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 in fact, old and brown, with citadel, wall, and bastions; Neuschwanstein, a white mass of towers on a mighty rock springing abruptly from the deep gorge of the river Pöllat. Between the castles and on all sides was the dark green forest, separating only for those two jewels of the Bavarian Highlands, the lakes, Alp and Schwan. Down in the lower valley were the old grey towers of Füssen; beyond Hohenschwangau and facing Neuschwanstein, three sharp peaks of the higher Alps glittered with snow. Behind the newer castle a green mountain rose almost as straight as a rampart, throwing the romantic white pile into such bold relief that it attracted the eye from every point of the valleys.
As Ordham wandered about, staring at the castles from all sides, or lying on the turf under the trees of the forest, his solitude broken only by a passing peasant in the picturesque grey and green costume of the Highlands, or the sudden appearance of a chamois at the end of a vista, he understood something of Ludwig’s contempt for mere mortals. He loitered on in the groves sacred to the unhappiest man the modern world has seen, many moods sweeping over him, but finally he lay dreaming idly; and, feeling that such romantic solitudes demanded a mate in fancy, since fate was obdurate, he evoked the image of the prettiest girl he knew, Mabel Cutting, and persuaded himself for a few moments that his happiness depended upon seeing her again and at once. He had just resolved to overcome his hatred for letter writing and indite her an epistle on the morrow, when a footman came to remind him that dinner was at seven. Mabel vanished with the chamois, although he made a wry face as he reflected that he was to dine alone in this enchanted vale with Princess Nachmeister.
The same lackey stood outside his door while he dressed, evidently under the impression that he must not be lost sight of again, and this time conducted him to the story above. He had expected as a matter of course that the dinner would be served in one of the smaller rooms, perhaps over in the Kemenate, where Excellenz might have inveigled the Styr to join their little party. But he was shown into a vast room, which was in such a glitter of light that for a moment he was half blinded. Few surprises ruffled his imperturbability, however; and although he appeared barely to glance about him, he observed with much pleasure the immense vaulted room, which was nearly a hundred feet long and almost half as wide, supported on carved columns and decorated with the legend of Parsifal. The ten chandeliers were blazing suns.