From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine.

NINA BALATKA:

THE STORY OF A MAIDEN OF PRAGUE.

PART I.

THE PERSONS OF THE STORY.

STEPHEN TRENDELLSOHN, A Jew in Prague.
ANTON TRENDELLSOHN, His Son.

KARIL ZAMENOY,-A Christian Merchant of Prague.
MADAME ZAMENOY, His Wife.

ZISKA ZAMENOY, Their Son.

JOSEF BALATKA,- A Broken Merchant of Prague, also a Christian.
NINA BALATKA,- His Daughter.

RUTH JACOBI,- Grandaughter of the Jew.
REBECCA_LOTH, - A Jewess.

FATHER JEROME,

RAPINSKI, A Jeweller.

LOTTA LUXA, - Servant to Madame Zamenoy.
SOUCHEY, Servant to Josef Balatka.

CHAPTER I.

occurred in years when Nina was an infant.. But in these shiftings Balatka became a NINA BALATKA was a maiden of Prague, ruined man, and at the time of which I born of Christian parents, and herself a write he and his daughter were almost penChristian - but she loved a Jew; and this niless. The reader must know that Karil is her story. Zamenoy and Josef Balatka had married Nina Balatka was the daughter of one sisters. Josef's wife, Nina's mother, had Josef Balatka, am old merchant of Prague, long been dead, having died so said Sowho was living at the time of this story; phie Zamenoy, her sister-of a broken but Nina's mother was dead. Josef, in the heart; of a heart that had broken itself in course of his business, had become closely grief, because her husband had joined his connected with a certain Jew named Tren- fortunes with those of a Jew. Whether the dellsohn, who lived in a mean house in the disgrace of the alliance or its disastrous Jews' quarter in Prague-habitation in result may have broken the lady's heart, or that one allotted portion of the town having whether she may have died of a pleurisy, been the enforced custom with the Jews as the doctors said, we need not inquire then as it still is now. In business with here. Her soul had long been at rest, and. Trendellsohn, the father, there was Anton, his son; and Anton Trendellsohn was the Jew whom Nina Balatka loved. Now it had so happened that Josef Balatka, Nina's father, had drifted out of a partnership with Karil Zamenoy, a wealthy Christian merchant of Prague, and had drifted into a partnership with Trendellsohn. How this had come to pass needs not to be told here, as it had all FOURTH SERIES. LIVING AGE. VOL. III. 7.

her spirit, we may hope, had ceased to fret itself in horror at contact with a Jew. But Sophie Zamenoy was alive and strong, and could still hate a Jew as intensely as Jews ever were hated in those earlier days in which hatred could satisfy itself with persecution. In her time but little power was left to Madame Zamenoy to persecute the Trendellsohns other than that which nature.

had given to her in the bitterness of her palaces and now, alas! also of Austrian tongue. She could revile them behind their back, or, if opportunity offered, to their faces; and both she had done often, telling the world of Prague that the Trendellsohns had killed her sister, and robbed her foolish brother-in-law. But hitherto the full vial of her wrath had not been emptied, as it came to be emptied afterwards; for she had not yet learned the mad iniquity of her niece. But at the moment of which I now speak, Nina herself knew her own iniquity, hardly knowing, however, whether her love did or did not disgrace her. But she did know that any thought as to that was too late. She loved the man, and had told him so; and were he gipsy as well as Jew, it would be required of her that she should go out with him into the wilderness. And Nina Balatka was prepared to go out into the wilderness. Karil Zamenoy and his wife were prosperous people, and lived in a comfortable modern house in the New Town. It stood in a straight street, and at the back of the house there ran another straight street. This part of the city is very little like that old Prague, which may not be so comfortable, but which, of all cities on the earth, is surely the most picturesque. Here lived Sophie Zamenoy; and so far up in the world had she mounted, that she had a coach of her own in which to be drawn about the thoroughfares of Prague and its suburbs, and a stout little pair of Bohemian horses ponies they were called by those who wished to detract somewhat from Madame Zamenoy's position. Madame Zamenoy had been at Paris, and took much delight in telling her friends that the carriage also was Parisian; but, in truth, it had come no further than from Dresden. Josef Balatka and his daughter were very, very poor; but, poor as they were, they lived in a large house, which, at least nominally, belonged to old Balatka himself, and which had been his residence in the days of his better fortunes. It was in the Kleinseite, that narrow portion of the town which lies on the other side of the river Moldau the further side, that is, from the so-called Old and New Town, on the west-, ern side of the river, immediately under the great hill of the Hradschin. The Old Town and the New Town are thus on one side of the river, and the Kleinseite and the Hradschin on the other. To those who know Prague, it need not here be explained that the streets of the Kleinseite are wonderful in their picturesque architecture, wonderful in their lights and shades, wonderful in their strange mixture of shops and

barracks — and wonderful in their intricacy and great steepness of ascent. Balatka's house stood in a small courtyard near to the river, but altogether hidden from it, somewhat to the right of the main street of the Kleinseite as you pass over the bridge. A lane, for it is little more, turning from the main street between the side walls of what were once two palaces, comes suddenly into a small square, and from a corner of this square there is an open stone archway leading into a court. In this court is the door, or doors, as I may say, of the house in which Balatka lived with his daughter Nina. Opposite to these two doors was the blind wall of another residence. Balatka's house occupied two sides of the court, and no other window, therefore, besides his own looked either upon it or upon him. The aspect of the place is such as to strike with wonder a stranger to Prague, that in the heart of so large a city there should be an abode so sequestered, so isolated, so desolate, and yet so close to the thickest throng of life. But there are others such, perhaps many others such, in Prague; and Nina Balatka, who had been born there, thought nothing of the quaintness of her abode. Immediately over the little square stood the palace of the Hradschin, the wide-spreading residence of the old kings of Bohemia, now the habitation of an ex-emperor of the House of Hapsburg, who must surely find the thousand chambers of the royal mansion all too wide a retreat for the use of his old age. So immediately did the imperial hill tower over the spot on which Balatka lived, that it would seem at night, when the moon was shining as it shines only at Prague, that the colonnades of the palace were the upper storys of some enormous edifice, of which the broken merchant's small courtyard formed a lower portion. The long rows of windows would glimmer in the sheen of the night, and Nina would stand in the gloom of the archway counting them till they would seem to be uncountable, and wondering what might be the thoughts of those who abode there. But those who abode there were few in number, and their thoughts were hardly worthy of Nina's speculation. The windows of kings' palaces look out from many chambers. The windows of the Hradschin look out, as we are told, from a thousand. But the rooms within have seldom many tenants, nor the tenants, perhaps, many thoughts. Chamber after chamber, you shall pass through them by the score, and know by signs unconsciously recognized that there is not,

and never has been, true habitation within | archway, she remembered that the very them. Windows almost innumerable are frock she wore had been sent to her by her there, that they may be seen from the out- aunt. But in spite of the bitter tongue, side - and such is the use of palaces. But and in spite of Ziska's derision, she would Nina, as she would look, would people the tell her tale, and would tell it soon. She rooms with throngs of bright inhabitants, knew her own courage, and trusted it; and would think of the joys of happy girls and, dreadful as the hour would be, she who were loved by Christian youths, and would not put it off by one moment. As who could dare to tell their friends of their soon as Anton should desire her to declare love. But Nina Balatka was no coward, her purpose, she would declare it; and as and she had already determined that she he who stands on a precipice, contemplating would at once tell her love to those who the expediency of throwing himself from had a right to know in what way she in- the rock, will feel himself gradually seized tended to dispose of herself. As to her by a mad desire to do the deed out of hand father, if only he could have been alone in at once, so did Nina feel anxious to walk off the matter, she would have had some hope to the Windberg Gasse, and dare and enof a compromise which would have made it dure all that the Zamenoys could say or do. not absolutely necessary that she should She knew, or thought she knew, that perseseparate herself from him forever in giving cution could not go now beyond the work herself to Anton Trendellsohn. Josef Ba- of the tongue. No priest could immure latka would doubtless express horror, and her. No law could touch her because she would feel shame that his daughter should was minded to marry a Jew. Even the love a Jew though he had not scrupled people in these days were mild and forbearto allow Nina to go frequently among these ing in their usages with the Jews, and she people, and to use her services with them thought that the girls of the Kleinseite for staving off the ill consequences of his own would not tear her clothes from her back idleness and ill-fortune; but he was a meek, even when they knew of her love. One broken man, and was so accustomed to yield thing, however, was certain. Though every to Nina that he might at last have yielded to rag should be torn from her though some her even in this. There was, however, that priest might have special power given him Madame Zamenoy, her aunt her aunt to persecute her though the Zamenoys in with the bitter tongue; and there was their wrath should be able to crush herZiska Zamenoy, her cousin her rich and even though her own father should refuse to handsome cousin, who would so soon declare see her, she would be true to the Jew. Love himself willing to become more than cousin, to her should be so sacred that no other if Nina would but give him one nod of en- sacredness should be able to touch its couragement or half a smile of welcome. sanctity. She had thought much of love, But Nina hated her Christian lover, cousin but had never loved before. Now she loved, though he was, as warmly as she loved and, heart and soul, she belonged to him to the Jew. Nina, indeed, loved none of the whom she had devoted herself. Whatever Zamenoys neither her cousin Ziska, nor suffering might be before her, though it her very Christian Aunt Sophie with the were suffering unto death, she would enbitter tongue, nor her prosperous, money- dure it if her lover demanded such enloving, acutely mercantile uncle Karil; but, durance. Hitherto, there was but one pernevertheless, she was in some degree so sub- son who suspected her. In her father's ject to them, that she knew that she was house there still remained an old dependant, bound to tell them what path in life she who, though he was a man, was cook and meant to tread. Madame Zamenoy had housemaid, and washerwoman and servantoffered to take her niece to the prosperous of-all-work; or perhaps it would be more house in the Windberg Gasse when the old true to say that he and Nina between them house in the Kleinseite had become poor and did all that the requirements of the house desolate; and though this generous offer demanded. Souchey for that was his had been most fatuously declined-most name- - was very faithful, but with his wickedly declined, as aunt Sophie used fidelity had come a want of reverence to declare nevertheless other favours towards his master and mistress, and an abhad been vouchsafed; and other favours sence of all respectful demeanour. The had been accepted, with sore injury to enjoyment of this apparent independence Nina's pride. As she thought of this, stand- by Souchey himself went far, perhaps, in ing in the gloom of the evening under the lieu of wages.

"Nina," he said to her one morning, have gone in and out with smaller risk "you are seeing too much of Anton Trendellsohn."

"What do you mean by that, Souchey?" said the girl, sharply.

"You are seeing too much of Anton Trendellsohn," repeated the old man.

"I have to see him on father's account. You know that. You know that, Souchey, and you shouldn't say such things."

of observation. It was now the beginning of September, and the clocks of the town had just struck eight as Nina put her hand on the lock of the Jew's door. As usual it was not bolted, and she was able to enter without waiting in the street for a servant to come to her. She went at once along the narrow passage and up the gloomy wooden stairs, at the foot of which there hung a small lamp, giving just light enough to expel the actual blackness of night. On the first landing Nina knocked at a door, and was desired to enter by a soft female voice. The only occupant of the room when she entered was à dark-haired child, some twelve years old perhaps, but small in stature and delicate, and, as appeared to the eye, almost wan. "Well, Ruth dear," said Nina, "is Anton at home this evening?"

"He is up-stairs with grandfather, Nina. Shall I tell him?""

"If you will, dear," said Nina, stooping down and kissing her.

"You are seeing too much of Anton Trendellsohn," said Souchey for the third time. "Anton Trendellsohn is a Jew." Then Nina knew that Souchey had read her secret, and was sure that it would spread from him through Lotta Luxa, her aunt's confidential maid, up to her aunt's ears. Not that Souchey would be untrue to her on behalf of Madame Zamenoy, whom he hated; but that he would think himself bound by his religious duty- he who never went near priest or mass himself to save his mistress from the perils of the Jew. The story of her love must be told, and Nina preferred to tell it herself to having it told for her by her servant Souchey. She must see Anton. When the evening therefore had come, and there was sufficient dusk upon the bridge to allow of her passing over without observation, she put her old cloak upon her shoulders, with the hood drawn over her head, and, crossing the river, turned to the left and made her way through the parrow crooked streets which led to the Jew's quarter. She know the path well, and could have found it with blindfold eyes. In the middle of that close and densely popu- is as light as yours, and her eyes are as lated region of Prague, stands the old Jew-grey." ish synagogue · the oldest place of worship "What has that to do with it?"

belonging to the Jews in Europe, as they delight to tell you; and in a pinched-up, high-gabled house immediately behind the synagogue, at the corner of two streets, each so narrow as hardly to admit a vehicle, dwelt the Trendellsohns. On the basement floor there had once been a shop. There was no shop now, for the Trendellsohns were rich, and no longer dealt in retail matters; but there had been no care, or perhaps no ambition, at work, to alter the appearance of their residence, and the old shutters were upon the window, making the house look as though it were deserted. There was a high-pitched sharp roof over the gable, which, as the building stood alone fronting upon the synagogue, made it so remarkable, that all who knew Prague well, knew the house in which the Trendellsohns lived. Nina had often wished, as in latter days she had entered it, that it was less remarkable, so that she might

"Nice Nina, dear Nina, good Nina," said the girl, rubbing her glossy curls against her friend's cheeks. "Ah, dear, how I wish you lived here.”

"But I have a father as you have a grandfather, Ruth.'

"And he is a Christian."

"And so am I, Ruth."

"But you like us, and are good, and nice, and dear — and oh, Nina, you are so beautiful! I wish you were one of us and lived here. There is Miriam Harter · her hair

"Only I am so dark, and most of us are dark here in Prague. Anton says that away in Palestine our girls are as fair as the girls in Saxony."

"And does not Anton like girls to be dark?"

"Anton likes fair hair — such as yours and bright grey eyes such as you have got. I said they were green, and he pulled my ears. But now I look, Nina, I think they are green. And so bright! I can see my own in them, though it is so dark. That is what they call looking babies."

"Go to your uncle, Ruth, and tell him that I want him on business." "I will, and he'll come to you. He won't let me come down again, so kiss me, Nina; good-bye."

Nina kissed the child again, and then was left alone in the room. It was a comfortable chamber, having in it sofas and arm-chairs - much more comfortable, Nina