John Hus has just been mentioned. He passes before us in the pageant of the Charles Bridge. Wenceslaus IV knew this fervent soul who came up to Prague from his humble home in Southern Bohemia, and arrived at his M.A. degree in 1396, eventually to become Rector of the University. It is possibly indirectly through Wenceslaus that Hus became acquainted with the writings and teachings of Wycliffe. Wenceslaus frequently corresponded on the subject of Church Reform, on the recognition of Urban VI as Pope, and other cognate matters, with his brother-in-law, Richard II of England, and no doubt sister Anne added a line to her husband's letters. Now Anne, we know, had already been deeply impressed by Wycliffe's teaching; his writings had been known and treasured in Prague for some time. John Hus had certainly studied them, and he was an ardent advocate of Church Reform. We also find that he had a friend in that long-suffering Queen Sophie, wife of Wenceslaus; he was even for a time her father-confessor. We see John Hus pass on his way through the storms of controversy to the pyre at which he perished by the faithlessness of an Emperor, Sigismund, younger brother of Wenceslaus, and also some time King of Bohemia. Then again we see the fire that destroyed John Hus's body at Constance reflected time and again, angrily, in the waters of the Vltava; the Hussites were out and, as we have seen, were destroying by fire. So we see the Bishop's palace in flames, the Church of "St. Mary under the Chain," and many of the old houses on the Mala Strana. The same fate, but not by the same agents, befell the old Gothic tower you see standing up above that quaint congerie of buildings below you as you look upstream at the Old Town end of the bridge. Here is the old water tower dating back through many vicissitudes to 1489, and below it are the buildings of the Old Town mill, which are also of venerable age.