Page:Magdalen by J S Machar.pdf/102

 Nepomuk; once a year, in the beautiful month of May, he is painted in a bright brown color, at the town’s expense.

A hunchbacked, crooked sidewalk runs along the rows of houses, and is intercepted by malodorons rills that flow from the dwellings, and that form a filigree stream on the common. Throughout the day an old sweeper heaps small piles of straw, dust, and dirt, but the wind, or wanton youths, regularly disperse them at nightfall.

From the common there is a beautiful view towards the west. The streets lie somewhat lower here, and one can see through them the cemetery with its chapel and its crosses, its darkling cypresses, its grave-stones, where rest in peace the heroes