t him askance. Living in Prague all his
life, he had hardly been above once or twice in the narrow streets
which he was now threading. Strangers who come to Prague visit the
Jews' quarter as a matter of course, and to such strangers the Jews of
Prague are invariably courteous. But the Christians of the city seldom
walk through the heart of the Jews' locality, or hang about the Jews'
synagogue, or are seen among their houses unless they have special
business. The Jews' quarter, though it is a banishment to the Jews from
the fairer portions of the city, is also a separate and somewhat sacred
castle in which they may live after their old fashion undisturbed. As
Ziska went on, he became aware that the throng of people was unusually
great, and that the day was in some sort more peculiar than the
ordinary Jewish Sabbath. That the young men and girls should be dressed
in their best clothes was, as a matter of course, incidental to the
day; but he could perceive that there was an outward appearance of gala
festivity about them which could not take place every week. The tall
bright-eyed black-haired girls stood talking in the streets, with
something of boldness in their gait and bearing, dressed many of them
in white muslin, with bright ribbons and full petticoats, and that
small bewitching Hungarian hat which they delight to wear. They stood
talking somewhat loudly to each other, or sat at the open windows;
while the young men in black frock-coats and black hats, with crimson
cravats, clustered by themselves, wishing, but not daring so early in
the day, to devote themselves to the girls, who appeared, or attempted
to appear, unaware of their presence. Who can say why it is that those
encounters, which are so ardently desired by both sides, are so rarely
able to get themselves commenced till the enemies have been long in
sight of each other? But so it is among Jews and Christians, among rich
and poor, out under the open sky, and even in the atmosphere of the
ball-room, consecrated though it be to such purposes. Go into any
public dancing-room of Vienna, where the girls from the shops and the
young men from their desks congregate to waltz and make love, and you
shall observe that from ten to twelve they will dance as vigorously as
at a later hour, but that they will hardly talk to each other till the
mellowness of the small morning hours has come upon them.

Among these groups in the Jewish quarter Ziska made his way, conscious
t