Inventors -- United States -- Biography; Pupin, Michael, 1858-1935
I mentioned above that the first sight of Budapest nearly took my
breath away. The first view of Prague filled me with a strange
religious fervor. The ancient gates, surmounted by towers with
wonderful stone carvings and inscriptions; the lofty domes, crowning
mediæval cathedrals, the portals of which were bristling with beautiful
images of saints; the historic public buildings, each of which told a
story of the old glories of Bohemia’s kingdom; the ancient stone bridge
across the Moldava River, supporting statues of Christian martyrs;
the royal palace on the hill of Hradchin, which seemed to rise way up
above the clouds--all these, and many other wonderful things, made me
feel that it was places like Prague which St. Sava visited when he
deserted his royal parents and went to the end of the world to seek new
knowledge. I saw then why the protoyeray of Panchevo had suggested that
I go to Prague; I even began to suspect that he expected the influence
of Prague to turn my attention to theology. I think now that it would
have done so if it had not been for that unpleasant goose incident at
Karlovci. Besides, there was another influence at Prague, which was
more powerful than any other influence in the Austrian Empire at that
time.
* * * * *
The sights of Prague interested me more than its famous schools, which
I was to enter and delayed entering. But finally I was enrolled, and
the boys in the school scrutinized me with a puzzled expression, as
if they could not make out what country or clime I came from. When
they found out that I hailed from the Serb military frontier, all
uncertainty vanished, and I knew exactly where I stood. The German
boys became very cold, the Czech boys greeted me in their own tongue
and hugged me when by my Serbian answer I proved not only that I
understood them but also that I expected them to understand my Serbian
greeting. They were all nationalists to the core and did their best to
make me join their ranks, which, after some reluctance, I finally did.
I showed them then two letters from protoyeray Zhivkovich introducing
me to Rieger and to Palacky, the great apostles of Panslavism and of
nationalism in Bohemia. From that day on I was one of their young
revolutionary set, and henceforth school lessons looked tame and lost
most of their charm to me.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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