"If it please Your Majesty," one of them answered, "Brother Palecek is conversing with the fish." "Brother Palecek," said the King, "what are you doing?" "Brother King," replied Palecek, "I'll tell you. I had a brother fisherman who was drowned in the river. So I am asking these little fish if they know anything about him." "And what do they tell you?" asked the King. "They tell me," returned Palecek, "that they're still too young and small to know anything about it, but that I'd better ask those bigger, older fish that are on your table." The King laughed and ordered the largest fish of all to be placed on a dish and given to Palecek. These the jester accepted gracefully and shared, amid general good cheer, with all at his table. There were various boys' associations, which Jozef was soon invited to attend or was asked to join. One was a boys' orchestra. In this land of music, it was very natural that all who formed a part of it should have been enthusiasts. As an encouragement to its members, the orchestra received free tickets to all the purely national concerts given in the city. Thus Jozef came to know better the works of the great Czech composers, Antonin Dvorak, Bedrich Smetana, and Zdenko Fibich. He thus also had an opportunity to hear Jan Kubelik, the renowned violinist, and Emmy Destinn, the prima donna. Now and then the school children were taken to a national art exhibit. One of Vaclav Brozik, whose "Columbus at the Court of Queen Isabella" is known to all American children, and one of Alfons Mucha, known also in America for his poster work, but renowned in his own country in other lines as well, were followed by one of Joza Uprka, the Moravian Slovak, whose paintings of his beloved country folks, with their riot of color, and his passionate portrayal of the action and joy of life, made Jozef for a time quite homesick for the simpler, more picturesque life of his mother's home. CHAPTER XI WAR THE world rang with the assassination of the Austrian Archduke, Francis Ferdinand, and his wife, at Sarajevo, in a province of Austria-Hungary, but quite outside the Czech and Slovak lands. It was a terrible deed with which no law-loving people were in sympathy. But when Austria, backed by Germany, seized the killing as a pretext for declaring war on little Serbia, both Czechs and Slovaks felt the grave injustice, and despite all efforts made by the Government, very few of them could be induced to make any demonstration in favor of the action. When Germany mobilized, there was no doubt in the minds of any but that the War was simply one against all the Slavs, who opposed German possession of Middle Europe and German and Magyar ideas of superiority and power.