Legends From River and Mountain by Carmen Sylva

Upon a lofty crag, overhanging the river Weistritz, in Eastern Germany, / stand the ruins of the Kynsburg. Once it was a splendid castle, and / many an assemblage of noble knights and ladies, and many a gay revel, / were held within its walls. It had its guardian spirit, too; for the / tale went that an apparition, called by the castle-folk "the white / lady," often wandered by night through hall and garden, and most of / all when some maiden of the house of Kynsburg needed help. So it had / been, they said, when a daring and cruel knight once waylaid a daughter / of Kynsburg as she passed alone at even along the corridor. For this / knight had cast his eyes upon the maiden, who was beautiful, and had / urged her to give him her love, but she denied it him; and so he would / fain have won by foul means what he could not get by fair ones. But / this maiden had, from her childhood, loved to hear of the "white lady," / and to fancy she was under her protection, and many a prayer had she / said in the castle chapel for the repose of her soul. And now, in the / hour of need, she called upon her, and at once the mysterious white / figure appeared; and while the reckless knight fell upon his knees in / terror, the closed doors of the corridor silently opened, and the girl / fled through them to a place of safety. But next morning the knight was / found lying dead upon the floor.

This was the story that was handed down from generation to generation / among the folk of Kynsburg, and Adelheid, the beautiful daughter of the / house, had often listened to it with eager ears, and had longed in her / turn to see the "white lady," and invoke her help.