Chapter XI

A few miles below Mohács is the upper mouth of the Franzens Canal which joins the Danube with the Theiss, giving an easy outlet for the produce of the great fertile plain, facilitating the transportation of grain and lumber from the interior to the chief water highway. The construction of the canal dates from the last century, and, in all probability, it was projected even as early as the Roman occupation. It is only within a few years, however, that, by the aid of English capital, it has been finished and put in active operation. The wonderfully rich farming country through which it passes has attracted, since earliest times, settlers from all surrounding regions, and of all the Hungarian kingdom it has the most varied and heterogeneous population. Almost anywhere within the narrow limits of the low horizon may be counted between the Danube and the Theiss a dozen villages, sheltering representatives of as many different races, and a more attractive field for the philologist or for the artist cannot be found between the Black Sea and the Baltic. The traveller who rushes down the Danube in a steamer, or yawns at the monotonous plain from the window of a Pullman-car on the Orient Express, gets no more idea of the people than if he saw them from a balloon. Even studied intimately and at leisure, this unique mixture of races is confusing and perplexing, and only those who have long been familiar with them can thoroughly

understand the conditions of their existence. In all Hungary the Magyar, or pure Hungarian, does not number over four out of the fifteen millions of inhabitants. They are the dominant race intellectually and physically, and, of course, the governing race. But frugal, industrious immigrants have on all sides taken possession of the land, have established manufactories and built up trade, and have often left to the Magyar little beside that pride of race to which even the lowest among them cling as their most precious birthright. It is this pride which has bound the nation together all through the dark centuries of constant warfare with an implacable enemy, and it is this pride which is the Magyar’s best support in his present struggle for a place in the foremost rank of civilized nations. There can be no question of his intellectual superiority over the races who crowd him on the east, the south, and the west. That he is not yet in the same plane of civilization as the nations in the west of Europe is due to the fact that while the west was civilizing, the Magyar was keeping the frontier against advancing Mahometanism; and it is only now, after many centuries of discouragement and oppression, that he is in a position to advance along the road of peaceful development and culture. To such a nature as his all is possible, and his marvellous progress during the past twenty years is gratifying proof that he is making the best of his present possibilities.

We had the great good-fortune to be personally conducted through this interesting region by Mr. Louis Gerster, the vice-consul of the United States at Budapest, who met us at the mouth of the canal and who, from long acquaintance with the population, was able to steer our course successfully among the manifold ethnological and philological shoals on which we should certainly have been wrecked had we been travelling alone. He placed a small propeller at our disposal, and we made the journey as far as the Theiss, shooting the wild-fowl with which this region abounds, visiting all the villages, and studying the natives, their customs, costumes, and modes of life. The few days we spent in his company along the Franzens Canal would make a volume in itself, and it is only because we must not pause in the tale of our Danube voyage that we are obliged to keep the log-book of this side trip closed. Russians, Bulgarians, Saxons, Servians, Jews, Gypsies, Schokaczs, Bunyvaczs, and other known and unknown races and tribes, each with distinctly different dress, language, and customs practically unchanged by transplantation into Hungarian soil, so bewitched us with the charms of constant variety and novelty that our trip was one round of exhilarating and delightful impressions. Thanks to the excellent management of our friend, we were able to spend a Saturday afternoon and part of Sunday in the Schokacz village of Monostorszég, situated on the banks of the Danube, but so hidden away behind islands that it would not have attracted our attention from the canoes, and even if we had seen it, we would

not have suspected the existence of the treasures it held for us. The village itself is not unlike many others we visited, with broad streets shaded by acacias and mulberries, low whitewashed houses, a large barren church edifice, and a few unobtrusive shops. In the daytime, particularly in the harvest season, the whole place is deserted except by a few old people and children. With the peep of day the entire adult population rattles away over the plain in springless wicker wagons to the cornfields, often miles distant. As the sun gets low in the afternoon the dusty streets are again lively with laden carts and wagons full of chattering, singing girls as brown as Indians. The village swineherd, who has watched his unsavory flock on the muddy shores of the Danube through the heat of the day, now drives them to the village again, and as they approach their homes they scamper away, each to his own sty, adding the harsh notes of shrill squeals and grunts to the chorus of general congratulation that the hot day is past and the coolness of the night is at hand.

Like three Tartarins of Tarascon, we found everything at Monostorszég arranged for our amusement and entertainment as if by a stock company. In the court-yard of one of the well-to-do farmers’ houses, where we stopped to examine the stock of home-made embroideries and fabrics for which the housewife was justly renowned in the neighborhood, we soon saw assemble quite a large party of youths and maidens, many of them in holiday dress, and all ready for a dance. From somewhere, we never knew how or whence, a group of strange-looking musicians and stranger instruments appeared casually in the crowd, and the inspiriting tinkle of native dances set every bare foot patting time on the smoothly trampled earth. There were a bass-viol, a guitar, a medium-sized mandolin, and one, the tamboura, no larger than a lady’s hand, all of them strung with wire, and played with a bit of bone or horn. On the last-named instrument, which had a neck out of all reasonable proportion in length, a tall, brawny native picked the most intricate and encouraging melodies, and the feet must indeed have been heavy which did not rise to the rhythm of this music. Out of deference to the visitors the csárdás was for some time the only dance, but as the excitement increased, and the presence of strangers was forgotten, their own dance, the kollo, took its place, and we all participated in this, with more zeal than skill. The kollo, which is the common dance all through Croatia, Slavonia, and Servia, is more solemn and stately than either the Hungarian csárdás or the Roumanian hora, but, like these, comes to an end only with the strength and endurance of the participants. A ring is formed, usually of an equal number of dancers of both sexes. Each maiden places her hands on the shoulder of a youth on either side of her, giving both the strings of her girdle or the ends of a kerchief, passed behind her back, to twist around their forefingers, thus binding the circle firmly together. The dance consists in stepping one measure by a rhythmic patter with the feet, and then the next measure by a movement to the left, with now and then a few steps backward and forward, as the caprice of any part of the circle may decide. In this dance, as in the csárdás, the performers are swayed and directed by the leader of the orchestra, who alternates a slow, almost mournful, strain, with wild and passionate bursts of music, which, like shocks of electricity, set every figure in spirited action.

The ordinary costume of both sexes at Monostorszég is simplicity itself. The women wear a high-necked, ankle-long chemise of white homespun linen, with full sleeves gathered at the elbow and richly embroidered, usually with blue. Bands of narrow embroidery decorate the waist and the skirt also. This chemise is girded to the body by a thick woollen belt, binding tightly to the figure the upper edge of a narrow apron of striped woollen homespun, very brilliant in color. A kerchief is usually worn on the head, and the feet are habitually bare. On Sundays and fête-days the girls exchange the coarse garments for others of choicer texture, the chemise being fine and carefully plaited, and the apron of mull or muslin delicately embroidered with white. Tall red morocco boots, with yellow heels and soles and curious pointed toes, adorn, or rather disfigure, the feet, and around the neck are hung many rows of gaudy glass beads. The hair is elaborately braided in a broad band, which is brought over to the forehead and then turned back again. This is held in place by dozens of pins with ornamental heads; and all along the edges of the braid behind is a thick row of bits of a fine green aromatic herb, while in the hair itself at the back, as well as around the face,

bright-colored geraniums, marigolds, and other flowers, are skilfully arranged. On their wedding-day they cover their heads with a wonderful square structure, more like a pastry-cook’s _pièce montée_ than a bonnet, wear an ample white lace shoulder-cape, a brilliant scarlet petticoat, with white lace apron and tall red boots. This dress is preserved with jealous care, and is never produced except on Sundays and holidays. The men’s costume consists of loose linen trousers, like a divided skirt, a full tunic, a waistcoat with silver buttons, hussar boots, and a small round hat. Both sexes have for an outer garment either a sheepskin cloak or a great-coat of very thick, felt-like, white woollen, with broad, square collar, and sleeves either sewed up at the bottom, or else in short, rudimentary form. These coats, and also the sheepskin cloaks, are often richly and gaudily embroidered.

When we came into the village bright and early Sunday morning everybody was in holiday dress. The red petticoats of the matrons flashed along the sidewalks, but half-shaded by the small trees; groups of gay maidens, each with wild-flowers in hand, hurried along to church, where companies of men in immaculate linen and stiff embroidered coats stood in solemn rows like supernumeraries on a stage. The church was already partly full when we entered, and there was a bustle of many people settling themselves in their places, and a constant stream of worshippers coming in at different doors. We sat there marvelling at the strange dresses, enchanted by the brilliant colors, all the while unable to realize that this was the customary weekly ceremony, not a dramatic pageant arranged for our benefit. The sexes sat apart, and the married and the single each had a portion of the pews reserved for them, and each entered the church by a different door. Near the altar the marriageable maidens came clumping in with their red boots, always in parties of three or more, each with a little bright-colored rug, a prayer-book, and a bunch of flowers. Spreading out their rugs on the stone floor, they kneeled down in rows facing the altar, and, after carefully arranging their plaited Sunday chemises so as to cover their feet, remained a few moments in the attitude of prayer, and then rose and took their seats. Of all that great congregation there was not one who did not wear the costume, and, with the exception of some of the ornaments and finer textiles, all the articles of dress were of home production. Every thread of the linen and wool had been spun on the busy distaff as the women went to and from the fields to their work, and woven in the winter-time, when the clatter of the loom is heard in every house.

During the sermon we hurried away to be present at the close of the church-service in the neighboring village of Bezdán, inhabited by Magyars. It was a few miles away, and we arrived only in time to see the quiet streets enlivened with people totally different in type and dress from those we had just left. In the flickering shadow of the trees, under the noonday sun, the women strode off homeward with an

energy of action that made their stiff petticoats balloon out still more. Near the church the men gathered in silence to listen to the crier, who was announcing various articles for sale. The unmarried girls of the village wear white linen dresses, with short sleeves and embroidered waists, wreaths of flowers in their hair, bright red ribbons down their backs, black stockings, and dainty red and yellow slippers. The matrons wear colors, sometimes green or black, but usually red, and the men are chiefly noticeable for their loose linen garments and elaborate boots, often with a survival of the spur in the shape of a brass ornament on the side of the heel. Even as we stood watching the people the streets became quite deserted again; and so we hastened on to another village, where, in the populous Servian quarter, we caught our first glimpses of Oriental life in the groups of women sitting flat in the road in the shadow of the houses, disdaining, like true Orientals, all such luxuries as chairs and tables, and disturbed by no horror of dirt. Our Sunday’s excursion also included a gypsy settlement--not a common sight, for these people are seldom permitted to occupy houses. It disagreeably contrasted in its squalor and filth with the perfection of neatness and tidiness among the Schokaczs and Magyars, but gave us a notion of the range of types easily studied in this one neighborhood.

When we left the mouth of the canal, one breezy morning after our excursion, and shot down the turbid stream with all sail set, the soothing regularity of the tree-covered banks, and the utter absence of anything to study or to sketch, was not without a calming influence on us, and but for this little respite we probably should not have had the heart to land at the long straggling village of Apatin, which promised new beauties and fresh interests. Almost the first person we saw was a little old German woman spinning flax on a tiny wheel, looking exactly as if she had been transported bodily from the Black Forest. Farther along the street we met unmistakable Germans, and heard again the familiar language of the upper river. At the nearest corner was a brewery, with tables under the trees, and guzzling sluggards devouring strong sausage and stronger cheese. Everything was of the most commonplace German order, from the architecture of the houses to the beer mugs. Our parachute had burst, and we came to earth with a heavy thump.

About half-way between Apatin and the village of Erdöd, with course as straight as a canal, the river Drave pours in a muddy flood, and far up the shining stream the foot-hills of the Tyrolean Alps lie all faint in the distance. Fertile hills now skirt the west bank, and their sunny yellow slopes looked agreeably bright and warm after the heavy greens of the forest and swamp. The river has washed away the hills into perpendicular bluffs, which are of earth almost as hard as sandstone. Rude steps cut along a cleft were lively with girls carrying jars of Danube water to the village above; and once, under a vineyard, where the vines trail over the very edge of the bank, we saw a rude cave dug in the earth, where a long pole with a dangling bush projecting far

beyond the rough bough shelter at the door of the cellar announced to the river men that wine was for sale. Our old friends the current mills still clustered at frequent intervals, where the stream ran the swiftest. Since the first time we saw them--far up the river, above Vienna--they had not changed their general shape or construction; but the owners’ names, painted in large white letters on the sides, had marked with accuracy the limits of the different nationalities we had passed in our journey. Now, before the curious combinations of letters on the mills near the Hungarian shore had ceased to puzzle us, Croatian and Slavonian names in a new and unfamiliar alphabet stared at us from the weather-stained sides of the mills along the opposite bank, and something of the crudity of Oriental taste was seen in the unskilful attempts to decorate the wood-work near the door and window. From the right bank we heard hails in an unknown language, and by the water’s edge saw peasants with fiercer mustaches than even the Magyar boasts, and women of a heavy, unsympathetic type. The costume, too, had undergone a decided change. Both men and women wore clumsy wrappings around the ankles, and uncouth sandals and shoes. The loose trousers of the men were strapped to the calf by the thongs which bound the thick woollen cloths or coarse socks to the ankles, and red sashes took the place of belts. Servia was beginning to show herself to us long before we reached the political frontier.