But when, at sunset, the outline of the donjon cast its long shadow over three leagues of cultivated ground, and the colossal Chateau seemed to be rebuilt in the evening mists, one still felt the great strength, and the old sovereignty, which had made of it so impregnable a fortress that even the kings of France trembled before it.
"And I am sure," continued Angelique, "that it is inhabited by the souls of the dead, who return at night.

All kinds of noises are heard there; in every direction are monsters who look at you, and when I turned round as we were coming away, I saw great white figures fluttering above the wall.

But, mother, you know all the history of the castle, do you not ?" Hubertine replied, as she smiled in an amused way: "Oh! as for ghosts, I have never seen any of them myself." But in reality, she remembered perfectly the history, which she had read long ago, and to satisfy the eager questionings of the young girl, she was obliged to relate it over again.
The land belonged to the Bishopric of Rheims, since the days of Saint Remi, who had received it from Clovis.
An archbishop, Severin, in the early years of the tenth century, had erected at Hautecoeur a fortress to defend the country against the Normans, who were coming up the river Oise, into which the Ligneul flows.
In the following century a successor of Severin gave it in fief to Norbert, a younger son of the house of Normandy, in consideration of an annual quit-rent of sixty sous, and on the condition that the city of Beaumont and its church should remain free and unincumbered.

It was in this way that Norbert I became the head of the Marquesses of Hautecoeur, whose famous line from that date became so well known in history.

Herve IV, excommunicated twice for his robbery of ecclesiastical property, became a noted highwayman, who killed, on a certain occasion, with his own hands, thirty citizens, and his tower was razed to the ground by Louis le Gros, against whom he had dared to declare war.