made known to the Emperor through the Director of the 

 imperial laboratories, Dr. von Hayek, and by the gossiping 

 poet laureate, Mardocheus de Delle. (The Italian favorite, 

 who was more successful as a jester than as a writer of 

 rhymes, reported how Benedict Topfer, commonly known by 

 his Latinized name "Benedictus Figulus," had made the im- 

 portant discovery that gold could be made out of Jews. He 

 had found by experiment that 24 Jews yielded by proper 

 treatment one half ounce of gold, so that by repeating the 

 process daily with 100 Jews, making due allowance for holy- 

 days, 624 ounces of gold could be made in twelve months !. 

 Doctor von Hayek gave his Majesty particulars of a crafty 

 scheme played on the residents of Gold Alley by an unknown 

 Arabian who made a brief sojourn in Prague. He appeared 

 unannounced, coming direct from the Orient; after establish- 

 ing himself in grand style on the Hradschin and making the 

 acquaintance of the better soft of hermetic students, astrol- 

 ogers and occultists, the gorgeously apparelled and polished 

 Arabian invited four and twenty of them to a sumptuous 

 supper at his residence. When the feast and much wine had 

 been consumed, the foreigner proposed making an experiment 

 of the " multiplication" of gold in the laboratory adjoining 

 his apartments ; this being agreed to, he suggested that each 

 one present should contribute one hundred marks to the enter- 

 prise, a perfectly safe proceeding inasmuch as the process 

 would increase the weight of metal ten -fold. Each one present 

 eagerly paid in his quota, some sending home for their purses, 

 and the richer ones loaning to the poorer the sums necessary 

 to equalize the shares ; the Arabian received the golden coins, 

 added his own contribution, and apparently put them into 

 a large crucible, together with salt, aqua fortis, copperas, 

 eggshells, mcrcur\^, lead and dung. The crucible was then 

 placed in a furnace already glowing, and the whole company 



