But the chief glory of the city is the Church of Our Lady Mary. It no longer stands apart, a monument visible from afar as of old—other palaces and buildings have shut it in, and one sees its towers only, until one is close upon it. Then the sudden magnificence leaps upon the visitor. A splendid silence lurking in its high roof descends suddenly like the thousands of pigeons that thunder down for particles of bread. Beneath one’s feet is the old city cemetery; there on the walls are the tablets and shrines; there at the south doorway are the iron collars that once clasped the throats of petty criminals as they stood supplicating the prayers and pennies of the faithful. Inside, the church is a veritable miracle of beauty. Above its exquisite wood carvings and choir rises a vaulted roof of sky blue, studded with stars. Images of stone look down from breaks in the Gothic fluting—tablets, banners, altars, shrines all strike alike upon the sight in amazing beauty. But listen: is the organ playing? Whence come those notes that float down from above like God’s own music from heaven? They come from the towers, for the hour is striking on the bell, and a trumpeter is playing at one of the open tower windows. And that tune? It is the Heynal, the same tune played by a young man so many centuries ago when the Tartars burned the city—and listen, the trumpeter breaks off his song in the middle of a note. . . . Four times he sounds the Heynal, once at each of the four windows, west, south, east, north. And many a man or woman or child on hearing that song thinks of the days when the young life was given to country and God and duty. . . . Poland has been through many fires since that time—she has had centuries of war, a century of extinction. But in all that time the Heynal has sounded with each passing hour and men have sworn each year to keep the custom unto the very end of time. Hark, it is sounding now. May it bring in an epoch of peace to all men! NOTES The author wishes to acknowledge his indebtedness to the following persons for their services in aiding his research: Professor Roman Dyboski of the English Department of the University of Krakow; Director Frederic Papee of the university library, and his assistants, Dr. Sophia Ameisen and Dr. Wojciech Gelecki; Director Adam Chmiel of the Old Archives Building; Miss Helene d’Abancour de Franqueville of the library of the Krakow Academy; Miss Helena Walkowicz, a student in the university, and Madame Sophia Smoluchowska of Krakow. The Aqua Phosphorata mentioned on page 108 was a luminous liquid compounded by the alchemist. Phosphorus as we know it to-day was first made by Brandt in 1699. In 1602, however, Scipio Begatello exploited the qualities of the famous Bologna Stone and its luminous qualities, discovered by Vincenzo Cascariolo about 1595, and there are other suggestions that similar substances were used by earlier alchemists and magicians.