The mauufactures consist of cotton tissues, hosiery, silk, leather, hats, gloves, earthenware, jewellery, and plated goods, mathematical and musical instruments, glass, buttons, snuff and tobacco, paper and paper-haegings. There are also breweries, saltpetre-works, and many other industrial establishments. Prag has a very flourishing com merce: the transit trade facilitated by the 3Ioldau, which is navigable, and by railways which connect the city with Vienna, Berlio, Dresden, and the principal towns of Germany, is considerable; there are three great annual fairs.
Prag is an ancient city, but the time of its foundation is uncertain. It has suffered frequently and severely by the calamities of war, espe cially in the religious troubles of the 15th century. In 1620, in the couteat between the elector palatine and the emperor for the crown of Bohemia, a battle was fought on the White Hill, two miles from the city, in which the Imperial troops were victorious, and the elector Frederick V., son-in-law of James I. of England, heat the crown. In 1741 Prag was taken by the French, who were blockaded iu it by the Austrians and after a vigorous defence were compelled by famine to evacuate the city. In 1744, the Prussian Frederick 11., got possession of
the city with an army of 100,000 men, but in ten weeks afterwards was obliged to evacuate it with the loss of 2000 prisoners, 132 cannons, and 12 mortars, which fell into the hands of the Austrians. In 1757 Frederick again besieged Prag, hut the victory of the Austrians at Collin obliged him to retire. On the 29th of May, 1848, the Czechs, or native Bohemian party, revolted against Austria, and appointed a provisional government. From the 12th to the 17th of June there was desperate fighting between the Czechs and Germans; on the latter day the military under Prince Windischgriitz retired to the llradschin, from which they commenced to bombard the rest of the town. On the 19th the insurrection was quelled and the ringleaders in custody. The population of Prag is 143,000, of whom 12,000 are Jews, and the great majority of the rest Catholics.