THE CITIZEN OF PRAGUE. TRANSLATED BY MARY HOWITT. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. "That was a man! we shall not find a second like him." THE EMPRESS MARIA THERESA. LONDON: HENRY COLBURN, PUBLISHER GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1261. PREFACE. my I CANNOT let this noble Work go out of hands without endeavouring by a few words to draw the reader's attention to the singular coincidence between the relative positions of Austria and Bohemia, as demonstrated in the story, and those of England and Ireland at the present moment. Neither is this coincidence confined to the countries themselves; it extends equally to the most eminent and active personages in both cases;-a Queen upon the throne, a distinguished advocate and agitator implicated, the public trial for high treason, -and the great national effort for a suffering country. It strikes me, that in these volumes there lies a profound moral lesson, which both the monarch and the subjects of these islands may read and apply to the happy advan tage of the public weal. Independently, however, of this curious coincidence, which must force itself on every reader's attention, the beautiful and elevated spirit which breathes through the whole work, and animates its leading characters, makes this splendid romance an honour to human nature. Clapton, December 1845. M. H. THE CITIZEN OF PRAGUE. CHAPTER I. IN a turret-chamber of the old palace in Vienna, which in its princely yet simple style of decoration shewed itself worthy of its inhabitants, sat, in the year 1755, in the recess of a window, the Empress Maria Theresa, and read with attention, in a tolerably thick roll of manuscripts, apparently taken from the writing-table which stood before her, and upon which lay in great order papers, books, maps, and rolls of parchment, shewing this to be the study of the noble lady. She was in the full maturity of middle life, and the beauty which distinguished her bore especially the firm and strong expression of a noble, assured self-respect, lending to each feature a plastic repose and a purity of form which made one almost believe in the imperishableness of these charms. The fashion VOL. I. B |