boundless mystery, and the hold which it has exercised upon all who
have lingered by the hero-trodden paths that wind among its mysterious
promontories and song-haunted strands.

--L.S.




CHAPTER I--TOPOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL


There are many rivers whose celebrity is of much greater antiquity than
that of the Rhine. The Nile and the Ganges are intimately associated
with the early history of civilization and the mysterious beginnings
of wisdom; the Tiber is eloquent of that vanished Empire which was
the first to carry the torch of advancement into the dark places of
barbarian Europe; the name of the Jordan is sacred to thousands as that
first heard in infancy and linked with lives and memories divine. But,
universal as is the fame of these rivers, none of them has awakened in
the breasts of the dwellers on their banks such a fervent devotion,
such intense enthusiasm, or such a powerful patriotic appeal as has the
Rhine, at once the river, the frontier, and the palladium of the German
folk.

The Magic of the Rhine

But the appeal is wider, for the Rhine is peculiarly the home of a
legendary mysticism almost unique. Those whose lives are spent in their
creation and interpretation know that song and legend have a particular