Once, on the eve of a holy festival, Hermann set out to hunt in the ancient forest about the base of the Loewenburg.  In the excitement of the chase he outstripped his followers, his quarry disappeared, and, overtaken by night, his surroundings, in the dim light, took on such an unfamiliar aspect that he completely lost all sense of direction.  Up and down he paced in unrestrained yet impotent anger, feeling that he was under some evil spell.  Maddened by this idea, he endeavoured to hack his way through the thick undergrowth, but the matted boughs and dense foliage were as effectual as prison bars.  He was trapped, he told himself, in some enchanted forest, for the place seemed more and more unfamiliar.  He strove to bring back some recollection of the spot, which surely he must have passed a thousand times.  But no—­he could not distinguish any feature that seemed familiar.  His spirits sank lower and lower, his strength seemed on the point of failing, his brain seemed to be on fire.  Round and round he went like some trapped animal; then he threw himself madly upon a mass of tangled underwood and succeeded in breaking through to a more open space.  This also seemed unfamiliar, and in the dim light of the stars the tall trees shut him in as if with towers of impenetrable shadow; silence seemed to lay everything under a spell of terror, ominous of coming evil.

Wearied in body and mind, Hermann flung himself down on the sward and quickly fell asleep.  But suddenly a plunging in the brushwood aroused him, and with the instinct of the huntsman he sprang up instantly, seizing his spear and whistling to his dogs, which, however, crouched nearer to the earth, their hair bristling and eyes red with fear.  Again their master called, but they refused to stir, whining, with eyes strained and fixed on the undergrowth.  Then Graf Hermann went forward alone to the spot whence proceeded the ominous sound, his spear poised, ready to strike.

He was about to penetrate into the brushwood when suddenly there emerged from it a majestic-looking man, who seemed as if hotly pursued.  He was dressed in ancient garb, carrying a large crossbow in his right hand.  A curved hunting-horn hung at his side, and an old-fashioned hunting-knife was stuck in his girdle.

With a stately motion of the hand he waved Hermann aside, then he raised the horn to his lips and blew upon it a terrible blast so unearthly in sound that the forest and mountains sent back echoes like the cry of the lost, to which the hounds gave tongue with a howl of fear.  As if in answer to the echoes, there suddenly appeared hundreds of skeleton stags, of enormous size, each bestridden by a skeleton hunter.  With one accord the ghostly riders spurred on their steeds, which with lowered antlers advanced upon the stranger, who, with a scream for mercy, sought frenziedly for some means of evading his grisly pursuers.