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Updated: June 21, 2025
John of Nepomuk was cast into the Moldau for refusing to publish the confession of King Wenceslaus' consort. On the opposite bank I mounted the Hradschin, and paid a visit to the cathedral, in which a large sarcophagus, surrounded and borne by angels, and surmounted by a canopy of crimson damask, is dedicated to the memory of the saint.
The Czechs are no doubt obscurely placed in Europe, but the traveller when he gets to their country not the "seacoast of Bohemia" will find that they make good showing. Prague is a fine old city on the rolling Moldau what a fine name, suggestive of rolling boulders down from the hills! Ancient Prague has this river for its moat.
But the old town, the larger half of Prague, which is divided into two parts by the Moldau, by its vigorous resistance wearied out the efforts of the Palatine, Charles Gustavus, the successor of Christina on the throne, who had arrived from Sweden with fresh troops, and had assembled the whole Swedish force in Bohemia and Silesia before its walls.
The Austrians tried sallies; but these availed nothing, very ill-conducted, say some. Siege lasted six weeks; four weeks extremely hot, from May 19th, when the proper artilleries, in complete state, got up from Dresden. Line of siege-works, or intermittent series of batteries, is some twelve miles long; from Branik southward to beyond the Belvedere northward, on both sides of the Moldau.
Prag stands nestled in the lap of mountains; and is not in itself a strong place in war: but the country round it, Moldau ploughing his rugged chasm of a passage through the piled table-land, is difficult to manoeuvre in. It is narrow everywhere, especially when once got fairly north of Prag; and runs along like a Quasi-Highland Strath, amid rocks and hills.
The ascent of Ziscaberg, by roads, is steep and tedious: but once at the top, you find that it is precipitous on two sides only, the City or westward side, and the Moldau or northward.
At Budweis, or between that and Tabor, Towns of our old friend Zisca's, of which we shall hear farther in these Wars; Towns important by their intricate environment of rock and bog, far up among the springs of the Moldau, there can these Bavarians, and this French Vanward of Belleisle, halt a little, till the other parties, who are likewise on march, get within distance."
The water had indeed already fallen, but the walls of the houses were soaked through and through; the doors had been carried away, and from the broken windows no faces looked out upon the passers-by. The water had risen two feet more than in 1784, in which year the Moldau had also attained an unusual height.
Tuesday, 3d May, in the way of reconnoitring, and decisively on Wednesday, 4th, Friedrich is off northward, along the western heights of Lower Moldau, proper force following him, to seek a fit place for the pontoons, and get across in that northern quarter. "How dangerous that Schwerin is a day too late!" murmurs he; but hopes the Austrians will undertake nothing.
And below, the Moldau runs with a fine, silent, dark volume of water a very sea of waters when the rains have fallen and the little rivers have been full, though in times of drought great patches of ugly dry land are to be seen in its half-empty bed. At the present moment there were no such patches; and the waters ran by, silent, black, in great volumes, and with unchecked rapid course.
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