January, and was established in fourteen
hundred and fifty-eight. Curiously enough
the real business of the fair is negotiated in
the week preceding its actual proclamation;
it is, then, that the great sales between
manufacturers and merchants, and their busy
agents from all parts of the continent, are
effected, while the three weeks of the actual
fair are taken up in minor transactions. No
sooner is the freedom of the fair proclaimed
than the hubbub begins; the booths, already
planted in their allotted spaces— every inch
of which must be paid for— are found to be
choked up with stock of every description,
from very distant countries: while every
town and village, within a wide radius, finds
itself represented by both wares and
customers.

It is not, however, all freedom even at
fair time. The guild laws of the different
trades, exclusive and jealous as they are, are
enforced with the utmost severity. Jews, in
general, and certain trades in particular,—
shoemakers, for example, — are not allowed
the same privileges as the rest; for their
liberty to sell is restricted to a shorter period,
and woe to the ambitious or unhappy
journeyman who shall manufacture, or expose for
sale, any article of his trade, either on his own
account or for others, if they be not acknowledged
as masters by the Guild. Every such
article will be seized by the public officers,
deposited in the Rathhaus, and severe punishment
— in the shape of fines— inflicted on
the offender. The last week of the Fair is
called the pay-week; the Thursday and Friday
in this week being severally pay and
assignation days. The traffic at the Easter
Fair, before the establishment of railways,
was estimated at forty millions of dollars, but
since, by their means, increased facilities of
transit between Leipsic and the two capitals
— Berlin and Dresden — have been afforded,
it has risen to seventy millions of dollars, or
ten millions, five hundred thousand pounds
sterling.

In the meantime, here we are in the Brühl,
a street important enough, no doubt, so far as
its inhabitants and traffic are concerned, but
neither beautiful nor picturesque. The
houses are high and flat, and, from a
peculiarity of build about their tops, seem to leer
at you with one eye. Softly over the pebbles!
and mind you don't tread on the pigeons.
They are the only creatures in Leipsic that
enjoy uncontrolled freedom. They wriggle
about the streets without fear of molestation;
they sit in rows upon the tops of houses;
they whirl in little clouds above our heads;
they outnumber, at a moderate estimate, the
whole human population of the city, and are
as sacred as the Apis or the Brahmin bull.
As we proceed along the Brühl, the evidences
of the unrestricted traffic become more
perceptible. Square sheds of a dingy black hue
line one side of the way, and are made in
such a manner, that from being mere closed
boxes at night, they readily become
converted into shops in the daytime, by a falling
flap in front, which in some cases is adjusted
so as to perform the part of a counter. These
booths form the outer depositories of the
merchandise of the fair, and are generally
filled with small and inexpensive articles.
The real riches accumulated in Leipsic during
these periods, are stowed in the massive old
houses: floor above floor being filled with
them, till they jam up the very roof, and in
their plenitude flow out into the street. The
booths, where not private property, are
articles of profitable speculation with the
master builders of the city. They are of
planed deal painted, and are neatly enough
made. They are easily stowed away in
ordinary times, and, when required, are
readily erected, being simply clammed
together with huge hooks and eyes.

We have not proceeded half-way down
the Brühl, when we are accosted by a
veritable child of Israel, who in tolerably good
English, requests our custom. Will we buy
some of those unexceptionable slippers? In
spite of my cap and blouse, it is evident that
I bear some national peculiarity about me at
once readable to the keen eyes of the Jew;
and upon this point, I remember that my
friend Alcibiade, of Argenteuil, jeweller, once
expressed himself to me thus: "You may
always distinguish an Englishman," said he,
"by two things; his trousers and his gait.
The first never fit him, and he always walks
as if he was an hour behind time."

We are at the sign of the Golden Horn.
Its very door-way is blocked up for the
moment by an enormous bale of goods,
puffy, and covered with cabalistic characters.
When we at length enter the outer gate of
the house, we find ourselves in a small courtyard
paved with stone and open to the sky,
but now choked with boxes and packages,
piled one upon the other in such confusion,
that they appear to have been rained from
above, rather than brought by vulgar
trucks and human hands. Herr Herzlich,
whose house this is, resides on the third
floor. As we ascend the winding stair to
his apartments, we perceive that the building
occupies the four sides of the courtyard, and
that on the third floor a wooden gallery is
suspended along one side, and serves as a
means of connection between the upper
portions of the house. Queerly-shaped
bundles, and even loose goods, occupy every
available corner; and as we look down from
the gallery into a deep window on the opposite
side, we perceive a portly moustachoed
gentleman busily counting and arranging
piles of Prussian bank-notes, while heaps of
golden coin, apparently Dutch ducats, or
French louis d'or, are built up in a golden
barricade before him. We pause before the
door of Herr Herzlich, master goldsmith and
house-owner, and prepare to deliver our
letter of introduction. They are trying