A Tale from My Family

I come from a family of lower gentry based in the Eastern part of Lower Austria. My forebears were farmers, woodsmen and wine-growers and some of my relatives still are. They also often did administrative duties or ran errants for the higher aristocracy, one was for example first hunter-master of the ancient Kuenringer family whose 'heirs' and descendants are known under the name of Liechtenstein today, another one once had the duty to deliver a substantial amount of money to some workmen in service of the Hapsburg-Emperor.

It must have been in the 18th century when the times were still rough. When he stayed at an inn, some highwaymen unfortunately took the money of all the other guests. Yet, they left my ancestor alone because for the journey he had donned the coarse robes of a monk and when the bandits observed him, he kept his eyes on the prayer book that he had brought along silently moving his lips.

"That filthy beggar-monk has got no money, anyhow." the robbers said and left him untouched so that he could safely deliver the earnings to the craftsmen, even though he could have kept them for himself since news of the incident, though not of its details, had spread by then, already.