"My father!... Hear oh Israel, the Lord our God is one God."
Gabriel flung himself into his father's wide opened arms.... they held one another in close embrace.... their lips quivered as if they would have spoken.... but they never spoke again.... the too swift alternation of feeling had loosened the slight bond that united spirit to body; the most terrible emotion, that has ever possessed a human heart, killed them!
They held one another still fast embraced in death--in life divided, isolated, in death they would not be parted.
This heart-breaking scene had not remained unwitnessed. Blume had stood at the window of her house in sad painful expectation.... What she had seen and heard had filled her with unutterable horror.... but she was saved.... Profoundly struck by this dispensation of Providence, she fell with unspeakable emotion upon her knees and prayed.
VII.
The Palatine escaped next morning in the direction of Breslau. Anhalt, Hohenlohe, the elder Thurn, the elder Bubna, Bohuslaw Berka, Raupowa, and others accompanied him.--The Kleinseiters always devoted to the Emperor, as soon as Frederick had left the city sent messengers to Duke Maximilian and begged him to make his entry into the city. At mid-day the Duke accompanied by Boucquoi and Tilly marched through the Strahower Gate to the Hradschin, William of Lobkowiz, and five other Bohemian nobles came to meet him, wished him joy of the victory that he had won, and begged, as the chronicles declare, in a long speech interspersed with much weeping, pardon for their revolt, the maintenance of their liberties and mercy for the city. Maximilian answered benignantly that he would do all that he was able, and that the city should not be injured; with regard to the other points, he had no full powers. For himself he advised them to surrender unconditionally to the Emperor.--The Alt- and Neu-stadters had sent at the same time a deputation to the Duke, with a request, that he would grant them three days to draw up the conditions, under which they were willing to surrender. Maximilian refused this delay, and they immediately took an oath of obedience and fidelity to the Emperor and delivered up their arms to the duke.--The news of the duke's successful entry had evoked the most joyous excitement in the Jews-town, which like the Kleinseiters had ever been well disposed towards the Emperor. The overseer invited the elders and members of the college of Rabbis to an extraordinary conference at the Rathhaus, and it was unanimously decided, to present a congratulating address to the Duke Maximilian, as victor, in the name of the Jewish community at Prague. The meeting was just at an end, when the grave-diggers accompanied by Cobbler Abraham urgently begged to be admitted. In the morning at a funeral two dead bodies had been found in the burial ground, that held one another close clasped even in death. The two corpses had assumed in death an extraordinary likeness, a likeness such as one only meets with between father and son, both namely bore upon their forehead a similar blue streak. The mad Jacob had been known to everyone, but with regard to the other body only one of the persons who happened to be present at the funeral, could give accurate information. Cobbler Abraham to wit, declared that he had been acquainted with the young man, who had only lately arrived at Prague, and that immediately on his arrival he had recommended him to a lodging at Reb Schlome Sachs', the upper attendant of the Old-Synagogue. In answer to enquiries made of the last mentioned person later on, he had learnt that the stranger was called Gabriel Mar, and was a clever student from upper Germany. The gravediggers thought it their duty to make a report of this strange occurrence to the college of Rabbis and the overseers of the community, and Cobbler Abraham once again repeated his depositions with respect to the corpse of the young man.
The assembled authorities accounted this matter of sufficient importance to justify their casting a look over the letters which had been found in the clothes of the deceased. The superscription at once excited universal surprise, the letters were addressed to Major-General Otto Bitter and signed Ernest of Mannsfield, General and Field Marshal; their contents referred to the operations of the war and secret plans.... No one knew what to think about it. Some were inclined to believe that Gabriel Mar was a messenger of Mannsfield's, others doubted, for if so, Mannsfield would not have signed his name in full, and held Gabriel to be a spy of the Imperialists, who had somehow or other got possession of these letters; others again believed simply that Gabriel Mar, and Major-General Otto Bitter were one and the same person. They had just got into a lively discussion on this point, when the door of the council-room was suddenly opened and Reb Schlome Sachs and Reb Michoel Glogau entered unannounced.
"You come at the right time," cried the overseer to him--"perhaps you can give us some information about your lodger, who...."
"We come for that very purpose, Reb Gadel!" interposed Reb Schlome.... "but I am too much overcome with what I have just heard. Do you tell them, Reb Michoel, I pray you, you are more composed than I."
The attention of the whole assembly was now directed to Michoel Glogau.