A picturesque majority of Polish Jews, whom some vice of their climate is
said peculiarly to fit for the healing effects of Carlsbad, most took his
eye in their long gabardines of rusty black and their derby hats of plush
or velvet, with their corkscrew curls coming down before their ears. They
were old and young, they were grizzled and red and black, but they seemed
all well-to-do; and what impresses one first and last at Carlsbad is that
its waters are mainly for the healing of the rich. After the Polish Jews,
the Greek priests of Russian race were the most striking figures. There
were types of Latin ecclesiastics, who were striking in their way too;
and the uniforms of certain Austrian officers and soldiers brightened the
picture. Here and there a southern face, Italian or Spanish or Levantine,
looked passionately out of the mass of dull German visages; for at
Carlsbad the Germans, more than any other gentile nation, are to the
fore. Their misfits, their absence of style, imparted the prevalent
effect; though now and then among the women a Hungarian, or Pole, or
Parisian, or American, relieved the eye which seeks beauty and grace
rather than the domestic virtues. There were certain faces, types of
discomfort and disease, which appealed from the beginning to the end.
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