Carried along by the crowd, the Rabbi and his wife arrived at the Römer. This is the great market-place of the city, surrounded by houses with high gables, and takes its name from an immense building, "the Römer," which was bought by the magistracy and dedicated as the town-hall. In it the German Emperor was elected, and before it tournaments were often held. King Maximilian, who was passionately fond of this sport, was then in Frankfort, and in his honor the day before there had been great tilting in the Römer. Many idle men still stood on or about the scaffolding, which was being removed by carpenters, telling how the Duke of Brunswick and the Margrave of Brandenburg had charged one another amid the sound of drums and of trumpets, and how Lord Walter the Vagabond had knocked the Knight of the Bear out of his saddle so violently that the splinters of the lances flew high into the air, while the tall, fair-haired King Max, standing among his courtiers upon the balcony, rubbed his hands for joy. The golden banners were still to be seen on the balconies and in the Gothic windows of the town-hall. The other houses of the market-place were still likewise festively bedecked and adorned with shields, especially the Limburg house, on whose banner was painted a maiden with a sparrow-hawk in her hand, and a monkey holding out to her a mirror. Many knights and ladies standing on the balcony were engaged in animated conversation, or looking at the crowd below, which, in wild groups and processions, surged back and forth. What a multitude of idlers of all ages and ranks were crowded together here to gratify their curiosity! There was laughing, grumbling, stealing, rib-poking, hurrahing, while every now and then blared the trumpet of the mountebank, who, in a red cloak and with his clown and monkey, stood on a high stand loudly boasting of his own skill, and sounding the praises of his marvelous tinctures and salves, ere he solemnly examined the glass of urine brought by some old woman, or applied himself to pull a poor peasant's tooth. Two fencing-masters, dancing about in gay ribbons and brandishing their rapiers, met as if by accident and began to cut and pass with great apparent anger; but after a long bout each declared that the other was invincible, and took up a collection. Then the newly-organized guild of archers marched by with drummers and pipers, and these were followed by the constable, who was carrying a red flag at the head of a flock of traveling strumpets, hailing from the brothel known as "The Ass," in Würzburg, and bound for Rosendale, where the highly honorable authorities had assigned them quarters during the fair. "Shut your eyes, Sara," said the Rabbi. For indeed these fantastic, and altogether too scantily clad women, among whom were a few really beautiful girls, behaved in a most immodest manner, baring their bold, white breasts, chaffing those who went by with shameless words, and swinging their long walking sticks; and using