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'The Eye of God' (2)
Nor did Berchtold forget the noble animals to whom he owed his entire fortune: he fed and tended his wind-swift little horse faithfully until her death and, high up though his castles were situated, spared neither effort nor expense until each castle was adorned with a magnificent stable, filled with the most exquisitely beautiful creatures fetched from the Barbary Coast and distant Spain, and equipped with spacious and extensive riding grounds.
And so when Marshal Berchtold departed this world to join his non-noble forebears, he left his sons behind as the most powerful lords of Styria and as equally superb horsemen as he himself had been. Count Ottokar II, gratefully acknowledging the merits of old Berchtold and his valiant sons, did not revoke the title of Marshal which his father had bestowed upon Berchtold, but bequeathed it to the latter's eldest son, and from that time forth it remained with the house of Rossum for nearly two hundred years.
But if horsemanship, outstanding equestrian prowess and the Marshal's title had established and promoted the ascent of the house of Rossum, it was that very title and the Rossums' love-affair with horses that also contributed in almost equal measure to this respected family's final downfall. The Rossums as the mightiest knights of Styria and as horsemen for whom no steed was too wild, no ditch too deep and no river too wide, deemed it their duty to show off these skills for all the world to see. Thus games and tournaments were held which far surpassed those of the Counts of Styria; at their banquets the most noble Nierenstein wine flowed in veritable rivers and their castles, their stables and their furnishings left all else previously witnessed of this kind far, far behind. The castle chapel at Stallberg was adorned with twelve life-size silver Apostles; the weathercocks of the same castle were fashioned from pure gold; the stable was panelled in marble, and the ceilings of their favourite horses' stables were not seldom arrayed with pearls and precious stones.
Thus they forgot that their forefather, Berchtold, had only acquired his wealth through thrift, and that it is advisable in times of plenty to set aside for the future - for even now the time was fast approaching when they would sorely require money for a stormy day. An unfortunate feud with the Stubenbergs - begun out of blind belligerency - resulted in the loss of Castle Weidenberg and several other estates; a number of raids by the rapacious dukes of Hungary, and the cost of campaigns and border skirmishes against the latter, also contributed towards the gradual impoverishment of the Rossums, which bowed them all the lower since for many years no member of their family had known poverty any closer than merely by name. The twelve silver Apostles emigrated from Stallberg chapel into the hands of usurious Jews, and the mighty storm which threatened to tear down the house of Rossum had long since ensured that the golden weathercocks had been ripped out from the high Stallberg roofridge and broken up into small, easy-to-handle pieces of gold. The magnificent marble panelling of the stable ended up in Goess Monastery in exchange for ringing coinage, since the Monastery wished to use the marble to adorn its newly built church; and as the Rossums were not in a financial position to maintain even the roof of so large and essentially unnecessary a building as the stable, and had to allow the same building, together with the now rarely used riding school - constructed at infinite expense - to be exposed to the fury of the elements: - in consequence of all this, these beautiful monuments of thankfulness from the founding father of the Rossum dynasty were soon in a sorry state of virtual collapse.
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'The Eye of God' (3)
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