the
Czech is so intensely musical that he will master any instrument before
he has got the hang of the grammar of his own language, the fiddle is so
much easier. The strange thing is that the musical performance continued
long after Dalibor's death--here Legend steps in with the assertion that
an angel, a fairy, or at least some sort of supernatural being, is
continuing Dalibor's programme.

[Illustration: A TOWER OF THE HRAD[vC]ANY.]

There were many other visitors to Daliborka, and in course of time the
lower stratum of the tower filled up with human relics. As the defunct
visitors were mostly Czechs, and therefore full of music, I should think
that they could form at least a string quartette--it only requires a
little enterprise and a good strong medium. I make a present of this
suggestion to the Prague Society for Psychical Research, if there be
one.

Prague must have been a fair city in those days when Ottokar II rode out
of the gate to meet Rudolph of Habsburg. Although the ban of the Empire
and the interdict of the Church were upon their King, the people of
Prague, clergy and laymen, accompanied him to the city gate with prayers
and tears. When news of his death came to Prague the bells of one
hundred churches tolled out on that 26th of August, the Feast of St.
Rufus, a day destined to be of ill-omen to Bohemia's Kings.

* * * * *

The shadow of the hand of Habsburg hung darkly over the southern
frontiers of Bohemia. Rudolph, the first Habsburg Emperor, began the
famous tactics of his house, gaining power by matrimonial alliances. His
son Rudolph was to marry Agnes, daughter of Ottokar II, whose son
Wenceslaus II was to marry Gutta, the Emperor's daughter.

Wenceslaus II was a minor when he succeeded his father, and suffered
considerably under his guardian and cousin Otto of Brandenburg, who, in
pursuit of an all-German policy, even imprisoned the young King. Anarchy
reigned in Bohemia when young Wenceslaus, at the age of twelve,
nominally assumed the reins of government. The actual ruler of the
country, however, was Zavis of Falckenstein, an able man but of doubtful
morality; there was some unsavoury story concerning him and Ottokar's
widow Kunhuta, whom Zavis eventually married. Then again the young King
had Zavis done to death in treacherous manner, while the condition of
Bohemia as an ordered State went from bad to worse. Strange to relate,
the country flourished economic