Page:The Czechoslovak Review, vol4, 1920.pdf/224
It was not far to Hrubá Skála, where the Austian minister, Baron von Aehrenthal, owned a castle. He it was, I believe, who said on a certain well-remembered occasion: “These wretched Czechs! They ought to be exterminated, root and branch. Let them wait. Their day is coming!” It was a curious proof that their day had really arrived, when Miloš went serenely up to the gate of the castle and knocked, requesting admittance for himself and wife and an American. The lodge-tender, who was a German, and like to die with humiliation, went off to find the resident keeper, who came and received us with great courtesy. We explained that we were interested in old castles, and he immediately conducted us about. There was a richly colored old porcelain stove that we liked, made out of the fragments of a still larger and older one which, in the course of time had collapsed and been removed to some obscure store-house, where one of the Aehrenthal family found it. There was also a curious set of chess-men, and an enormous clock, and some intricate wood-carving.
The keeper talked with us about the ruin of Trosky, which is easily seen from Hrubá Skála, but he warned us solemnly against going there. For it appeared that there had long been only one guide who was capable of leading travelers up the beetling hill and through the crumbling halls and balconies. This man was only considered reliable when slightly drunk, but it appeared that his favorite beverages had so stolen a march upon him that he now spent most of his days in a state of torpor. I am bound to say that we did not put much faith in the keeper’s story and, when his back was turned, we debated just what he meant by it. Miloš thought he probably wanted to guide us there himself and receive pay for it, Milada believed it was the influence of spring or that love might have made him temporarily mad, while I in a riotous burst of imagination, conceived that there might be German propaganda books stored in the deserted rooms of Trosky or insidious printing-presses operating by moonlight. At any rate, we decided not to go up there, and, after we had shaken hands with the keeper and given him good day, we walked across the open square of Hrubá Skála and turned down into the Mouse-Hole.
Everyone who knows anything about this art of Bohemia knows about the Mouse-Hole. It is a great descending crack in the rock, so narrow and deep that a damp twilight forever holds sway in its lower recesses. The Mouse-Hole is a freakish exhibition of Nature, something to sit down and laugh at, except that the sudden way it opens up on the edge of the Hrubá Skála square makes it momentarily rather awful. Stone steps run down through it to the valley below, and the really notable thing about it is that it is a public thoroughfare, constantly used, and not a mere curiosity. As we went down into the Hole, I had no idea of meeting anyone, but when we were half-way an old peasant woman suddenly came in sight around a corner pensively urging three she-goats along the upward course. She stared and nodded at us, and Miloš and Milada gave her a polite salutation. But I did not. The manner of her appearance made her seem like one of those spirits which are not natural, and the sombre light of the place caused the animals to take on the look of astral goats. I afterwards regretted that I had not spoken, but it was too late to go back and atone for my discourtesy. If this be rudeness, thought I, then, old woman, you must just make the most of it.
The walk from the lower mouth of the Mouse-Hole led over a pleasant road which was first arched over with trees and then bordered with villas. It led us to a railway station in the midst of fields, and we waited there and lay on our backs, blinking up at the cloudless sky until a train arrived. This train conveyed us to Jičín.
It was in Jičín that Miloš broke the clasp of his nose-glasses. Being blinder than a bat without them, he felt that he must have the damage repaired at once. So he went to a purveyor of spectacles, but it was so late that the shop was closed, and he set off on his rounds to find another, leaving Milada and me to walk about and see the statues for which Jičín is noted. There are three, in particular, which one must see: statues of Hus, Havlíček and one other. We admired them, but immediately afterward we encountered something which diverted us much more. Two wagon-loads of komedianti, itinerant players, came into the town, and we joined the gang of small boys who followed them through the winding streets. The vehicles in which they trav-