Back at Mehadia--Troubles about a carriage--An unexpected night on
the road--Return to Karansebes--On horseback through the Iron Gate
Pass--Varhely, the ancient capital of Dacia--Roman remains--Beauty
of the Hatszeg Valley.
After a week of such weather as we had had in the mountains, a
water-tight roof over one's head was in itself a luxury; so we were not
inclined to quarrel with our quarters at the hotel at Mehadia, had they
been even less good than they were.
F---- and I wished the next day to get back to Karansebes; he had left
his carriage, and I my Servian horse. A Hungarian gentleman, one of the
late expedition, said he would arrange to have a _vorspann_, if we would
join him, as he also wanted to go there. This well-understood plan
insures to the traveller relays of horses, and we were only too glad to
acquiesce in the prospect of making the journey pleasantly and quickly.
The driver who was to take us the first stage came in and asked for a
florin to get some oats for his horses. Very foolishly I gave him the
money, nothing doubting; and off he went to spend it on _slivovitz_,
the result being that he was soon drunk and incapable. If we had
realised the fact at once it might have been better, but we waited and
waited, not knowing for a long time what had happened. This upset all
our _vorspann_ arrangements, and to our great disgust the best part of
the day was wasted in seeking another vehicle and horses to take us to
Karansebes. At last we succeeded in obtaining a lumbering sort of
covered conveyance, whose speed we doubted from the first; but the
owner, who was to drive us, declared he would get us to our journey's
end in an incredibly short space of time.
We took care to give no _pourboire_ in advance; but what with the
inevitable dilatoriness of the people down in these parts, it was after
seven o'clock before we left the Hercules-Bad, and we had fifty miles to
drive.
Not even the ten hours of undisturbed consecutive repose in the downy
bed at the Mehadia hotel had made up the deficiency of sleep during the
foregoing week, and drowsiness overcame us. I think we must have had a
couple of hours of monotonous jog-trot on the fairly level road when I
fell asleep, and I suppose my companions did the same.
I must have slept long and profoundly, for when I woke, pulling myself
together with some difficulty, having slept in the form of a doubled-up
zigzag, I found it was daylight. I was surprised that we were not
moving; I rubbed my eyes, and looked out at the back of the cart, and
there I saw a round tower on a slight eminence, encircled by a belt of
fir-wood, the very counterpart of a pretty bit of scenery I had noticed
in the twilight. I looked again, and sure enough it was just the tower
itself and no other, and the very same belt of wood. The explanation was
not far to seek. I was the first to wake up in our "fast coach." Every
mortal soul--and there were five of us, besides the four horses--had, it
seems, gone to sleep much about the same time that I did. The magic
sleep of eld must have fallen upon us. The simple fact was, we had
passed the night in the middle of the highroad. Was there ever anything
so ridiculous?
We were about seven miles from Mehadia; I knew the country perfectly
well. Of course we made a confounded row with the idiot of a driver, who
certainly had been hired--not to go to sleep. I have known these
Wallacks drive for miles in a state of somnolency, the horses generally
keeping in the "safe middle course" of their own accord. As there were
some awkward turns not far ahead of us, it was perhaps just as well that
the horses stopped on this occasion.
Well, we jogged on all that day, reaching Karansebes between one and two
o'clock. We had been some eighteen hours on the road!
Here F---- and I parted, my friend returning to Uibanya, while I pursued
my way to Transylvania.
I slept the night at Karansebes, rising very early; indeed I started
soon after four o'clock. I was again on my little Servian horse, who was
quite fresh after his long rest, and I saw no reason why I should not
reach Hatszeg the same evening, as the distance is not more than
forty-five miles. About two miles from Karansebes I passed a hill
crowned with a picturesque ruin, locally called Ovid's Tower. Tradition
fondly believes that Ovid spent the last years of his banishment, not on
the shores of the stormy Euxine, but in the tranquillity of these lovely
valleys. Certain it is that the name and fame of many of the great
Romans are still known to the Wallacks; and the story is told by Mr
Boner, that they have a catechism which teaches the children to say that
they have Ovid and Virgil for their ancestors, and that they are
descended from demigods!
On my way I passed the villages of Ohaba, Marga, and Bukova. On arriving
at Varhely, or Gradischtie, as it is called in Wallack language, I found
that it was worth while to stay the night, for the sake of having the
afternoon to examine the Roman remains scattered about the
neighbourhood.
The Wallack villages I had passed through were very miserable-looking
places: they are generally in the south of Transylvania. The houses are
mostly mere wattled wigwams, without chimneys; a patch of garden, rudely
hurdled in, with the addition of a high stockaded enclosure for cattle.
Some of the women are extremely pretty, and, as I have said before, the
costume can be very picturesque; but they are often seen extremely
dirty, in which case the filthy fringe garment gives them the appearance
of savages.
Varhely is conspicuous for its dirt even among Wallachian villages, yet
once it was a royal town. It is built on the site of the famous
Sarmisegethusa, the capital of ancient Dacia. In Trajan's second
expedition against Decebalus, King of the Dacians, he came from Orsova
on the Danube by the same route that forms the highroad of this day--the
same I had traversed in my way hither. It is curious to reflect how
nation succeeding nation tread in each other's footsteps, through the
self-same valley, beneath the shadow of the old hills. Here they have
trudged, old Dacian gold-seekers, returning from the daily labours of
washing the auriferous sands of the mountain streams; here, too, have
tramped victorious Roman soldiers--Avars, Tartars, Turks, and other
intruders. A long and motley cavalcade has history marshalled along this
route for two thousand years and more!
The old Dacians were strong enough we know to exact a yearly tribute
from Domitian: it was for this insult that Trajan marched upon Dacia,
defeating Decebalus at Klausenburg, in the heart of Transylvania, which
was at the time their greatest strong-hold. It was after this that the
Dacian king retreated upon Sarmisegethusa, and there Trajan came down
upon them through the Iron Gate Pass. Unable to defend themselves, the
Dacians set fire to their royal city and fled to the mountains. On these
ruins the Romans, ever ready to appropriate a good site, erected the
city of Ulpia Trajana, connecting it by good roads with the existing
Roman colonies at Karlsburg and Klausenburg.
Unless the traveller had brought historic facts with him to Gradischtie,
he would hardly be induced to search for tesselated pavements and relics
of royalty amongst the piggeries of this dirty Wallack village. It is a
literal fact that a very fine specimen of Roman pavement exists here in
an unsavoury outhouse, not unknown to pigs and their congeners.
This Hatszeg Valley, in the county of Hunyad, has long been celebrated
for the richness of its Dacian and Roman antiquities. These treasures
have unfortunately been dispersed about amongst various general
collections of antiquity, instead of being well kept together as
illustrative of local facts and history. The archæologist must seek for
these remains specially in the Ambras collection of the Archæological
Museum at Vienna, the National Museum at Buda Pest, in the Bruckenthal
Museum at Herrmannstadt, also in the Klausenburg Museum. Dr H. Finály,
Professor of Archæology at the University of Klausenburg, is the great
living authority on this interesting subject. To him I am indebted for
some information, conveyed in a letter to a private friend.[12] The
professor alludes to the fact of the treasures being all carried away,
adding that on the spot very little is to be found except the remains of
Roman encampments (_castra stativa_), Roman military roads, together
with the foundations of buildings, the materials of which however are
usually carried away by the peasants. Nor are the records of former
interesting discoveries to be found in one volume, but are dispersed
about in the various publications of learned societies, such as the
'Archælogiæi Közlemények' of the Hungarian Academy, the 'Year-Book of
the Transylvanian Museum,' and 'Verhandlungen und Mittheilungen' of the
Verein fur Siebenbürgische Landeskunde of Herrmannstadt.
That the materials of the old Roman buildings are now used for baser
purposes, one has abundant proof; even in my hurried inspection I saw
many a sculptured stone and fragment of fluted column doing duty as the
support of a wretched Wallack shanty. Another evidence of the Roman
occupation of the country occurs in the case of certain plants now found
growing wild, which are exotic to the soil. This, I am told, occurs in a
marked manner at Thorda, which was known to be a Roman colony. The
plants, it may be presumed, were brought thither by the Roman
legionaries. The most picturesque bit of Roman antiquity is the Temple
at Demsus, within a short drive of Varhely. It is on a small eminence
overlooking a cluster of Wallack dwellings, and has long been used as a
church by these people.
The Hatszeg Valley, which comprehends the district I am now describing,
is the pride of Transylvania, not less for its fertility than for its
beauty. It has the appearance of having been filled in former geological
ages by the waters of a widespread lake.
It was a lovely afternoon, but very hot, when I rode into the little
town of Hatszeg. Everywhere is to be seen evidence of the careful
cultivation of the maize and other crops. Numerous villages dot the
plain and cluster amidst the thickly-wooded hillsides. And now we come
upon the railway system again, which has stretched out its feelers into
the wilds of the Southern Carpathians. The railroad enters Transylvania
by two routes. The main line is from Buda-Pest to Grosswardein, and so
on by Klausenburg--the Magyar capital--to the present terminus of
Kronstadt, one of the chief towns of the Saxon immigrants. This includes
a branch to Maros Vásárhely. It is proposed to carry this line over a
pass in the Carpathians to Bucharest. The second line of railway
entering Transylvania starts from Arad, and terminates at Herrmannstadt,
the Saxon capital, having a branch to the mineral district of Petrosèny.
It will be seen from the above that this "odd corner of Europe," as
Transylvania has been called, is fairly well off for iron roads; and
considering how short a time some portions of them have been opened,
they have already borne good fruit in developing the resources of the
country.
[Footnote 12: Martin Diosy, Esq.]