD-WORM OF THE ALPBACH VALLEY._

Near the “Reichen-Felder” (rich fields), behind the valley of Alpbach, is often to be seen, especially on the eve of holy-days, a gold-worm of wonderful brilliancy, which lies there motionless, and wrinkled in such a manner that it looks like a golden chain.

Sometimes this gold-worm has also been seen down in the valley far beneath the Reichen-Felder, even once so far as the banks of the Alpbach, on a spot which is called G’reit. Several times daring people approached the worm, but when they had come near to him they were struck with an uncontrollable terror; and on running to fetch others as witnesses, on their return the worm was no longer to be seen.

The peasants round about say, “Those people had not the grace of putting something sacred upon the worm, and for that reason it disappeared.” After all, it is not stated what the worm is, whether it is a treasure-bloom, or a treasure-guardian, of which there are numbers in this rich gold country.

_THE GLUNKEZER GIANT._

In the Volder valley, out of which rises the Glunkezer, and where now stands the sheep Alp, called Tulfein, is a very picturesque mountain meadow, in the middle of which, some centuries ago, a peaceful King had built his palace, in which he lived with his four daughters, of whom each was more beautiful than the other. Round about the palace was a magnificent garden, full of Wonder-Flowers, and large expanses of meadow-lands, upon which tame Alpine animals browsed in large herds, and of these the four daughters of the King were very fond. They went also very often down into the huts of poor herds-people, to whom they did all sorts of charity, and all around they were honoured and reverenced as protecting genii.

This quiet happiness was troubled, and at last destroyed, by the arrival of a wild giant in this Alpine paradise, who built himself a cavern on the top of the Glunkezer, from whence, during the night, he roared so dreadfully that the mountains trembled, and huge masses of rock rolled down into the valleys. After he had caught sight of the four daughters of the King, he determined to try and gain one of them for his wife; so he decorated his bearskin mantle with enormous new buttons, tore up a fine tree for a walking-stick, passed his long finger-nails a few times through his shaggy beard and hair, and set off down to the Tulfein to pay his addresses. The King’s heart trembled with fright as he saw this pretender to the hand of one of his daughters, and replied that his daughters were perfectly free to choose their own husbands, therefore, if one of them would accept him, he should have no opposition to make.

Upon this the giant made himself as small as possible, but that was not very much, and did not bring him in much either, for one after the other of the girls refused him. This enraged the giant out of bounds, and he determined upon the most terrible vengeance, which he did not tarry in executing as quickly as possible. In the following night, rocks as large as a house rolled down upon the Tulfein, hurled against the palace, which they carried along with its inhabitants into the Wild-See, into whose depth it disappeared, and which was almost completely filled up with the tumbling rocks. The little of its dark waters which is still left, now bears the name of the “Schwarzenbrunn” (black spring), and round about it is a “death valley,” for nothing will grow there.

After the vengeance of the giant was satiated, repentance came over him, and he mourned for the murdered innocent father and daughters, he sat for whole nights on the borders of the Wild-See, into which he gazed, and howled and cried so incessantly, that even the stones had pity on him, for they became quite soft, and his cavern trembled and fell to ruin. At last he bewitched himself and became a mountain dwarf, while the King’s daughters were transformed into fairies or mermaids, and appear often on moonlight nights, floating over the water. There then sits the small grey dwarf, stretching longingly his hands towards their light forms, which however dissolve in mist; the dwarf then plunges again into the See, with a noise so great that it seems as though a large rock had fallen into it, and cools in a cold bath the agony of his remorse.

_THE WEAVER OF VOMPERBERG._

The practice of the medical art is even now in the higher parts of the Tyrol rather in a primitive state. Those who are ill send a common messenger down to the doctor, to whom he has to explain all the illnesses of those who have sent him, and, therefore, he has to consult sometimes for twenty or thirty illnesses at a time. The doctor listens to his explanations, and gives to one patient a potion, to another a tisane, to another an unguent, etc., and hands the whole lot to the messenger. Happy it is if, in the confusion of his ideas, the messenger does not change the medicines, but gives to each patient his own. In this manner used the peasant Vögele to cure, who died in 1855, in the hamlet of Matrai, in the Under Wippthal. From early morning till late in the afternoon his farm was overrun with the sick, or their messengers.

But the arts which the weaver of Vomperberg, near the village of Vomp, in the Inn valley, practised were unknown to human doctor, for they were supernatural. It was generally reported that he was in league with the evil one, and eye-witnesses have even certified that the devil once caught him, but that the clever magician managed to slip through his fingers. This weaver, who died in 1845, once sold a herd of pigs to a peasant on the opposite side of the river Inn. The purchaser was driving his pigs over the bridge called Nothholzerbrücke, and, as they arrived in the middle, lo! they all disappeared. All those to whom he recounted this called out, “The weaver is a cunning fellow, he has got the money, and no doubt he has bewitched the pigs back again to his sheds.”

In his anger the peasant, after drinking a few bottles of wine, and when his head was rather hot, returned to the hut of the weaver, who was lying on a long plank, warming his feet against the stove. The indignant and half-drunken peasant threw himself upon the man, and, in his anger, tried to drag him out of the hut by his feet, but oh, Heaven! he had scarcely touched the feet, when they both came off in his hands. Trembling with terror and fright, he dropped the feet on the floor and ran off, and has never dared again to say one word about the loss of the pigs.

_THE FIERY SENNIN._

Over the high valley of Alperschon stands a mountain called Gerichtsalp, belonging to the canton of Landeck, of which the judge, for centuries past, has had the right of letting the meadows to all the different parishes of the district; and from time immemorial it has been the privilege of the flock-herds to pasture there also their own animals, together with those of their masters, and then to sell them in the autumn on their own account.

There was at that time upon the Alp a young “Sennin” (or herd-woman), who had among the herd some of her own pigs, of which she took rather too much care, for she cheated the parish to feed them, and gave them goat-milk and the milk from the butter, so that they soon became very fat and round; while the parish pigs she made live upon the thin cheese whey, upon which, of course, they did not thrive. The Sennin was always gay and joking, and sang the nicest songs, and therefore every one liked her for her good temper, and nobody dreamed that she was an alm thief.

A couple of root seekers of the village of Schnaun, the girl’s native village, often climbed the Alp, and one day, when busy over their work, they remained there longer than usual, after the Sennin had driven the herd home. They were in the habit of using the empty enclosure in which the pigs were driven to rest in the middle of the day, as a drying-place for their roots, and when they returned home again, late at night, to Schnaun, they heard to their great astonishment that “the pretty young Sennin” had suddenly died, and they stayed a few days in the village to attend her funeral with the rest of the villagers.

Some few days afterwards, they went up again on the mountain to resume their usual business, and it was almost quite dark as they arrived on their favourite spot. As they approached the enclosure, they heard the voice of some one calling the pigs to their feeding-troughs, which they immediately recognized as that of the dead young Sennin, and, as they approached nearer, they saw her in bodily form, carrying a bucket of whey in her hand, and walking about in the enclosure, but red as a fiery furnace. The men stood thunderstruck and gasped with terror, and the spirit called to them, “Yes, sigh for me; here I must burn until my dishonesty is wiped away, even to the last _pfennig_;” and in saying this she disappeared from their sight, while making a terrific noise, and enveloped in a cloud of sulphurous smoke.

_THE SPIRIT OF THE ZIRL USURER._