Page:Guide to the Bohemian section and to the Kingdom of Bohemia - 1906.djvu/53

39 as a house of correction, and next to it, the former monastery of St. Ursula’s nuns (now used as barracks) with a fine baroque church of St. John of Nepomuk one of the best works of Ign. Kilian Dienzenhoffer’s. The rich façade of this fine edifice forms the chief attraction of a quiet and even melancholy square „The New World“ the beautiful porch, flanked by caryatides, which reminds us, by all its dispositions, of the porch of St. Nicolas’ church in the Old Town, where Russian church services are held now. From here we return to the former Clam-Martinic palace (now a military hospital) the work of the Italian architect Scotti. The next object we remark is the former Hall of the Castle town a rather low building, but interesting for its gables and rustica, as well as for the porch adorned by an imperial double-eagle. Close to the town-hall in a corner of a completely mediaeval character, under a high arch belonging to the monastery of Barnabite-nuns, we descend the steep stairs of the town-hall leading down to Neruda street. The dark edifice of this most strict and ascetic order of nuns, with its thickly grated windows forms a melancholy background to this otherwise very picturesque corner.

A brighter and more striking sight, is offered by the opposite Toscana-palace which is an effectively built corner of the Castle-town-square; it is in fact not only a corner-house, but fills its whole western side. It belonged formerly to the Counts of Thun, was built in the beginning of the XVIIIth. century. It is of a highly ornamented style, having two dormer-windows in the upper part, and between them a very long and decorative balustrade with many statues. The palace looks down on the square, which by the care of the corporation of Prague was converted into a beautiful grove of birch trees. There is here a nice baroque statue of the Virgin Mary, a work of Braun from 1725. Nearly the whole northern side of the square is taken up with the houses of the Counts Martinic, ornamented by coat of arms and fine renaissance gables and by the quiet canon-houses of the rich chapter of St. Vitus’ cathedral, along with the splendid palace of the Prince-archbishops of Prague, which dates from the second half of the XVIth. century; only its façade is of later date, having