[The History of a Lie by Herman Bernstein]@TWC D-Link bookThe History of a Lie CHAPTER TWO 4/48
In these places deals amounting to thousands are transacted daily. "If you take a few steps along this dirty, foul market-place, you will suddenly come upon an old, high, decayed wall which surrounds a space of from two to three acres.
Elder-trees and other wild shrubbery wind around this wall.
Old Jewish houses are crowded all along near this wall, threatened with destruction at any moment. The strange circle formed by this wall has an unwelcome, puzzling appearance. "This is the city of the dead--the renowned Prague cemetery. "In this abode of rest may be seen the spirit of the nation, whose bones found shelter here after long wandering,--here is stamped all its history, full of sufferings, struggles and resistance. "It seems as though at any moment these tombs, overgrown with shrubbery, are ready to open, these stones growing for thousands of years are ready to raise themselves, and to let out into the world the restless wanderer with a pack upon his shoulder, with a staff in his hand, in order to go again to strange peoples,--to cheat and combat them and to seek a new Canaan--his dominion! The Jewish cemetery in Prague is the very oldest cemetery known.
It was closed by order of the government a hundred years ago.
For foreigners it is a historical landmark; for the Jews it is a sacred place.
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