[Illustration: BECALMED]
Between Lom Palanka and Sistova, a stretch of about 150 miles--which,
by-the-way, we paddled in less than two days and a half--there are only
three towns on the river, Cibar Palanka, Rahova, and Nicopolis, and
these are all Bulgarian. There are two or three busy grain-shipping
stations on the Roumanian side, however, and we could see on the edge of
a low plateau, miles back from the river, frequent prosperous-looking
places, and, opposite Nicopolis, the church-towers of Turnu Magurelli,
one of the most important towns in southern Roumania, rising above the
trees. This shore of the river is, for almost the entire distance
referred to, a broad, low marsh, intersected by numerous lagoons and
shallow, irregular lakes, often ten miles or more in length. The lonely
picket-stations are the only human habitations along the bank. In
agreeable contrast to this dull and desolate waste of marsh and willow
swamp, is the rich pastoral country of Bulgaria opposite. Although
villages and farm-houses are not numerous, we saw everywhere abundant
signs of life. The meadows were dotted with hay-stacks, and great
net-works of deeply-worn cattle-paths scored the smooth slopes of the
hills, all burned yellow by the summer sun. Before the greatest heat of
the day came on, immense herds of cattle and buffaloes, driven by
Turkish cowboys, rushed panting down the hill-side in a cloud of dust to
cool themselves in the stream. The buffaloes wallowed in the muddy
places, and then lay down with the tops of their heads alone visible
above water, like uncouth amphibious animals. Great flocks of sheep
stood on the shore by the water’s edge, crowding together in a solid
mass, and holding their heads close to the ground to escape the heat
from the direct rays of the sun, and multitudes of goats were scattered
all over the steep and arid slopes. The shepherds dig little shallow
caves in the mud bluffs, with steps leading to them, where they lie and
sleep for hours in the daytime; others curl up in the gullies, so that
every yard of shade on the rough bank has its human or its animal
occupant, and sometimes men and goats, both seeking to avoid the sun,
lie down peacefully together in the same narrow cleft or in the shadow
of the same projecting corner.
In the broad straight reaches of the river the frequent
[Illustration: ON THE BULGARIAN SHORE, NEAR RAHOVA]
sand-banks were covered with water-fowl. Thousands upon thousands of
noisy wild-geese, hosts of ducks, plover, and other game birds, rose
into the air as we approached, almost deafening us with their cries.
Wheeling round in broad circles, they settled down again before we had
fairly passed them. Ranks of solemn pelicans awkwardly flopped into the
water, and swam ahead of us in stately dignity scarcely out of
pistol-shot, turning their huge, ill-balanced beaks from side to side,
and if we came too near, flew up with a tremendous splashing and
fluttering. Tall herons soared away out of the shallows on every side,
and swans and storks sailed overhead in graceful flight. Sometimes we
paddled in the full light of noonday up to within a few yards of
slender, white cranes wading among the water-grasses, and once
approached within a paddle’s length of a large gray heron standing on
one leg and blinking in the brilliant glare of the sun. The flora of the
river-bank in this region is best described in a quotation from Alfred
Parsons’ note-book: “By the camp opposite Kalafat was a very handsome
sedge with brown flowers, a mass of blossoms of the flowering rush, and
plenty of excellent dewberries. A flat below Lom Palanka was covered
with a thorny, leguminous shrub, tufts of small purple flowers and
prickly red seed-pods, small yellow asters, tall scabious with pale
blossoms, and chiccory, which has been a constant flower for a long
distance down the river. The slopes above the limestone cliffs below
Rahova were covered with feather sumac and lilac bushes. Wild-grape
vines grow all over the willows on an island above Sistova, and the
marshy lake near there had great yellow patches of villarsia. On the
edge of this lake grow arrow-head and flowering rush, and where the land
is drier are seen purple and yellow dwarf thistles, a small scentless
heliotrope, and a white scutellaria. Tamarisk grows on the sandy
flats.”
[Illustration: TURKISH FLAT-BOAT]
The river life was mostly confined to the larger craft; very few small
boats were seen, and almost no fishermen. The great clouds of canvas on
the Turkish vessels gleamed above the trees behind the islands far in
the perspective, and the black smoke of tow-boats with their trains of
loaded lighters was a constant feature in the ever-changing landscape.
Occasionally a huge flat-boat of the roughest build, piled high with a
cargo of red and yellow earthen-ware, melons, sacks of charcoal, and
other miscellaneous merchandise, floated down in the gentle current,
steered by Turks in costumes of varied hue, the whole reflecting a mass
of glowing color in the stream. Each of the river towns we passed was
the centre of great activity. Crowds of peasants’ carts laden with grain
covered the broad strand in the vicinity of the steamboat-landing,
waiting their turn to discharge their loads into the lighters. When the
grain is harvested and threshed, the farmers load their rude carts, and
lead the slow and stupid buffaloes, often several days’ journey, to the
nearest river town, where they find a certain market for their produce.
The whole country is covered with trains of creaking carts, and
peasants’ bivouacs are
[Illustration: TURKISH WOMEN AT SISTOVA]
scattered all over the scorched hill-sides and everywhere along the
dusty highways. They carry no tents nor shelters of any sort, and only
the simplest food for themselves and their beasts. When night overtakes
them they lie down on the ground beside their carts, and, wrapped in
their rough coats, sleep as peacefully as their tired oxen. Their whole
outfit is as rude and uncouth as it was centuries ago, and the native
carts have not improved in build since they transported the supplies of
Trajan’s armies. The only iron used in their construction are the
linchpins and the rings which bind together the great hubs; the
roughly-hewn felloes, the different parts of the body of the cart, and
of the yoke as well, are all held together by wooden pegs.
We noticed at Nicopolis the first of the series of Russian monuments
along the river which commemorates the bravery of those who fell in the
late war--a plain stone shaft on a hill-top just above the town; and
when we landed there found every evidence of increasing prosperity and
enterprise in new buildings, public squares and promenades, and general
improvements. A friendly young soldier-policeman piloted us about, acted
as our cavass or special guard, saw that we were not cheated at the
shops, and at the same time busied himself with keeping order in the
drinking-places, and cleared the streets when they became congested with
traffic. He did not so much as ask to see our papers, and we began to be
more hopeful about our trip along the Bulgarian frontier, and looked
forward to landing at Sistova, twenty-five miles below, with no
disagreeable anticipations.
The large biweekly passenger steamer on its downward trip reached
Sistova a few moments after we did, and we were just in time to witness
the exodus of twenty-five Turkish families who were leaving the country
for Asia Minor by way of Chernavoda, Kustendji, and Constantinople. The
whole remaining Turkish population of the town had turned out to see
them off, and veiled women in solemn rows along the shore looked from a
distance like so many queer river birds. We were assured by the agent of
the steamboat company that similar emigrations are of frequent
occurrence, but that most of the families sooner or later wander back
again, after having found that their condition is not bettered by change
of residence. Sistova has improved since the war in much the same way
that Nicopolis has, but the river-front remains unchanged, and looks
to-day very much as it did when, after the crossing in June, the
Russians built their pontoon-bridge from the low island opposite and
marched their armies through the town to Plevna and the Balkan passes.
We made an interesting excursion of three days to the battle-fields of
Plevna, fifty miles distant from Sistova, across a rolling country,
sparsely inhabited, but producing a great deal of wheat and Indian-corn.
The heat was intense and the dust terrible, but every moment of the
excursion was crowded with interest and novelty. Travelling, as the
natives do, by private conveyance, and stopping at the khans, which are
still the only houses of entertainment in country places, we were thrown
into intimate relations with the people, and, it must be confessed,
found little in their character to encourage the belief in their
capacity for immediate improvement. It is undoubtedly a fact that the
peasants between the foot-hills of the Balkans and the Danube are the
least agreeable specimens of the race to be found in the country, and it
would be unfair to judge of the young nation by the inhabitants of a
particular district. Their most curious characteristics are their
emotionless expression and their habitual silence. We seldom saw them
smile, and almost never heard them laugh. All the river people we met
until we crossed the Bulgarian frontier were
[Illustration: OLD MOSQUE, RUSTCHUK]
cheery and more or less communicative, and we heard singing, laughter,
and constant merry chatter among the people as we passed. But in
Bulgaria these cheerful sounds no longer came to our ears; villages near
the river were as silent as the grave; the peasants at the
landing-places stared at us stupidly as we went along, and no one ever
hailed us pleasantly or showed any intelligent interest in our fleet.
[Illustration: BULGARIAN BUFFALO CART]
Russian monuments are seen on several hills between Sistova and
Rustchuk, about thirty-five miles below, and scarcely a mile of the
river but has some interesting history in connection with the struggle
along the Danube in the early part of the summer campaign in 1877. By a
curious coincidence, we happened to camp the afternoon we left Sistova
near the very place where, fourteen years before, on the same date, the
writer had crossed the river at the end of a long courier’s ride,
described in the pages of HARPER’S MAGAZINE not long since. It is not
strange, therefore, that as we paddled down the beautiful calm reach the
following morning the familiar lines of the landscape stimulated a flow
of reminiscences of the campaign. Nearing Pyrgos, and in sight of the
monument on one of the great rounded hills where the battle was fought
in which young Sergius Leuchtenberg, the cousin of the present Czar, was
killed, we were startled by the unmistakable sound of the grunt of a
Gatling-gun and the rattle of small-arms. We could not at first believe
our ears, each of us thinking this dramatic and suggestive accompaniment
to the tales of the war was a mental distortion of ordinary noises
brought about by our preoccupation with the subject. However, as we
paddled along, increasing our stroke in our growing excitement, we
discovered that the sounds came from the hills near Rustchuk, and
although we could see no smoke, we could accurately distinguish the
reports of rifles in irregular scattering succession, like the prelude
of a great battle. Our mystification increased with every moment, and we
hastened on past the low willow-fringed shores on the Roumanian side,
studying the rocky bluffs across the river and the billowy summits of
the bare hills to find a solution of the enigma. The sounds ceased as
suddenly as they began, and as we rounded a wide bend full of islands,
and came in sight of the minarets of Rustchuk and the great buildings in
Giurgevo on the low hills far across the marshes opposite, we met a
small Bulgarian gunboat with a machine-gun at the bow and discovered at
the same time, on a broad plateau under the old Turkish redoubt back of
the town, the summer encampment of the garrison. What we had heard was,
undoubtedly, the morning target practice on land and the trial of the
machine-gun on the river.
Rustchuk is the most important Bulgarian town on the river, and situated
as it is on the main route to Constantinople, _via_ the Rustchuk-Varna
Railway and the Black Sea, and only two hours by rail from Bucharest, is
one of the best-known cities on the lower Danube. It is at present in
the disagreeable phase of transition from an old Turkish town to a
modern trade centre, and has neither the picturesqueness
[Illustration: MARKET-PLACE, SILISTRIA]
of an old place nor the comforts of a new one. Imposing shops, with all
sorts of Viennese and Parisian goods, chiefly neckties and ready-made
clothing, crowd the shanties where native rawhide sandals are made, and
the street butcher slaughters his animal before the plate-glass window
of a large grocery, filled with English, French, and German delicacies.
Some of the streets are well paved and kept in repair, while in others
the passer often stumbles over the half-buried shells thrown into the
town by the Russians in 1877.
For about thirty miles below Rustchuk both shores are flat and devoid of
life. We had our old enemy, a head-wind, against us; and, indeed, from
this point to the end of our journey--about 300 miles below--we scarcely
had an hour’s relief from this persistent opposition to our progress. We
had fought our way for a few miles, when we overtook a tow-boat with
several large Greek grain lighters steaming down-river at less speed
than we were making. As we ran alongside, the captain of one of the
lighters cordially invited us to tie up and take it easy. Perhaps it was
not a very sporting thing to do, but it appealed to us as an excellent
scheme to defeat the efforts of the head-wind and to see the landscape
at our leisure, and we therefore promptly accepted the invitation, and
fastened our canoes to the lighters. In this way we slowly went on for
several hours, until we came to the town of Turtukai, on the Bulgarian
side, where the hills again crowd the river. There we cast off, and
instinctively avoiding the Roumanian pickets, whose unwelcome attentions
we had escaped for several days, paddled down to a beautiful
camping-ground in the middle of a group of islands covered with poplar,
wych-elm, willows, and brambles, and a tangle of wild-grape vines
growing to the tops of the highest trees.
From the important part the town and fortress of Silistria
[Illustration: MOSQUE IN SILISTRIA]
has played in the history of European Turkey for the last hundred years,
we anticipated finding a stronghold far more grand and imposing than any
on the river, with the possible exception of Belgrade and Peterwardein.
Whatever may have been in past times the strategical importance of the
place, it certainly gave us little notion of its strength. It occupies
the whole of a low point projecting far into the
[Illustration: FROM RUSTCHUK TO SULINA]
river, which here spreads out into a broad shallow reach, filled with
long low islands. Along the greater part of the water-front of the town
are two walls, one within the other, more resembling embankments to
protect the town from inundations than constructions for military
purposes. Behind these walls, as seen from the river, domes and minarets
rise above the roofs of the town, which rambles back from the river to
the great bare slopes behind. All over the tops of the hills are visible
the lines of great earthworks, rounded and softened by the weathering of
many seasons. After the usual passport formalities, we wandered about
the town for an hour or more, waiting for it to wake up, and had
sufficient leisure to examine the extensive improvements in progress
here, which bid fair to reduce at no distant date the picturesque old
town to the commonplace level of a modern city. We could not help,
however, being interested in the building of an enormous school-house,
which will be, when finished, the most imposing modern structure in the
town--a gratifying indication of the successful enforcement of the
compulsory education law in Bulgaria.
After the hundreds of miles of uninteresting scenery on the Roumanian
shore, it seemed as if monotony could go no further, but opposite
Silistria the far-off hills recede still more, the bank grows flatter,
and at last degenerates into a swamp, with nothing but the wretched
picket huts to break the interminable line of small willow-trees.
Sluggish branches of the river straggle off to the left and cut the
morass into two large islands, honey-combed with lakes and intersected
by lagoons. High grass-covered hills skirt the right bank, and here and
there, at long distances apart, villages make irregular brown patches on
the yellow slopes. The long reaches become more and more desolate, and
in the narrow channels among the numerous islands there is the solitude
of an unexplored wilderness, and the banks are a tangle of great trees
and undergrowth. Black mud everywhere covers the shallows, and the banks
are lined with a sticky, fetid deposit, and sometimes, after sunset, the
odor emanating from this mass of river scourings is almost overpowering.
We often landed on what appeared to be a hard beach, only to find it a
jelly of mud, with a thin crust of sand on top, through which we broke
at every step. All the river men we met were suffering from the Danube
fever, which, in the lower river, is the constant scourge of the
population.