Now a man hurries past carrying a tall circular basket filled with piled-up dinners in round dishes; now another wheeling bundles of coloured glass rods; now another with a barrow-load of bread, and many a slice will you see sold for a noonday repast. Then comes a troop of lawless-looking street-musicians; then beggars grinding out squeaky music from tinkered organs; then a girl carrying a coffin, painted black and yellow, under her arm, which bears a cross on its gabled lid. And now and then, among all these, your eye is arrested by a singular, wild-looking figure, whom you will think the strangest of all. He has lank black hair hanging to his shoulders from under a fluffy, round-crowned, broad-brimmed hat—of the fashion still worn by a few old Quakers in out-of-the-way places. He disdains a shirt, and wears a tight jacket and hosen of whitey-brown serge. He goes barefoot, walking with long, stealthy strides, looking, so you guess, furtively around. On his shoulder he carries a coil of fine iron wire, and in his hand a broken red pan or stone pitcher. Wild, however, and out of place as he looks, he is only a Wallachian plying his honest calling. He is a Drateñik—or Drahtbinder (Wirebinder), as the Germans call it—going about to mend broken pans and pitchers by binding the fractures together with wire; a task which he performs with neatness and dexterity.
I went to the Polizeidirection to reclaim my passport. About a dozen persons were waiting. To some who looked poor and timid the clerk spoke roughly, assuming beforehand a something "not regular." One might fancy that his ungracious occupation had told upon his looks, for he was the ugliest man I ever saw, and, unlike the women, who gave themselves airs in the streets, he seemed to be aware of Nature's unkindness towards him. When my turn came, he asked, "Where are you going?"
"To the Riesengebirge."
"So! But we can't sign a passport for the mountains. You must tell us the name of some town."
"Make it Landeshut, if you will; or any frontier town in Silesia."
"Can't do that. We must have some town on this side the mountains."
"I don't yet know which of three routes I shall take. Say some town nearest to the mountains. Does it make any difference?"
"Schön! You can come back here when your mind is made up." And with this rejoinder, Ugly turned away to consider a timid lady's request for permission to go a journey of fifteen miles.
There was time enough, so I strolled away to the suspension-bridge—Kaiser Franzens Brücke—which, more than 1400 feet long, crosses the Moldau and the Schützen Insel, a short distance above the stone bridge. The view midway will make you linger. On the right bank, Franzens-quai, stretching from one bridge to the other, forms a spacious esplanade, in the centre of which, surrounded by gardens, rises the monument erected by the Estates of Bohemia to the honour of Francis I. Beyond and on either side the towers and palaces are seen in a new aspect, differently grouped from our early morning view. Those of the Kleinseite, backed by the leafy slopes of the Laurenzberg, while immediately beneath your eye rests on the green sward and shady groves of three or four islands. The river rushing past to the dam makes a lively ripple, imparting a sense of coolness enjoyed by the visitors who throng the islands during the summer season. The Sophien Insel, named after the Archduchess Sophie, the emperor's mother, with its pleasure-grounds, dancing-floors, orchestras, refreshment-rooms, and baths, is the chief resort, especially on Sundays. The large ball-room was the scene of noisy public meetings in '48; the Sclave Congress was held there, followed by a Sclavonic costume ball. These islands are a pleasing feature in the view, and, with their shady bowers and the noise of the water mingling with strains of music, contrast agreeably with the matter-of-fact of the city. The Schützen Insel is resorted to by rifle companies, and you may hear a brisk succession of shots from the practice that appears to be always going on.
During the outbreak of June, 1848, the floor of the bridge was taken up, and the passage across completely interrupted for some weeks by the military. And it was to Prince Windischgratz's demonstrations during the same month that the inhabitants were indebted for an extension of their handsome quay. An old water-tower, and sundry ricketty wooden mills that stood at the end of the stone bridge, were set on fire by a shell from the prince's artillery, and the space cleared by the flames was taken into the newly-formed area.