om the scene of disasters. Open carriages stood in waiting; they
stepped in, the students flung themselves on horseback; the princes were
to take up their residence in the palace of the cardinal-archbishop, the
primate of Liparia, in the Episcopal, which, together with the cathedral
and the Old Palace, formed one colossal, ancient, grey mass, a town in
itself, the very heart of the city.

They rode quickly on. The people cheered; they look upon them as a train
of deliverers who, they thought, would at last bring them safety.
Between the departure of the emperor and the arrival of the prince a
depression had reigned which, at the sight of Othomar, changed into
morbid enthusiasm.

It became suddenly dark, but not through the sun's setting--it was only
five o'clock in the month of March in the south--it became dark because
of the clouds, the ships in the sky carrying in their tense,
bowl-shaped, giant sails water which already was beginning to trickle
down again in drops. Under that grey sky the cheering of the people rose
in a minor key, when suddenly, as though the swollen clouds were
bursting open with one rent, a flood dashed down in a solitary,
perpendicular sheet of water.

Othomar was sitting with Herman and Ducardi in the first carriage.

"Would not your highness prefer to have the carriage closed?" asked the
old general, helping the prince on with his cape.

Othomar hesitated; he had no time to answer the general; the crowd
increased, became thicker, cheered; and he bowed in acknowledgement,
saluted, nodded. The heavy rain clattered straight down. The hard
rainbeams ran down the princes' and the general's necks, down their
backs, soaked their knees. The crowd stood sheltered under an irregular
roof of umbrellas, as though grouped under wet, black stars, filled the
narrow streets of the old city, pressed in between the outriders and the
carriage: the coachman had to drive more slowly.

"Won't you have the carriage shut?" Herman repeated after Ducardi.

Othomar still hesitated. Then--and he himself thought his words a little
theatrical and did not know how they would sound--he answered aloud:

"No, do not let us be afraid of the water; they have all suffered from
the water here."

But Ducardi looked at him; he felt something quiver inside him for his
prince....

The carriage remained open. In one of the landaus following, Prince
Dutri looked round furiously to see how much longer the Duke of Xara
meant t