realised it was the toy-bird trader.
I turned back for I had nothing better to do. When I passed him I saw that his eyes—his right one to be precise —were fixed on the three people. Without being seen himself he watched their every move with an indefinable expression, half hatred, half love.
I left the park. It was sultry. Rain hung in the air. Or was it the mist that rises in the evening from rivers, here as in all steep valleys? I walked down to the river through countless streets, narrow for the most part. Its banks announced themselves from afar through a closely-beaded pearl necklace of splendid candelabra lights and arc lamps. My thoughts were blank, or, rather, occupied by the toy trader with his feathered mechanical toys and by—geese.
My cursed watch had made me miss the connection with the express train in Nuremberg on my journey from Paris. The slower passenger train I had to take instead gave me the chance to become better acquainted withthe Bohemian countryside. We stopped at small stations, larger villages, tiny hamlets, once even in the middle of a field.
The fields were already harvested. The woods, comprising deciduous trees (there are many birches and oaks in Bohemia, and majestic lime trees in the villages ) had greatly thinned, and blackish twigs gleamed here and there through the bright foliage in the weak sun. In the bare fields, still covered in stubble, I saw gaggle upon gaggle of geese. Bohemia, surely, boasts the most beautiful geese of any country. Here they are not fed, as in France, on fish waste. In the summer they are set free on the grassy meadows, later on the fields of stubble, and come autumn they’re fattened indoors in a manner both refined and cruel. Alongside the beautiful, powerful, snow-white creatures I noticed others apparently ailing, stripped of all but their large wing feathers. Their breasts, their underbellies, were naked, unkempt, reddish-grey, and they didn’t march with the same cockiness and confidence as their healthy comrades; they waddled slowly, timid and fearful, and steered clear of humans, flapping their wings and starting up a furious cackling whenever they glimpsed one. I asked a fellow passenger what lay behind their strange behaviour. He didn’t understand me at first, but then he smiled and replied: “You try being flayed alive, having every single hair pulled out one by one,being throttled and squeezed all the while between a pair of knees! I’d like to see you then! And the same procedure every year!” I then learned in detail how in most parts of Bohemia geese are plucked alive each year thereby producing the heavenly, light, downy feathers which made sleeping amongst the plump, snowy-white pillows of my Prague hotel such a pleasurable experience. Yet the goose not only provides feathers, but also skin, fat, meat, stomach, heart, liver and blood! Virtually every part of it is eaten. There is no escaping geese here in Bohemia.
I opted to dine somewhere else that evening, perhaps in that small, old-fashioned tavern which had caught my eye when I was following the toy trader. It was situated on Wenceslas Square beyond the statue and was bound to have simple but good fare that didn’t feature geese. Most importantly, I’d noticed large glasses of almost black beer on the tables, and charmingly svelte or reassuringly sturdy blonde and brunette waitresses whose bare and firm beautifully white arms were heaving around enormous amounts of food and drink. People of modest means sat together amiably on the long wooden benches, smoking, and happily gorging on food and beer.
I stared blankly at my watch. Now it had outperformed itself. It had ground to a complete halt although the spring was tightly wound. Still furiouslyshaking my watch which was swishly chromed in nickel I entered the stuffy room beneath the gothic vaulted walls, suffused with tobacco smoke and odours of beer, frying and onions. I looked around. In a corner, sandwiched between two
I turned back for I had nothing better to do. When I passed him I saw that his eyes—his right one to be precise —were fixed on the three people. Without being seen himself he watched their every move with an indefinable expression, half hatred, half love.
I left the park. It was sultry. Rain hung in the air. Or was it the mist that rises in the evening from rivers, here as in all steep valleys? I walked down to the river through countless streets, narrow for the most part. Its banks announced themselves from afar through a closely-beaded pearl necklace of splendid candelabra lights and arc lamps. My thoughts were blank, or, rather, occupied by the toy trader with his feathered mechanical toys and by—geese.
My cursed watch had made me miss the connection with the express train in Nuremberg on my journey from Paris. The slower passenger train I had to take instead gave me the chance to become better acquainted withthe Bohemian countryside. We stopped at small stations, larger villages, tiny hamlets, once even in the middle of a field.
The fields were already harvested. The woods, comprising deciduous trees (there are many birches and oaks in Bohemia, and majestic lime trees in the villages ) had greatly thinned, and blackish twigs gleamed here and there through the bright foliage in the weak sun. In the bare fields, still covered in stubble, I saw gaggle upon gaggle of geese. Bohemia, surely, boasts the most beautiful geese of any country. Here they are not fed, as in France, on fish waste. In the summer they are set free on the grassy meadows, later on the fields of stubble, and come autumn they’re fattened indoors in a manner both refined and cruel. Alongside the beautiful, powerful, snow-white creatures I noticed others apparently ailing, stripped of all but their large wing feathers. Their breasts, their underbellies, were naked, unkempt, reddish-grey, and they didn’t march with the same cockiness and confidence as their healthy comrades; they waddled slowly, timid and fearful, and steered clear of humans, flapping their wings and starting up a furious cackling whenever they glimpsed one. I asked a fellow passenger what lay behind their strange behaviour. He didn’t understand me at first, but then he smiled and replied: “You try being flayed alive, having every single hair pulled out one by one,being throttled and squeezed all the while between a pair of knees! I’d like to see you then! And the same procedure every year!” I then learned in detail how in most parts of Bohemia geese are plucked alive each year thereby producing the heavenly, light, downy feathers which made sleeping amongst the plump, snowy-white pillows of my Prague hotel such a pleasurable experience. Yet the goose not only provides feathers, but also skin, fat, meat, stomach, heart, liver and blood! Virtually every part of it is eaten. There is no escaping geese here in Bohemia.
I opted to dine somewhere else that evening, perhaps in that small, old-fashioned tavern which had caught my eye when I was following the toy trader. It was situated on Wenceslas Square beyond the statue and was bound to have simple but good fare that didn’t feature geese. Most importantly, I’d noticed large glasses of almost black beer on the tables, and charmingly svelte or reassuringly sturdy blonde and brunette waitresses whose bare and firm beautifully white arms were heaving around enormous amounts of food and drink. People of modest means sat together amiably on the long wooden benches, smoking, and happily gorging on food and beer.
I stared blankly at my watch. Now it had outperformed itself. It had ground to a complete halt although the spring was tightly wound. Still furiouslyshaking my watch which was swishly chromed in nickel I entered the stuffy room beneath the gothic vaulted walls, suffused with tobacco smoke and odours of beer, frying and onions. I looked around. In a corner, sandwiched between two
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