to the
attractive composition of Prague. This must also have impressed that
far-seeing lady, Libu[vs]a--it inspired her as it has inspired many
people since.

* * * * *

The psychology of rivers has not been sufficiently studied. Most people
just call a river blue, or golden or muddy, and pass on to other
subjects. In reality every river of importance has a definite character
all its own; so, for that matter, has every stream of running water,
however insignificant it may seem. Our ancestors recognized the fact,
but preferred to endow brooks and streams with a definite personality in
the form of nymphs, pixies, or whatever they were called. The Cross has
driven these harmless and pathetic little beings out of the world they
lived in; only a few were allowed to linger, such as Isa, who till quite
recently came ashore from the Danube between Passau and Vienna because
she felt so lonely, poor dear! Then there is Undine, but she only
appears on the operatic stage, and that but rarely. Under our present
strenuous existence, where all is bent towards material success, there
is no place for the sprites whose voices the ancients heard in the
twilight silence. How could any properly constituted nymph play
hide-and-seek with the moonbeams, or cast an eye upon a handsome
boatman, from under the well-regulated bank of a river of to-day? As far
as present-day mortals are concerned, any stream means water-power, any
river means a waterway for commerce, and those thus engaged after the
day's work turn away from river and stream without waiting to hear what
they have to say when the din of industry dies down and the voice of the
running water can be heard again.

There must be a certain and strong connection between a river and the
people that live on its banks; one surely reacts upon the other, and in
the process the character of both develops. Not only the sky, but the
works of man, are reflected in rivers, have been so reflected since man
began to work at all; so the character of a people must be influenced by
rivers: witness the lazy reflections of the "Ponte Vecchio" in the
golden Arno, the comfortable parks and lawns and country houses mirrored
by the Thames until it gradually becomes busy, and very dirty, on its
way to join the sea, with a sigh of relief after such a very strenuous
"last lap."

The river at Prague is worthy of careful study, but whatever I may
suggest as to its influence on th