Chapter 11

THE JEWS' TOWN. VISITS TO VARIOUS POINTS WORTH NOTICING. STATE OF PUBLIC FEELING.

I have devoted so much more of space than I had intended to the university, and the associations connected with it, that I must be content to describe in few words, such other objects as appeared to me most deserving of notice in Prague. Prominent among these is the Juden Stadt, or City of the Jews; of which I may state, at the outset, that, of all the extraordinary scenes in which I have ever been an actor, there are few which, more than my visit to the Jews' Quarter of Prague, have left upon my mind so vivid and lasting an impression. Let the reader imagine to himself, if he can, the effect of a sudden transition from the pomp and splendour of a great capital into a suburb of mean and narrow streets, choked up with the litter of old rags, broken furniture, and cast-off clothes hung out for sale; where are aged women asleep in their chairs,--young ones nursing infants, or, it may be, perfecting their own unfinished toilets; men, squalid and filthy, with long beards, flowing robes, and all the other appurtenances which usually belong to their race; children in a state of nudity; turbaned heads, features thoroughly Oriental; tarnished finery, books, music, and musical instruments, scattered about; everything, in short, whether animate or inanimate, as entirely in contrast with what you have just left behind, as you might expect to find it, were you transported suddenly into some region of the earth, of the very existence of which you had previously been ignorant. I have passed through the classic regions of St. Giles, the Seven Dials, and Rag Fair. I have gone, in my youth, under the escort of a police officer, the round of all the most degraded corners of London; yet have I never beheld a sight, which, in all that is calculated to bewilder, if not to outrage, the senses, could bear one moment's comparison with what the Juden Stadt brought before me. I confess that the first feeling excited was a vague idea, that to proceed further might compromise our personal safety. Yet I defy any one who has penetrated but a few yards down the passage, to abstain from going on. There is about you, on all sides, an air of novelty, such as it is impossible to resist; and you march forward, wondering, as you move, whether you be awake or in a dream.

The establishment of a Jewish colony in Prague is said to be coeval with the foundation of the city itself. From age to age, moreover, the sons of Israel have inhabited the same quarter,--namely, a suburb which, running in part along the margin of the Moldau, is approached from the Alt Stadt, by the street of which I have just spoken. Here dwell they, to the number of eight or ten thousand, in a state of complete isolation from the Christian myriads which surround them, inhabiting flats, and in many cases, single apartments, by whole families; and appearing to rejoice in the filth and neglect to which the Christians have consigned them. The streets in their suburb are all narrow and mean, and devoid of ornament; the stalls, with the articles which the chapmen expose upon them, are scattered up and down in utter confusion; the shops--mere recesses--have Hebrew inscriptions over them, and the entire population, when I went among them, seemed to be abroad. One building, and one only, does indeed deserve to be visited: I allude to the synagogue, the oldest of its class, perhaps, in Europe; a strange edifice, above the floor of which the soil has gathered to such a height, that to enter it, you are forced to descend a flight of steps. I must endeavour to describe it, though conscious that description must utterly fail to convey a correct idea of the original.

The Old Synagogue, as it is called, a structure of the twelfth century, is essentially Gothic in the leading points of its architecture, but so loaded with Byzantine ornaments as to resemble no other edifice of a similar date which I, at least, have seen in Europe. It is thoroughly Oriental in its character, fantastic in its proportions, and little likely to be mistaken, under any circumstances, for a Christian church. The interior is not less remarkable, whether we look to the productions of the builder's skill, or to the arrangements which have been made for the purposes of worship and study. A lofty vault, supported upon three Gothic pillars, which spring from the middle of the area, and meet in pointed arches at the roof, it is lighted only by a range of lancet-shaped windows, which being elevated above the floor to the height of forty or fifty feet, throw down a few broken rays upon your head, just sufficient to render the darkness visible, but not to dispel it. By this uncertain glimmer, you perceive, after a while, that walls, and pillars, and roof, are black with the dust of ages; and that every thing around you bears testimony to the gloomy nature of the reverence which these stubborn Israelites pay to the God who has discarded them. Beneath the arch of the pillars there is a raised platform, where desks and stools are placed for the accommodation of the rabbins, and the pupils who come hither to study the Law. At the extremity of the vault stands the altar, the silver candlestick, with its many branches, surmounting it, while from the roof hang seven silver lamps, to "give light," according to the Divine injunction, "over against the candlestick." I exceedingly regretted to find that the day on which I inspected this pile was not a holy season in the Juden Stadt. Some doctors and students there were, on the platform, whose attention seemed engrossed by the occupation in which they were engaged; and their picturesque dresses, flowing beards, and stubborn and haughty expressions of countenance, accorded well with the localities by which they were surrounded. But the business of prayer was not in progress, and the sacred Book of the Law lay hidden.

From the Synagogue we passed into the old cemetery, which lies contiguous to it, and looked round upon a picture of desolation more stern than the dream of the poet has perhaps ever conjured up. Extensive as the plot of ground is, there is not, throughout its compass, one foot of level soil. Graves, trodden partially down, pointed grave-stones that are sloping and falling in every direction,--these, with a wilderness of alder trees, which, whether planted by the hand of man, or sown by the winds of heaven, overshadow the crumbling tombs, constitute altogether a fitting monument to the desolate condition and broken fortunes of the Hebrew race. Yet may you easily enough distinguish, from the devices that are engraved on each of them, the rank and condition of many of those who sleep beneath these grave-stones. The lion of Judah, the upraised hands of the house of Aaron, the Nazarite's bunch of grapes, are all here; while the graves of the rabbins are, as elsewhere, adorned, each with a sort of cenotaph. The Jews have, for some time, ceased to bury in this mass of human dust. It was filled, and filled, till it could contain the bones of no more; and now their dead are carried to a new cemetery, removed a short distance beyond the city walls.

According to their own traditions, the quarter of Prague which the Jews now occupy was possessed by their ancestors long before the destruction of Jerusalem. We may credit this statement or not, just as we please; but it seems admitted, on all hands, that if they dwelt not where we now find them, previous to the foundation of the city, they were among the earliest of the colonists who repaired to it. Many and severe changes of fortune they have indeed undergone. Plundered, oppressed, more than once expelled by violence, they have yet returned, again and again, to the home of their adoption, and they are now treated, if not respectfully, at least mildly, and on the whole, justly, by their Christian rulers. I must add, moreover, to this account of their suburb, that the more wealthy members of their community do not now make their dwellings there. These generally inhabit houses in the better part of the city, and having the command of a large proportion of the floating capital of the country, they receive such marks of deference as the rich, under the most unfavourable circumstances, contrive to exact from the poor.

Among other objects in the Alt Stadt, which make powerful demands on the traveller's notice, the Rath-haus, or ancient Town-hall, and the Thein Kirche, stand conspicuously forward. The former is a quaint, irregular Gothic pile, in a very dilapidated state, of which the Council-chamber is fine, in its degree, and the little chapel curious. It was here, that in 1420, the leaders of the Taborites assembled, their followers being gathered together in the Grosse Ring, or square beneath, and at the tolling of a bell, the whole sallied forth to commit those excesses which, both in Bohemia and elsewhere, have cast such discredit on the dawn of the Reformation. It was in a dungeon beneath the Rath-haus that the Emperor Wenzel IV. suffered, in the year 1403, a fifteen weeks' imprisonment; and it was in the square, on which the windows of the hall look out, that the jousts and tournaments of the knightly age were carried forward. Of the latter again, which fronts the Rath-haus, and so occupies a conspicuous position in the same square, why should I say more than has been said already? Here, in 1458, the states assembled to elect to the vacant throne the virtuous George of Podiebrad; here Huss preached, and John of Rokysan taught; and Tycho Brahe found here the last resting-place which is allotted to mortality. There is a rude monument to him,--a figure in armour, carved in relief, against one of the pillars near the altar; and over it is engraved the astronomer's motto, _Esse quam haberi_. It is remarkable enough that as in this church the communion was first administered in both elements to the people, so is there still to be found here the single memorial that remains of the privileges which were once so dearly prized, and so hardly won. The service of the Roman Catholic church is performed here in the Bohemian language; and the congregations which attend to take part in it are enormous.

From the Alt Stadt you pass to the Neu Stadt by a street called Graben, across the site of which was, in ancient days, a ditch, but of which, as well as of the rampart that surmounted it, not a trace now remains. It is a clean, airy, well-built portion of Prague, and embraces the old town within a sort of semicircle, of which the extremities reach, on either side, to the Moldau. Here the Military Hospital,--once a college of the Jesuits,--will naturally attract attention, both on account of the elegance of its structure, and the uses to which it is turned. It has a noble façade, which measures upwards of six hundred feet in length, a chapel, a hall, and accommodation for four hundred invalids, whose wants, though attended to, are certainly not prevented with the care which distinguishes a similar institution among ourselves. The old soldiers made, it is true, no complaints. They seemed, on the contrary, perfectly satisfied with their condition,--all, at least, except one,--who, strange to say, had served in the 97th British regiment for seventeen years, ere he entered the service of Austria; and even he said very little. He was a German, had been discharged in consequence of a wound, after fighting in Egypt and the Peninsula, had then entered the Austrian army, and was now enjoying his otium in Prague. I learned from him that the rate of allowance to each man, was a suit of clothes once in four years, one pair of shoes and one pair of soles per annum, a quarter of a pound of meat with twice as much black bread daily, and no wine. Had he gone upon what we should call the out-pension, his subsistence would have amounted to three-pence,--of our money,--per day.

There are several churches and convents in the same quarter of Prague; but none which much repay the trouble of inspecting them. That of St. Emaus is, perhaps, the most interesting, both because it is the oldest, being of the date 1348, and because here some traces of frescoes, which escaped the Hussite violences, may be found. But except for these, and a few of the trophies that were taken at the battle of the White Mountain, it will not strike the visitor as, in any respect, remarkable. It is not here, indeed, nor in the Alt Stadt neither, that the curious in such matters will seek for gratification. He who loves to muse amid the cloisters of a monastery, or delights to recreate himself amid the "Temple's holy gloom," will find the freest scope for the indulgence of his humours, on the opposite side of the Moldau; and as our tastes reverted to that channel, after sufficient time had been devoted to other matters, it may not be amiss if I state some of the occurences that befell during our second visit to the Hradschin and the Strahow.

Not far from the cathedral, and, as a necessary consequence, adjoining to the palace, are two objects which put in strong claims to notice. One is a Loreto chapel, built on the model of that which has so often changed its resting-place; the other is the convent of St. Lawrence, within which the chapel is erected. The latter,--an exact copy of that in the valley of the Misio,--is small, and dark in the interior, the shrine being lighted up only by the lamps which burn continually before the image of the Virgin. It is, however, rich in costly vestments and plate, and richer still in the reverence which the pious pay to it. The convent, again, is large, with fine cloisters, and some tolerable frescoes along the sides of them, and the monks, to do them justice, are exceedingly civil. My young companion expressed a wish to visit their cells, and it was instantly complied with: we were directed to pass round to another door, and there the porter took charge of us.

Our guide,--a squalid creature, with shaven crown, bare legs, sandaled feet, and a grizzly beard,--led us by a long passage first into the refectory. It was a hall of no great dimensions, meanly furnished with deal benches and tables, and surrounded on the walls, with some rude representations of the most loathsome and horrid martyrdoms. The tables were spread with wooden trenchers, each of which had a morsel of rye-bread beside it, and beneath each bench were rows of spit-boxes,--one being set apart for the use of each of the brothers. What the viands might be which were to fill the trenchers, I do not know; but the smell was not inviting, so we quitted the hall, and following our guide up stairs, were introduced into a cell. Its appearance entirely overthrew the theories which my young companion had nourished. A small, but neatly-furnished apartment, with a clean bed, a chest of drawers, and a quantity of flowers on the window-sill, by no means came up to the ideas which he had entertained of monastic asceticism; and when, over and above all this, he found more than a breviary and a crucifix within reach, namely, a sort of pocket-library and a lute, his astonishment found vent in words.

"Are monks allowed to indulge their taste for music?" asked he.

"Oh yes," was the reply; "Brother Franz is a great musician. It is he that always leads in the chanted grace before and after meals."

Brother Franz, however, was not present to answer for himself; so we continued our progress.

We desired to see the chapel; and as we approached it by a back stair, the notes of the organ that swelled along the passage, gave indication that some service was going on. We entered a gallery, whence, from behind the shelter of a screen, we could look down upon the chapel, and those that filled it. The congregation was both numerous and devout, and in the body of the pile, all were engaged in singing a requiem for a departed soul. On a bier in the middle aisle, stood a coffin, having a skull and cross-bones laid upon the pall, and over it hung a priest, whose gestures sufficiently indicated, that for the tenant of that narrow chamber he was supplicating. "This is some recent death?" demanded I; "some person of note is gone to his account, and you are praying that his sins may be pardoned?"

"No, sir," answered the monk, "the individual whose demise we this day commemorate, gave up the ghost an hundred years ago; but we are still bound to say masses for her soul. She has bequeathed property to secure this for ever."

"And is her body in that coffin?" demanded I.

"Not at all," was the answer; "these are but representations of what you take them for. That is not a coffin, neither are these a skull and cross-bones."

I could not help smiling, when this avowal was made with such perfect simplicity; and I went away surprised, that any such awkward endeavour to work upon the sympathies of the people, should be considered judicious.

Among other days of the week, we spent a Sunday in Prague; and a regard to truth compels me to state that the contrast which was presented by the mode of observing the Lord's Day there, to what we had witnessed in Protestant Saxony and Protestant Prussia, redounded very little to the honour of the latter countries. I need not observe that nowhere, on the continent of Europe, are the evenings of the Lord's Day devoted to other purposes than those of amusement. Whatever may be the national faith, whether Romish or Reformed, this is universally the case; but while in Saxony and Prussia the laws appear to sanction the total desecration of that day, even to the prosecution of men's ordinary employments, in Prague, and I am bound to add generally in popish Bohemia, no such desecration takes place. After a given hour, all classes put on their merriest bearing, it is true, and the clergy,--in Prague, a curious combination of stiffness and dandyism,--may be met every where; but till that time arrives, the offices of religion appear to engross all thoughts, for the shops are closed, and the streets deserted, except by persons passing to and from their several places of worship. How much more decent, to use no stronger expression, is this, than the sort of scenes which I had occasion to describe in a previous chapter,--how much better calculated to keep alive among the people some sense of religion, some respect at least for its external observances,--not entirely, it is to be hoped, unconnected with a regard for higher things than externals.

Why should I continue these details any further? We visited the theatre, with the music and acting in which we were greatly delighted; we dined on one of the islands in the Moldau, in the open air, in the midst of a crowd, beneath the canopy of heaven, and with a well-managed band to serenade us all the while; we spent an evening greatly to our own satisfaction, under the shade of the trees in the Thiergarten. We climbed the Strahow, inspected the monastery that crowns its summit, admired the fine library, and gazed with reverence on the autograph of Tycho Brahe; we wandered round the ramparts; we surveyed the field of the battle of Prague; we examined more minutely the ground on which Ziska had fought and conquered; we left nothing unexplored, in short, which we found that it was possible to bring within the scope of general observation; nor permitted any matter, concerning which curiosity had been excited, to pass without investigation. The result was a tolerably accurate acquaintance with every remarkable object in the place, not excepting Count Nositz's small but excellent gallery,--one of the most creditable collections of modern growth which I have seen. Neither did we fail to form acquaintance with the people, as well of the humbler as of the more exalted stations; of which the result, in every instance, was, that the favourable impression which had been made upon me, while wandering among the mountains, suffered no diminution. I found them to be,--in the city, not less than among the villages,--a kind-hearted, industrious, and most patient race. I saw, indeed, that they were not without their grounds of discontent, and that they felt their grievances keenly. The higher orders complained because the ancient capital of their native land had sunk into a mere provincial town. They pointed to palaces deserted and falling to decay, and said, with natural bitterness, that it ill became Bohemians of the best blood to prefer the pleasures of Vienna to the duty which they owed to their father-land. They spoke, too, indignantly of the centralizing system, of the ban that had gone forth against their beloved language, of the extinction of their privileges, and the efforts that are making, to blot out the very remembrance of their nationality. "But it will not succeed," was the usual termination of such harangues. "We have no idea of shaking off the yoke. We know that in the present state of Europe, Bohemia could not exist one year as an independent monarchy; but we shall never be content till the laws are everywhere administered in a language which is intelligible to the people, and we and they be permitted to exercise some control over our own affairs." In like manner, the humbler classes,--the shop-keeper, the mechanic, and the artisan,--spoke not unintelligibly of their altered condition, since the native nobility were their best customers, and taxation scarcely reached them. "But we are no longer a people now. The stranger rules us, the shackles are on our wrists;--what can we do?" Then would follow a shrug of the shoulders, a wink of the eye, and a hasty return to the sort of manner which a careless observer might easily mistake for the external proof of content, but which is, in fact, a disguise put on to hide feelings directly the reverse.