That, at all events, is the story we have been told, and though the Rosengarten and its miniature valleys are beautiful enough for real roses to have their home there, none grow there now save figurative ones caused by the sunset light.
The Rosengarten is a fine centre for mountain ascents, and the famous Vajolett towers and other rocky pinnacles present unfailing attractions to the adventurous rock climber, even though nowadays there can be very few "virgin" peaks or pinnacles to scale.
From the Rosengarten itself as well as from Bozen one can witness the blooming of the roses, and the really wonderful and entrancing play of colour, light and shadow over the stupendous peaks which forms an unforgettable experience when seen during the late afternoon of a summer day and onwards till twilight comes to gradually throw its blue and mystic mantle over the valleys and the mountain summits.
North of Bozen, prettily situated by the banks of the Adige, and some one thousand seven hundred feet above sea-level, stands the little, though somewhat important, town of Klausen, with its long, narrow street following the configuration of the gorge in which most of the houses lie, dominated by the great Benedictine monastery of Säben perched upon a steep vine-clad promontory overlooking the town and river, and six hundred feet above it. A castle till the end of the seventeenth century, the convent was attacked by the French in 1809, and from all accounts the nuns were not respected, for upon the walls of one of the towers on the hill is a painted crucifix, which the people of Klausen say was placed there in memory of one of the nuns who, pursued by the soldiery, jumped to her death over the battlements. The first impression of Klausen is that of cleanliness, for the tall houses strike one in the brilliant sunshine of a summer day as very white, though most of them are relieved by patches of vivid green, where window shutters hang upon the walls or keep the sunshine from the windows. Klausen folk are fond of flowers, too, for many hang trailing from balconies; pink and red geraniums, a variety of clematis, and bunches of ruby-coloured valerian, and tufts of yellow and orange nasturtiums. There are generally many monks about the streets, too; sombre-looking figures in rough frieze habits, who look at the stranger with mild curiosity, and then pass on their silent way up the hillside, or through the one long, narrow street which runs between the mountain side and the rushing river. Klausen women bore a brave part in Hofer's struggle against the French and Bavarians, and dressed in their husbands' and brothers' clothes gave material aid in driving back the French through the pass in 1797.