Tower of Ivory Author:Gertrude Atherton Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Ill NEUSCHWANSTEIN Ordham journeyed down to Neuschwanstein full of pleasant anticipations, which for several hours after his arrival seemed unlikely to be ... more »fulfilled. Although he and Princess Nachmeister, with whom he travelled, were received at Fussen by a royal coach, which bounded at the heels of four galloping steeds through the grey mediaeval town crowded on the banks of the river, then up through the woods to the white castle on its lofty rock, in a fashion that exhilarated his blood, and although they were received at Neuschwanstein with vast ceremony, he learned immediately that the King found himself too unwell to see his guests, and that the Grafin von Tann would dine in her own apartments over in the Kemenate, where rooms had been put in order for herself and the Princess Nachmeister. In the main body of the castle no woman had ever slept, and few men. Ordham, after ascending to the third story, was conducted through endless suites of rooms, very new, very gaudy, painted with the legends of the sagas and furnished with blue, purple, red, or green satin heavily in- crusted with gold. In his own imposing chamber, finding nothing comfortable but the bed — after turning up a corner of the quilt — to sit on (the gold embroideries of the chairs being at least four inches thick), he made his way out of the castle and determined to explore while it was still daylight, half hoping to meet the King or the Styr. He forgot both for a time while he roamed about what is probably the most beautiful spot on earth. In an undulating valley surrounded by an irregular chain of Alps, the two castles were set on their heights about a mile apart: Hohenschwangau, feudal in appearance if not infact, old and brown, with citadel, wall, and bastions; Neuschwanstein, a white mass of towers ...« less