by
the saint himself. The sound of their psalmody ceased. The crucifix was
lowered, and man and woman, boy and maiden, breaking loose from their
ranks, flocked down, _en masse_, to ascertain the cause of so strange a
phenomenon. I suspect that St. James received but a scanty allowance of
worship that evening; at least, I am sure that the number of his
votaries became sadly diminished; for when the chant rose again, and
the crucifix was uplifted as a signal for moving, the retinue that
attended it, came short by at least one-half of that which had
followed, with all imaginable decorum, as far as the banks of the Iser.

It was now getting on towards three o'clock, and as the weather,
instead of improving, became every moment more boisterous, we
determined to abandon our fishing. We accordingly adjourned to the
gasthof, where a roasted fowl had been prepared for us, and made a
hearty dinner, in the midst of the same crowd which had watched our
mode of operations on the river. To them we were obliged to explain the
whole process by which rods are unscrewed and put together again, reels
turned round, and flies attached to casting lines; and I dare say that
to this hour, they have not ceased to talk about the whole affair as an
invention, second in point of ingenuity, only to the steam-engine.

This done, we became, in our turn, the querists. We begged to be
conducted over the foundry, and our wishes were immediately attended
to. It is on a small scale, but apparently very complete, with one
furnace and numerous models; and it was stated to supply very many of
the manufacturies both in Bohemia and Austria Proper, with the
iron-work required for their machinery. As to the ore itself, that is
found in abundance among the hills hard by, and is said to be of
excellent quality. I need scarcely add, that, though they have pit-coal
at their command, they use only coke and charcoal for smelting, because
everybody knows that for such purposes charcoal is the most approved
species of fuel.

We had had a capital day's sport, and the rain having at length ceased,
we turned our faces towards Starkenbach. The fish, with which we loaded
a countryman, and conveyed by his means to our host's dwelling, caused
almost as much astonishment there, as our mode of catching them had
occasioned at Eisenhammer. Not only our hosts, but their domestics, and
not they alone, but the people in the streets as we passed, shouted and
clapped their hands at