," who on other occasions were banished, bag
and baggage, from Prague and driven out into the country. Though now and
again they suffered intolerably, yet were they on the whole better
treated than in many other parts of Europe, were allowed to develop
along their own lines, and produced many men of mark and learning, and
women of distinction, among the latter one who was raised to the
nobility by a Habsburg Emperor and King of Bohemia, Bas-Schevi called
"of Treunberg." Among the prominent men whose light shone out beyond the
Ghetto of Prague, I may mention the poet-Rabbi Abigdor Caro, the
bibliophile Rabbi Oppenheim whose library is now in Oxford, then the
chronicler and mathematician David Gans, a friend of Keppler and Tycho
de Brahe, and Solomon de Medigo de Candia the pupil of Galileo Galilei.

[Illustration: "A RELIC OF THE GHETTO."]

Tall modern houses look down upon the smoke-blackened temple; the Ghetto
gates have fallen long ago, and nothing remains of its former crowded
dwelling-places but a quaint ramshackle old house of Oriental aspect,
and the old cemetery, Beth-Chaim, "the House of Life," as the Jews call
it. This is no doubt the oldest existing and still preserved Jewish
cemetery in Europe. Here tombstones stand closely crowded together, or
lean one against the other under the thickets of ancient elder-bushes;
glints of sunlight flicker through the dense foliage over graven sign of
stag, of vine or flower, or the hand upraised in benediction of some son
of Aaron, light up Hebrew script in its severely decorative characters,
inscriptions half effaced but not forgotten, for careful record has been
kept. This old burial ground seems far removed from Central Europe, yet
it is intimately connected with the story of Prague. Though old
landmarks are vanishing, yet a mist of legend hangs close over this
strange, alien part of the city, legends of cabalists, reputed sorcerers
like Aaron Spira or the more famous Rabbi Jehuda ben Bezalel Loew. The
latter is supposed to have been in league with the Powers of Darkness
which bestowed on him superhuman gifts. This Rabbi is said to have
created an Homunculus which became so troublesome that it had to be
incarcerated. The spot chosen as prison for this evil being was high up
in the wall of the temple. A row of iron clamps leads up to a small door
on the outside wall facing the Mikula[vs]ska T[vr]ida, leads up to where
Homunculus is still believed to be in durance.

Prag