Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1882-11-16
IN THE AUSTRIAN ALPENLAND.
An Excursion Among the Wondrous Heights,
of the Syrian Mountains-The Semmering
Pass and Causeway of Giants-The Ancient
Ruin of Schottswein.

An Excursion Among the Wondrous Heights
of the Syrian Mountains-The Semmering
Pass and Causeway of Giants-The Ancient
Ruin of Schottswein.
Special Correspondence of the Pioneer Press.
VIENNA, Oct 21.-'Auf alien Bergen ist
Ruhe!" This simple truth, spoken from the
heart Of Goethe, is echoed by every poet,
painter and musician who ascends these Won
drous Alpen heights of the wild Syrian
mountains that join the Bavarian hills
with the Raxalpe of Lower Austria.
of engineering skill. built by that distinguished
italian, Chevalier di Chechi, over which the
Trieste express rushes daily from the banks of
the Danube to the shores of the Adriatic,
is well worth exploring at LEISURE not
only for its sad historical memories,
its blessed legendary stories of the shrine of
Maria Schulz, its health bringing 'Hochquelle"
rushing down through the A1litz Graben to
fill the fountains of imperial Vienna, but its
most imposing and sublime scenery in the very
heart of the Syrian alps.
One beautiful August morning, in the sum-
mer of 1881, a party of friends left the wood
land walks Of imperial Schonbrunu, the sum-
mer palace of the emperor, and took the
Trieste express at Meidling. They wero going
down to Miramar, sad Mramar, the loved
home of the unfortunate MaXimillian, where
the shadows of the lick trees fall thickest
Angelus when twilight gathers around
this deserted castle by the sea.
After leaving Meidling the train passed through
the celebrated wine districts, the pleasant
prairie lands of Gumpoldskirchen, prairies
broken by small hillocks all covered with vines
back to the wooded hills that rise on the right
and on the left, stretching far away to poplar
bordererd roads until lost in the blue distance
where mountains loom up into cloudland.
These superb vineyards reach for miles along
IL l. .1-.l...
springs of Baden, where the quaint old castle
of Rauhensttein CLEANS out white and gray
from the dark pines of its surrounding hills.
Through the lovely, garden-like village of
Voslau, and the broad meadows of the cele-
brated Wiener Neustadt. whose military school
into the mountain region of the
Weiner VALID. And strange fantastic
heights they are! Hohen Wand rises like the
catafalque of Titan. This August morning a
funeral pail of clouds wrapped the mount
aims rough sides, but between its gray crest
and the blue heaven silvery wreaths of morn
ing mist we're heaped as floral offerings on the
tomb of the buried giant Through pleasant
pine woods, where the sunlight glinted down
and burned golden upon the brown turf of
pine needles; into green corn fields set
around with broad bands of buckwheat,
bronzsd from the August sun, the travellers
came at last in view of the Raxalpe and the
heights that glitter in eternal SHOWS Before
reaching Glognitz. where the ascent of the
Semmering Balm begins, the scenery
CHANGES TO PARK-LIKE vIsTAs
and wooded hills. Crimson peoples
and blue larkspur CLEAN through the
golden grain as the spendor Of
suoset falls over the meadows. The mount
ain engine Ia cross between a stove and
plow) met the express at Payerbsch a strangely
small guide. it seemed, to take train of twen-
ty-fve cars carriage shaped coupes) up 3, $50
feet above the level of the seat But its mo-
tive powers were even more astonishing than
it's shape, the huge train moved slowly, stead
lily forward, up an inclined plane of forty feet,
into wilderness of dwarf pieces that spring
from the broad foundations of basaltic rock
that pave the magical wilderness of the
SchwarzenthaL Steadily, slowly, the crowded
carriages moved onward and upward. till the
Black valley sank lower and lower, and the
gray marble. walls Of the Atlitz
Graben rose, wierd and terrible.
from the deep green waves of the pine and
aspen forests-sea which surges through the
black-grey chasms that yawG between chalk
white parapets. Here and there from out
these frightful gorges, foaming mountain tor
rents rush Into the woodland depths below,
depths from which rise wall-lke precipices
covered with feathery ferns and blue fringed
gentians growing in the riffs and scars made by
the mighty glacier, which, centuries ago,
moved in awful majesty through the clefted
hills. Onward and upward, IN many curve,
granite arches, spanning fearful chasms with
graceful sweep and aerial poise, the train
rushed into the very heart Of the mountains.
The legendary lore of centuries long dead
has here chained the dwarfs of the Niebelung,
whose cruel fate was to toll until they could
pay the Scandinavian giants for building
''Walhalla" above the cloudsl
The yellow towers of Castle Wartenstein, and
the gray turrets of RUNE Klamm, sank lower
and lower beneath the spiral windings of the
road which had begun its ascent in the
Schwarzenthal, miles below these mighty
fortress walls, and even their battlements were
lost to sight as the last peak of the mountain
range was gained and the train halted upon tho
heights Of the Semmering pass in front of the
mighty Sonnwendstein, the glorious pyramid
which rises like
Nebo's lonely mountain
above it's circling hills. At this point the trav-
elers decided to stop and spend few days in
excursions among the mountains. The
| little inn, Erzherzog Johann, built
on the spot where Charles VI Of Austria
and the imperial family used to resi-
when they journeyed to and from Italy, was
reached by the tourists utter an hour OF
climbing up and down over steep mountain
road. In the time of the Emperor Charles, the
passage over the Sonnwendstein into Italy was
merely q footpath, but he laid the foundations
/ of a rrio ra road which hio dauohfar Mo 81,