On Prague's proud arch the fires of ruin glow, His blood-dyed waters murmuring far below.
As the old hermit of Prague, that never saw pen and ink, very wittily said to a niece of King Gorboduc, That that is, is.
"But you can understand," said our strange visitor, sitting down once more and passing his hand over his high white forehead, "you can understand that I am not accustomed to doing such business in my own person. Yet the matter was so delicate that I could not confide it to an agent without putting myself in his power. I have come incognito from Prague for the purpose of consulting you."
Well, as I was saying about the parlor, there was beautiful curtains on the windows: white, with pictures painted on them of castles with vines all down the walls, and cattle coming down to drink. There was a little old piano, too, that had tin pans in it, I reckon, and nothing was ever so lovely as to hear the young ladies sing "The Last Link is Broken" and play "The Battle of Prague" on it. The walls of all the rooms was plastered, and most had carpets on the floors, and the whole house was whitewashed on the outside.
CREDNER, CARL FRIEDRICH HEINRICH (1809-1876), German geologist, was born at Waltershausen near Gotha, on the 13th of March 1809. He investigated the geology of the Thüringer Waldes, of which he published a map in 1846. He was author of a work entitled _Über die Gliederung der oberen Juraformation und der Wealden-Bildung im nordwestlichen Deutschland_ (Prague, 1863), also of a geological map of Hanover (1865). He died at Halle on the 28th of September 1876. Entry: CREDNER
Before the combination of Clericals and Federalists the ministry broke down; they were divided among themselves; Counts Taaffe and Alfred Potocki, the minister of agriculture, wished to conciliate the Slav races--a policy recommended by Beust, probably with the sympathy of the emperor; the others determined to cripple the opposition by taking away the elections for the Reichsrath from the diets. Taaffe and his friends resigned in January 1870, but the majority did not long survive. In March, after long delay, the new Galician demands were definitely rejected; the whole of the Polish club, followed by the Tirolese and Slovenes, left the House, which consequently consisted of 110 members--the Germans and German representatives from Bohemia and Moravia. It was clearly impossible to govern with such a parliament. Not four years had gone by, and the new constitution seemed to have failed like the old one. The only thing to do was to attempt a reconciliation with the Slavs. The ministry resigned, and Potocki and Taaffe formed a government with this object. Potocki, now minister-president, then entered on negotiations, hoping to persuade the Czechs to accept the constitution. Rieger and Thun were summoned to Vienna; he himself went to Prague, but after two days he had to give up the attempt in despair. Feudals and Czechs all supported the declaration of 1868, and would accept no compromise, and he returned to Vienna after what was the greatest disappointment of his life. Government, however, had to be carried on; the war between Germany and France broke out in July, and Austria might be drawn into it; the emperor could not at such a crisis alienate either the Germans or the Slavs. The Reichsrath and all the diets were dissolved. This time in Bohemia the Czechs, supported by the Feudals and the Clericals, gained a large majority; they took their seats in the diet only to declare that they did not regard it as the legal representative of the Bohemian kingdom, but merely an informal assembly, and refused to elect delegates for the Reichsrath. The Germans in their turn now left the diet, and the Czechs voted an address to the crown, drawn up by Count Thun, demanding the restoration of the Bohemian kingdom. When the Reichsrath met there were present only 130 out of 203 members, for the whole Bohemian contingent was absent; the government then, under a law of 1868, ordered that as the Bohemian diet had sent no delegates, they were to be chosen directly from the people. Twenty-four Constitutionalists and thirty _Declaranten_ were chosen; the latter, of course, did not go to Vienna, but the additional twenty-four made a working majority by which the government was carried on for the rest of the year. Entry: II
MACH, ERNST (1838- ), Austrian physicist and psychologist, was born on the 18th of February 1838 at Turas in Moravia, and studied at Vienna. He was professor of mathematics at Grätz (1864-1867), of physics at Prague (1867-1895), and of physics at Vienna (1895-1901). In 1879 and 1880 as _Rector Magnificus_ he fought against the introduction of Czech instead of German in the Prague University. In 1901 he was made a member of the Austrian house of peers. In philosophy he began with a strong predilection for the physical side of psychology, and at an early age he came to the conclusion that all existence is sensation, and, after a lapse into noümenalism under the influence of Fechner's _Psychophysics_, finally adopted a universal physical phenomenalism. The Ego he considers not an entity sharply distinguished from the Non-ego, but merely, as it were, a medium of continuity of sensory impressions. His whole theory appears to be vitiated by the confusion of physics and psychology. Entry: MACH
DOMINICANS, otherwise called Friars Preachers, and in England Black Friars, from the black mantle worn over a white habit, an order of friars founded by St Dominic (q.v.). Their first house was in Toulouse, where the bishop established them at the church of St Romain, 1215. Dominic at once went to Rome to obtain permission to found an order of preachers whose sphere of activity should be the whole world, but Innocent III. said they must adopt one of the existing rules. Dominic returned to Toulouse and it was resolved to take the Rule of St Augustine, Dominic himself having been an Augustinian canon at Osma (see AUGUSTINIAN CANONS). Dominic went again to Rome, and during the year 1216 he obtained from Honorius III. a series of confirmations of the community at Toulouse as a congregation of Canons Regular of St Augustine with a special mission to preach. Early in 1218 an encyclical bull was issued to the bishops of the whole Catholic world recommending to them the "Order of Friars Preachers," followed in 1221 by another ordering them to give to the friars faculties to preach and hear confessions in their dioceses. Already in 1217 Dominic had scattered the little band of seventeen over the world--to Paris, into Spain, and one he took with himself to Rome. Within a few months there were forty friars in Rome, at Santa Sabina on the Aventine, and thirty in Paris; and before Dominic's death in 1221 friaries had been established at Lyons, Limoges, Reims, Metz, Poitiers and Orleans; at Bologna, Milan, Florence, Verona, Piacenza and Venice; at Madrid, Palencia, Barcelona and Seville; at Friesach in Carinthia; at Cracow and Prague; and friars were on their way to Hungary and England. Entry: DOMINICANS
HALLAM, ROBERT (d. 1417), bishop of Salisbury and English representative at the council of Constance, was educated at Oxford, and was chancellor of the university from 1403 to 1405. In the latter year the pope nominated him to be archbishop of York, but the king objected. However, in 1407 he was consecrated by Gregory XII. at Siena as bishop of Salisbury. At the council of Pisa in 1409 he was one of the English representatives. On the 6th of June 1411 Pope John XXIII. made Hallam a cardinal, but there was some irregularity, and his title was not recognized. At the council of Constance (q.v.), which met in November 1414, Hallam was the chief English envoy. There he at once took a prominent position, as an advocate of the cause of Church reform, and of the superiority of the council to the pope. In the discussions which led up to the deposition of John XXIII. on the 29th of May 1415 he had a leading share. With the trials of John Hus and Jerome of Prague he had less concern. The emperor Sigismund, through whose influence the council had been assembled, was absent during the whole of 1416 on a diplomatic mission in France and England; but when he returned to Constance in January 1417, as the open ally of the English king, Hallam as Henry's trusted representative obtained increased importance. Hallam contrived skilfully to emphasize English prestige by delivering the address of welcome to Sigismund on his formal reception. Afterwards, under his master's direction, he gave the emperor vigorous support in the endeavour to secure a reform of the Church, before the council proceeded to the election of a new pope. This matter was still undecided when Hallam died suddenly, on the 4th of September 1417. After his death the direction of the English nation fell into less skilful hands, with the result that the cardinals were able to secure the immediate election of a new pope (Martin V., elected on the 11th of November). It has been supposed that the abandonment of the reformers by the English was due entirely to Hallam's death; but it is more likely that Henry V., foreseeing the possible need for a change of front, had given Hallam discretionary powers which the bishop's successors used with too little judgment. Hallam himself, who had the confidence of Sigismund and was generally respected for his straightforward independence, might have achieved a better result. Hallam was buried in the cathedral at Constance, where his tomb near the high altar is marked by a brass of English workmanship. Entry: HALLAM
The downfall of Prussia left Austria the sole hope of Germany and of Europe. Gentz, who from the winter of 1806 onwards divided his time between Prague and the Bohemian watering-places, seemed to devote himself wholly to the pleasures of society, his fascinating personality gaining him a ready reception in those exalted circles which were to prove of use to him later on in Vienna. But, though he published nothing, his pen was not idle, and he was occupied with a series of essays on the future of Austria and the best means of liberating Germany and redressing the balance of Europe; though he himself confessed to his friend Adam Müller (August 4th, 1806) that, in the miserable circumstances of the time, his essay on "the principles of a general pacification" must be taken as a "political poem." Entry: GENTZ
After the re-establishment of European peace in 1815 the long-suppressed national aspirations of Bohemia began to revive. The national movement, however, at first only found expression in the revival of Bohemian literature. The arbitrary and absolutist government of Prince Metternich rendered all political action impossible in the lands ruled by the house of Habsburg. In spite of this pressure the estates of Bohemia began in 1845 to assume an attitude of opposition to the government of Vienna. They affirmed their right of voting the taxes of the country--a right that was due to them according to the constitution of 1627. To obtain the support of the wider classes of the population, they determined in 1847 to propose at their session of the following year that the towns should have a more extensive representation at the diet, that the control of the estates over the finances of the country should be made more stringent, and that the Bohemian language should be introduced into all the higher schools of the country. The revolutionary outbreak of 1848 prevented this meeting of the estates. When the news of the February revolution in Paris reached Prague the excitement there was very great. On the 11th of March a vast public meeting voted a petition to the government of Vienna which demanded that the Bohemian language should enjoy equal rights with the German in all the government offices of the country, that a general diet comprising all the Bohemian lands, but elected on an extensive suffrage, should be convoked, and that numerous liberal reforms should be introduced. The deputation which presented these demands in Vienna received a somewhat equivocal answer. In reply, however, to a second deputation, the emperor Ferdinand declared on the 8th of April that equality of rights would be secured to both nationalities in Bohemia, that the question of the reunion of Moravia and Silesia to Bohemia should be left to a general meeting of representatives of all parts of Austria, and that a new meeting of the estates of Bohemia, which would include representatives of the principal towns, would shortly be convoked. This assembly, which was to have had full powers to create a new constitution, and which would have established complete autonomy, never met, though the election of its members took place on the 17th of May. In consequence of the general national movement which is so characteristic of the year 1848, it was decided to hold at Prague a "Slavic congress" to which Slavs of all parts of the Austrian empire, as well as those belonging to other countries, were invited. The deliberations were interrupted by the serious riots that broke out in the streets of Prague on the 12th of June. They were suppressed after prolonged fighting and considerable bloodshed. The Austrian commander, Prince Windischgrätz, bombarded the city, which finally capitulated unconditionally. The nationalist and liberal movement in Bohemia was thus suddenly checked, though the Bohemians took part in the Austrian constituent assembly that met at Vienna, and afterwards at Kromeriz (Kremsier). Entry: HISTORY
Leitmeritz was originally the castle of a royal count and is first mentioned, in 993, in the foundation charter of the convent of St Margaret near Prague. In 1248 it received a town charter, and was governed by the laws of Magdeburg until the time of Ferdinand I., having a special court of jurisdiction over all the royal towns where this law obtained. The town reached its highest degree of prosperity under Charles IV., who bestowed upon it large tracts of forest, agricultural land and vineyards. In the Hussite wars, after its capture by the utraquist, Leitmeritz remained true to "the Chalice," shared also in the revolt against Ferdinand I., and suffered in consequence. It was still more unfortunate during the Thirty Years' War, in the course of which most of the Protestant inhabitants left it; the property of the Bohemian refugees being given to German immigrants. The present bishopric was established in 1655. Entry: LEITMERITZ
KOLIN, or NEU-KOLIN (also _Kollin_; Czech, _Nový Kolín_), a town of Bohemia, Austria, 40 m. E. of Prague by rail. Pop. (1900), 15,025, mostly Czech. It is situated on the Elbe, and amongst its noteworthy buildings may be specially mentioned the beautiful early Gothic church of St Bartholomew, erected during the latter half of the 14th century. The industries of the town include sugar-refining, steam mills, brewing, and the manufacture of starch, syrup, spirits, potash and tin ware. The neighbourhood is known for the excellence of its fruit and vegetables. Kolin is chiefly famous on account of the battle here on the 18th of June 1757, when the Prussians under Frederick the Great were defeated by the Austrians under Daun (see SEVEN YEARS' WAR). The result was the raising of the siege of Prague and the evacuation of Bohemia by the Prussians. Kolin was colonized in the 13th century by German settlers and made a royal city. In 1421 it was captured by the men of Prague, and the German inhabitants who refused to accept "the four articles" were expelled. In 1427 the town declared against Prague, was besieged by Prokop the Great, and surrendered to him upon conditions at the close of the year. Entry: KOLIN
FRANZENSBAD, or KAISER-FRANZENSBAD, a town and watering-place of Bohemia, Austria, 152 m. W.N.W. of Prague by rail. Pop. (1900) 2330. It is situated at an altitude of about 1500 ft. between the spurs of the Fichtelgebirge, the Böhmerwald and the Erzgebirge, and lies 4 m. N.W. of Eger. It possesses a large kursaal, several bathing establishments, a hospital for poor patients and several parks. There are altogether 12 mineral springs with saline, alkaline and ferruginous waters, of which the oldest and most important is the Franzensquelle. One of the springs gives off carbonic acid gas and another contains a considerable proportion of lithia salts. The waters, which have an average temperature between 50.2° F. and 54.5° F., are used both internally and externally, and are efficacious in cases of anaemia, nervous disorders, sexual diseases, specially for women, and heart diseases. Franzensbad is frequently resorted to as an after-cure by patients from Carlsbad and Marienbad. Another important part of the cure is the so-called _moor_ or mud-baths, prepared from the peat of the Franzensbad marsh, which is very rich in mineral substances, like sulphates of iron, of soda and of potash, organic acids, salt, &c. Entry: FRANZENSBAD
BOEHME (or BEHMEN), JAKOB (1575-1624), German mystical writer, whose surname (of which Fechner gives eight German varieties) appears in English literature as Beem, Behmont, &c., and notably Behmen, was born at Altseidenberg, in Upper Lusatia, a straggling hamlet among the hills, some 10 m. S.E. of Görlitz. His father was a well-to-do peasant, and his first employment was that of herd boy on the Landskrone, a hill in the neighbourhood of Görlitz; the only education he received was at the town-school of Seidenberg, a mile from his home. Seidenberg, to this day, is filled with shoemakers, and to a shoemaker Jakob was apprenticed in his fourteenth year (1589), being judged not robust enough for husbandry. Ten years later (1599) we find him settled at Görlitz as master-shoemaker, and married to Katharina, daughter of Hans Kuntzschmann, a thriving butcher in the town. After industriously pursuing his vocation for ten years, he bought (1610) the substantial house, which still preserves his name, close by the bridge, in the Neiss-Vorstadt. Two or three years later he gave up business, and did not resume it as a shoemaker; but for some years before his death he made and sold woollen gloves, regularly visiting Prague fair for this purpose. Entry: BOEHME
LAMONT, JOHANN VON (1805-1879), Scottish-German astronomer and magnetician, was born at Braemar, Aberdeenshire, on the 13th of December 1805. He was sent at the age of twelve to be educated at the Scottish monastery in Regensburg, and apparently never afterwards returned to his native country. His strong bent for scientific studies was recognized by the head of the monastery, P. Deasson, on whose recommendation he was admitted in 1827 to the then new observatory of Bogenhausen (near Munich), where he worked under J. Soldner. After the death of his chief in 1835 he was, on H. C. Schumacher's recommendation, appointed to succeed him as director of the observatory. In 1852 he became professor of astronomy at the university of Munich, and held both these posts till his death, which took place on the 6th of August 1879. Lamont was a member of the academies of Brussels, Upsala and Prague, of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, of the Cambridge Philosophical Society and of many other learned corporations. Among his contributions to astronomy may be noted his eleven zone-catalogues of 34,674 stars, his measurements, in 1836-1837, of nebulae and clusters, and his determination of the mass of Uranus from observations of its satellites (_Mem. Astron. Soc._ xi. 51, 1838). A magnetic observatory was equipped at Bogenhausen in 1840 through his initiative; he executed comprehensive magnetic surveys 1849-1858; announced the magnetic decennial period in 1850, and his discovery of earth-currents in 1862. His _Handbuch des Erdmagnetismus_ (Berlin, 1849) is a standard work on the subject. Entry: LAMONT
FRAUENLOB, the name by which HEINRICH VON MEISSEN, a German poet of the 13th century, is generally known. He seems to have acquired the sobriquet because in a famous _Liederstreit_ with his rival Regenbogen he defended the use of the word _Frau_ (i.e. _frouwe_, = lady) instead of _Weib_ (_wîp_ = woman). Frauenlob was born about 1250 of a humble burgher family. His youth was spent in straitened circumstances, but he gradually acquired a reputation as a singer at the various courts of the German princes. In 1278 we find him with Rudolph I. in the Marchfeld, in 1286 he was at Prague at the knighting of Wenceslaus (Wenzel) II., and in 1311 he was present at a knightly festival celebrated by Waldemar of Brandenburg before Rostock. After this he settled in Mainz, and there according to the popular account, founded the first school of Meistersingers (q.v.). He died in 1318, and was buried in the cloisters of the cathedral at Mainz. His grave is still marked by a copy made in 1783 of the original tombstone of 1318; and in 1842 a monument by Schwanthaler was erected in the cloisters. Frauenlob's poems make a great display of learning; he delights in far-fetched metaphors, and his versification abounds in tricks of form and rhyme. Entry: FRAUENLOB
BEUST, FRIEDRICH FERDINAND VON (1809-1886), Austrian statesman, was descended from a noble family which had originally sprung from the Mark of Brandenburg, and of which one branch had been for over 300 years settled in Saxony. He was born on the 13th of January 1809 in Dresden, where his father held office at the Saxon court. After studying at Leipzig and Göttingen he entered the Saxon public service; in 1836 he was made secretary of legation at Berlin, and afterwards held appointments at Paris, Munich and London. In March 1848 he was summoned to Dresden to take the office of foreign minister, but in consequence of the outbreak of the revolution was not appointed. In May he was appointed Saxon envoy at Berlin, and in February 1849 was again summoned to Dresden, and this time appointed minister of foreign affairs, an office which he continued to hold till 1866. In addition to this he held the ministry of education and public worship from 1849 to 1853; that of internal affairs in 1853, and in the same year was appointed minister-president. From the time that he entered the ministry he was, however, the leading member of it, and he was chiefly responsible for the events of 1849. By his advice the king refused to accept the constitution proclaimed by the Frankfort parliament, a policy which led to the outbreak of revolution in Dresden, which was suppressed after four days' fighting by Prussian troops, for whose assistance Beust had asked. On Beust fell also the chief responsibility for governing the country after order was restored, and he was the author of the so-called _coup d'état_ of June 1850 by which the new constitution was overthrown. The vigour he showed in repressing all resistance to the government, especially that of the university, and in reorganizing the police, made him one of the most unpopular men among the Liberals, and his name became synonymous with the worst form of reaction, but it is not clear that the attacks on him were justified. After this he was chiefly occupied with foreign affairs, and he soon became one of the most conspicuous figures in German politics. He was the leader of that party which hoped to maintain the independence of the smaller states, and was the opponent of all attempts on the part of Prussia to attract them into a separate union; in 1849-1850 he had been obliged to join the "three kings' union" of Prussia, Hanover and Saxony, but he was careful to keep open a loophole for withdrawal, of which he speedily availed himself. In the crisis of 1851 Saxony was on the side of Austria, and he supported the restoration of the diet of the confederation. In 1854 he took part in the Bamberg conferences, in which the smaller German states claimed the right to direct their own policy independent of that of Austria or of Prussia, and he was the leading supporter of the idea of the _Trias_, i.e. that the smaller states should form a closer union among themselves against the preponderance of the great monarchies. In 1863 he came forward as a warm supporter of the claims of the prince of Augustenburg to Schleswig-Holstein (see SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN QUESTION); he was the leader of the party in the German diet which refused to recognize the settlement of the Danish question effected in 1852 by the treaty of London, and in 1864 he was appointed representative of the diet at the congress of London. He was thus thrown into opposition to the policy of Bismarck, and he was exposed to violent attacks in the Prussian press as a "particularist," i.e. a supporter of the independence of the smaller states. The expulsion of the Saxon troops from Rendsburg nearly led to a conflict with Prussia. Beust was accused of having brought about the war of 1866, but the responsibility for this must rest with Bismarck. On the outbreak of war Beust accompanied the king to Prague, and thence to Vienna, where they were received by the emperor with the news of Königgrätz. Beust undertook a mission to Paris to procure the help of Napoleon. When the terms of peace were discussed he resigned, for Bismarck refused to negotiate with him. Entry: BEUST