Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - I - Environs of Kiel
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
Chap. I.
HOLSTEIN FARMHOUSES.
21
gentleman, and when once he discovered his mistake he
preferred banishment from court and country to
countenancing the intrigues of the Queen Mother and her
party. He quitted his native land for ever, and is said
to have fallen in combat, in the papal city of Avignon,
by the hand of an English officer, who had vowed to
avenge the fate of this ill-used princess, whom he had
accompanied on her voyage to Denmark.*
The homesteads or farmhouses of Holstein are models
of concentration: no turning out in bad weather to look
after cows, sheep, or horses; everything stands condensed
under one building, with a large high-pitched roof,
necessary to throw off the snow in winter season. They
are very picturesque to look at, built of brick and
timber in panels, the bricks arranged in pattern, the
woods blackened and varnished. You enter or drive in
under a lofty archway, through folding gates, into a
sort of oblong hall, which runs the entire length of the
buildings, at the extreme end of which is a large open
fireplace, ranged with bright pewter plates and china,
good shining copper pots and kettles, rivalling a Holland
interior in their brightness.
The gable above serves as a granary. Against one
side of the hall stand the stable, the cow-house, and
the remise; and on the opposite side are the rooms
occupied by the family, with muslin curtained windows,
well furnished, a stove in each, and in winter double
windows. We have visited many of them, and always
* Rastorf is mentioned as the property of the Rantzaus as early as
the 15th century, at which period they possessed large tracts of land
in the Holstein duchies, where they first settled about the year 1300.
At the death of Count Rantzau the property of the family came, by
inheritance, to the Rasdorf branch.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
