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LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE
OF
_POPULAR LITERATURE AND SCIENCE._
MAY, 1873.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by J. B.
LIPPENCOTT & Co., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at
Washington.
Transcriber's Note: Minor typos have been corrected and footnotes moved
to the end of the article.
THE ROUMI IN KABYLIA.
THIRD PAPER.
[Illustration: THE AMIN OF KALAA.]
Emerging from these gloomy _caflons_, and passing the Beni-Mansour, the
village of Thasaerth (where razors and guns are made), Arzou (full of
blacksmiths), and some other towns, we enter the Beni-Aidel, where
numerous white villages, wreathed with ash trees, lie crouched like
nests of eggs on the summits of the primary mountains, with the
magnificent peaks of Atlas cut in sapphire upon the sky above them. At
the back part of an amphitheatre of rocky summits, Hamet, the guide,
points out a little city perched on a precipice, which is certainly the
most remarkable site, outside of opera-scenery, that we have ever seen.
It is Kalaa, a town of three thousand inhabitants, divided into four
quarters, which contrive, in that confined situation, to be perpetually
disputing with each other, although a battle would disperse the whole of
the tax-payers over the edges. Although apparently inaccessible but by
balloon, Kalaa may be approached in passing by Bogni. It is hard to give
an idea of the difficulties in climbing up from Bogni to the city, where
the hardiest traveler feels vertigo in picking his way over a path often
but a yard wide, with perpendiculars on either hand. Finally, after many
strange feelings in your head and along your spinal marrow, you thank
Heaven that you are safe in Kalaa.
[Illustration: COURTYARD IN KALAA.]
[Illustration: KALAA.]
[Illustration: OURIDA, THE LITTLE ROSE.]
The inhabitants of Kalaa pass for rich, the women promenade without
veils and covered with jewels, and the city is clean, which is rare in
Kabylia. There are four amins (or sheikhs) in Kalaa, to one of whom we
bear a letter of introduction. The _anaya_ never fails, and we are
received with cordiality, mixed with stateliness, by an imposing old man
in a white bornouse. "_Enta amin?_" asks the Roumi. He answers by a
sign of the head, and reads our missive with care. Immediately we are
made at home, but conversation languishes. He knows nothing but the pure
Kabyle tongue, and cannot speak the mixed language of the coasts, called
Sabir, which is the pigeon-French of Algiers and Philippeville.
"_Enta sabir el arbi?_"--"Knowest thou Arabic?" asks our host.
"_Makach_"--"No," we reply. "_Enta sabir el Ingles?_"--"Canst thou speak
English?"
"_Makach_"--"Nay," answers the beautiful old sage, after which
conversation naturally languishes.
But the next morning, after the richest and most assiduous
entertainment, we see the little daughter of the amin playing in the
court, attended by a negress. The child-language is much the same in all
nations, and in five minutes, in this land of the Barbarians, on this
terrible rock, we are pleasing the infant with wiles learnt to please
little English-speaking rogues across the Atlantic.
The amin's daughter, a child of six years, forms with her slave a
perfect contrast. She is rosy and white, her mouth is laughing, her
peeping eyes are laughing too. What strikes us particularly is the
European air that she has, with her square chin, broad forehead, robust
neck and sturdy body. A glance at her father by daylight reveals the
same familiar type. Take away his Arab vestments, and he would almost
pass for a brother of Heinrich Heine. His child might play among the
towers of the Rhine or on the banks of the Moselle, and not seem to be
outside her native country. We have here, in a strong presentment, the
types which seem to connect some particular tribes of the Kabyles with
the Vandal invaders, who, becoming too much enervated in a tropical
climate to preserve their warlike fame or to care for retiring,
amalgamated with the natives. The inhabitants on the slopes of the
Djordjora, reasonably supposed to have descended from the warriors of
Genseric, build houses which amaze the traveler by their utter
unlikeness to Moorish edifices and their resemblance to European
structures. They make bornouses which sell all over Algeria, Morocco,
Tunis and Tripoli, and have factories like those of the Pisans in the
Middle Ages.
[Illustration: KABYLE SHOWING GERMANIC ORIGIN.]
Contrast the square and stolid Kabyle head shown in the engraving on
this page with the type of the Algerian Arab on page 494. The more we
study them, or even rigidly compare our Arab with the amin of Kalaa, the
more distinction we shall see between the Bedouin and either of his
Kabyle compatriots. The amin, although rigged out as a perfect Arab,
reveals the square jaw, the firm and large-cut mouth, the breadth about
the temples, of the Germanic tribes: it is a head of much distinction,
but it shows a large remnant of the purely animal force which entered
into the strength of the Vandals and distinguished the Germans of
Caesar's day. As for the Kabyle of more vulgar position, take away his
haik and his bornouse, trim the points of his beard, and we have a
perfect German head. Beside these we set a representative Arab head,
sketched in the streets of Algiers. See the feline characteristics, the
pointed, drooping moustache and chin-tuft, the extreme retrocession of
the nostrils, the thin, weak and cruel mouth, the retreating forehead,
the filmed eye, the ennui, the terrestrial detachment, of the Arab. He
is a dandy, a creature of alternate flash and dejection, a wearer of
ornaments, a man proud of his striped hood and ornamental agraffes. The
Kabyle, of sturdier stuff, hands his ragged garment to his son like a
tattered flag, bidding him cherish and be proud of the rents made by
Roumi bayonets.
[Illustration: TYPE OF ALGERIAN ARAB.]
It must be admitted that the Kabyles, with a thousand faults, are far
from the fatalism, the abuse of force and that merging of individualism
which are found with the Islamite wherever he appears. Whence, then,
have come these more humane tendencies, charitable customs and movements
of compassion? There are respectable authorities who consider them, with
emotion, as feeble gleams of the great Christian light which formerly,
at its purest period, illuminated Northern Africa.
It is the opinion of some who have long been conversant with the Kabyles
that the deeper you dive into their social mysteries the more traces you
find of their having once been a Christian people. They observe, for
instance, a set of statutes derived from their ancestors, and which, on
points like suppression of thefts and murders, do not agree with the
Koran. We have spoken of their name for the law--_kanoun_: evidently the
resemblance of this to [Greek: _chanon_] must be more than accidental.
Another sign is the mark of the cross, tattooed on the women of many of
the tribes. These fleshly inscriptions are an incarnate evidence of the
Christian past of some of the Kabyles, particularly such as are probably
of Vandal origin. They are found especially among the tribes of the
Gouraya, are probably a result of the Vandal invasion, and consist in
the mark or sign of the cross, half an inch in dimension, on their
forehead, cheeks and the palms of their hands. It appears that all the
natives who were found to be Christians were freed from certain taxes by
their Aryan conquerors; and it was arranged that they should profess
their faith by making the cross on their persons, which practice was
thus universalized. The tattooing is of a beautiful blue color, and is
more ornamental than the patches worn by our grandmothers.
Our final inference, then, is, that the Kabyles preserve strong traces
of certain primitive customs, which in certain cases are attributable to
a Christian origin.
A true city of romance, a Venice isolated by waves of mountains, and
built upon piles whose beams are of living crystal, Kalaa, all but
inaccessible, attracts the tourist as the roc's egg attracted Aladdin's
wife. For ages it has been a city of refuge, a sanctuary for person and
property in a land of anarchy. Nowhere else are the proud Kabyles so
skillful and industrious--nowhere else are their women so much like
Western women in beauty and freedom.
[Illustration: KABYLE WOMEN]
The Kabyle woman preserves the liberty which the female of the Orient
possessed in the old times, before the jealousy of Mohammed made her a
bird in a cage, or, as the Arab poet says, "an attar which must not be
given to the winds." In Kabylia the women talk and gossip with the men:
their villages present pretty spectacles at sunset, when groups of
workers and gossipers mingled are seen laughing, chatting and singing to
the accompaniment of the drum. Some of these women are really handsome,
and are freely decorated, even in public, with the singular enamels
which are their peculiar manufacture, and with threads of gold in their
graceful _cheloukas_ or tunics.
But Kalaa, like the picturesque "Peasant's Nest" described by Cowper in
his _Task_, pays one natural penalty for the rare beauty of its site. It
pants on a rock whose gorges of lime are the seat of a perpetual thirst.
In vain have the suffering natives sunk seven basins in one alley of the
town, the cleft separating the quarter of the Son of David from that of
the children of Jesus (_Aissa_). The water only trickles by drops, and,
though plentiful in winter, deserts them altogether in the season when
their air-hung gardens, planted in earth brought up from the plains,
need it the most. As the mellowing of the season brings with it its
plague of aridity, recourse is had to the river at the bottom of the
ravine, the Oued-Hamadouch. Then from morning to night perpendicular
chains of diminutive, shrewd donkeys are seen descending and ascending
the precipice with great jars slung in network.
[Illustration: KABYLE GROUP.]
But the Hamadouch itself in the sultry season is but a thread of water,
easily exhausted by the needs of a population counting three thousand
mouths. Then the folks of Kalaa would die of thirst were it not for the
foresight of a marabout of celebrity, whom chance or miracle caused to
discover a hidden spring at the bottom of the rock. By the aid of
subscriptions among the rich he built a fountain over the sources of the
spring.
It is a small Moorish structure, with two stone pilasters supporting a
pointed arch. In the centre is an inscription forbidding to the pious
admirers of the marabout the use of the fountain while a drop remains in
the Hamadouch. To assist their fidelity, the spring is effectually
closed except when all other sources have peremptorily failed, in the
united opinion of three amins (Kabyle sheikhs). When the amins give
permission the chains which restrain the mechanism are taken off, and
the conduits are opened by means of iron handles operating on small
valves of the same metal. In the great droughts the fountain of Marabout
Yusef-ben-Khouia may be seen surrounded with a throng of astute,
white-nosed asses, waiting in philosophic calm amid the excitement and
struggle of the attendant water-bearers.
[Illustration: YUSEF'S FOUNTAIN.]
Seen hence, from the base of the precipice, where abrupt pathways trace
their zigzags of white lightning down the rock, and where no vegetation
relieves the harsh stone, the town of Kalaa seems some accursed city in
a Dantean _Inferno_. Seen from the peaks of Bogni, on the contrary, the
nest of white houses covered with red tiles, surmounted by a glittering
minaret and by the poplars which decorate the porch of the great mosque,
has an aspect as graceful as unique. In a vapory distance floats off
from the eye the arid and thankless country of the Beni-Abbes. On every
level spot, on every plateau, is detected a clinging white town,
encircled with a natural wreath of trees and hedges. They are all
visible one from the other, and perk up their heads apparently to signal
each other in case of sudden appeal: it is by a telegraphic system from
distance to distance that the Kabyles are collected for their
incorrigible revolutions. Two ruined towers are pointed out, called by
the Kabyles the Bull's Horns, which in 1847 poured down from their
battlements a cataract of fire on Bugeaud's _chasseurs d'Orleans_, who
climbed to take them, singing their favorite army-catch as well as they
could for want of breath:
As-tu vu la casquette, la casquette,
As-tu vu la casquette du Pere Bugeaud?
Far away, at the foot of the Azrou-n'hour, an immense peak lifting its
breadth of snow-capped red into the pure azure, the populous town of
Azrou is spread out over a platform almost inaccessible.
[Illustration: THE LATEST IMPROVED REAPER.]
What a strange landscape! And what a race, brooding over its nests in
the eagles' crags! Where on earth can be found so peculiar a people,
guarding their individuality from the hoariest antiquity, and snatching
the arts into the clefts of the mountains, to cover the languid races of
the plains with luxuries borrowed from the clouds! The jewelry and the
tissues, the bornouses and haiks, the blacksmith-work and ammunition,
which fill the markets of Morocco, Tunis and the countries toward the
desert, are scattered from off these crags, which Nature has forbidden
to man by her very strongest prohibitions.
We are now in the midst of what is known as Grand Kabylia. The coast
from Algiers eastward toward Philippeville, and the relations of some of
the towns through which we have passed, may be understood from the
following sketch:
[Illustration]
The scale of distances may be imagined from the fact that it is
eighty-seven and a half miles by sea from Algiers to Bougie. The country
known as Grand Kabylia, or Kabylia _par excellence_, is that part of
Algeria forming the great square whose corners are Dellys, Aumale, Setif
and Bougie. Though these are fictitious and not geographical limits,
they are the nearest approach that can be made to fixing the nation on a
map. Besides their Grand Kabylia, the ramifications of the tribe are
rooted in all the habitable parts of the Atlas Mountains between Morocco
and Tunis, controlling an irregular portion of Africa which it is
impossible to define. It will be seen that the country of the tribe is
not deprived of seaboard nor completely mountainous. The two ports of
Dellys and Bougie were their sea-cities, and gave the French infinite
trouble: the plain between the two is the great wheat-growing country,
where the Kabyle farmer reaps a painful crop with his saw-edged sickle.
In this trapezoid the fire of rebellion never sleeps long. As we write
comes the report of seven hundred French troops surrounded by ten
thousand natives in the southernmost or Atlas region of Algeria. The
bloody lessons of last year have not taught the Kabyle submission. It
seems that his nature is quite untamable. He can die, but he is in his
very marrow a republican.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
OUR HOME IN THE TYROL
CHAPTER I
"Do not go to the Tyrol," said some of our friends in Rome. "You will be
starved. It is a beautiful country, but with the most wretched
accommodation and the worst living in the world."
"Come to Perugia, where it is always cool in summer," said a painter.
"You can study Perugino's exquisite 'Annunciation' and other gems of the
Umbrian school, and thus blend Art with the relaxation of Nature."
"Come rather to Zemetz in the Engadine, where good Leonhard Wohlvend of
the Lion will help us to bag bears one day and glaciers the next,"
exclaimed a sporting friend, the possessor of the most exuberant
spirits.
[Illustration: SHRINE AT ADELSHEIM.]
"But," remarked the fourth adviser, a lady, "I recommend, after all, the
Tyrol. I went weak and ill last year to the Pusterthal, and returned to
Rome as fresh and strong as a pony. I found the inns very clean and the
prices low; and if you can live on soup, delicious trout and char,
fowls, veal, puddings and fruit, you will fare famously at an outside
average of five francs a day."
As this advice exactly coincided with our own inclinations, we naturally
considered it the wisest of all, especially as the invitation to
bear-hunts and glacier-scrambles was not particularly tempting to our
party. The kind reader will perceive this for himself when he learns
that it consisted of an English writer, who, still hale and hearty in
spite of his threescore years and ten, regarded botany as the best rural
sport; his wife, his faithful companion through many years of sunshine
and shadow, who had grown old so naturally that whilst anticipating a
joyful Hereafter she still clothed this present life with the poetic
hues of her girlhood; their daughter, the present narrator; and their
joint friend, another Margaret, who, whilst loyal to her native country,
America, had created for herself, through her talent, her love of true
work and her self-dependence, a bright social and artistic life in
Italy. As for Perugia, our happy quartette had plenty of opportunities
for studying the old masters in the winter months. Now we were anxious
to exchange the oppressive, leaden air of the Italian summer for the
invigorating breezes of the Alps.
Yet how fresh and graceful Italy still looked as we traveled northward
in the second week of June! The affluent and at the same time gentle
sunshine streamed through the broad green leaves of the vines, which
were flung in elegant festoons from tree to tree. It intensified the
bright scarlet of the myriad poppies, which glowed amongst the brilliant
green corn. It lighted up the golden water-lilies lying on the surface
of the slowly-gliding streams, and brought into still greater contrast
the tall amber-colored campanile or the black cypress grove cut in sharp
outline against the diaphanous blue sky. We knew, however, that fever
could lurk in this very luxury of beauty, while health was awaiting us
in the more sombre scenes of gray mountain and green sloping pasture. We
traveled on, therefore, by the quickest and easiest route, and alighting
from the express-train to Munich at the Brixen station on the Brenner
Pass, were shortly deposited, bag and baggage, at that comfortable and
thoroughly German inn, the renowned Elephant.
We prided ourselves on being experienced travelers, and consequently
immediately secured four places in the Eilwagen, which was to start from
the inn at six o'clock the next morning for our destination, Bruneck. We
handed over our luggage to the authorities, partook of supper and then
retired contentedly to rest--in the case of the two Margarets to the
soundest of slumbers--until in the morning we were suddenly awoke, not
by the expected knock of the chambermaid, but by a hurrying to and fro
of feet, and the sound of several eager voices resounding through the
echoing corridors. Fortunately, it was not only perfectly light, but
exhausted Nature had enjoyed its allotted spell of sleep; for we found,
to our astonishment, that it was past five o'clock. The storm continued
outside no whit abated, and in the midst of the human hubbub the
father's voice sounded clear and distinct.
"The British lion is roaring," exclaimed Margaret: then, snatching at my
attire, I was in the midst of the disturbance in a very few minutes.
My father stood at his door and held in his upraised hand a pair of
villainous boots, old and "clouted," fit for the Gibeonites, very
different from the substantial English aids to the understanding which
he had placed in all good faith outside his door the previous night. A
meagre-faced chambermaid was wringing her hands beside him. Two waiters
vociferated, whilst a third, whose eyes were still heavy with sleep, was
blindly groping at the other doors.
"My excellent London boots, made on a special last, have disappeared,"
said my father, trying to moderate his indignation, "and this vile
rubbish has been substituted in their stead.--Where is your master?" he
demanded of the sobbing woman. "Fetch either your master or my boots."
"Herr Je! Herr Je! I've hunted high and low, up stairs and down,"
murmured the weeping maid, "and the gracious gentleman's boots are
nowhere."
"Sir," said a little round-headed man, who seemed to have his wits about
him, "I know very well that these are not your boots. I cleaned your
grace's boots, and placed them at your door at four o'clock. It is some
beggarly Welschers who have crept up stairs and exchanged for them,
unawares, their old leather hulks."
"Ah yes," said the wailing woman: "three Welschers, who came for the
fair, slept in the barn, and had some bread and cheese before they left,
an hour ago."
In the midst of this explanation the door of No. 2 was slightly opened,
and an arm in a shirt sleeve appeared and drew in a pair of boots.
Hardly, however, was the door closed when the bell of No. 2 began to
ring violently.
"Heavens! another pair gone!" exclaimed a waiter. Then with one accord
the whole bevy of distracted servants rushed to No. 2, declaring their
innocence.
"My good people, I cannot understand one word you say," replied a mild
English voice. "I request you to be gone, and let one of you bring me my
own proper boots."
The British lion--who, it must be owned, had reason to roar--became
calmed at the evident innocence of the servants and the gentle sounds of
this British lamb. He therefore went to the rescue, and explained the
matter to No. 2, who in his turn meekly expostulated: "Very vexatious!
Dear me! My capital boots made expressly for Alpine climbing! But we
must make the best of it, my dear sir."
Maids and men still remained in an excited group, when at this juncture
the head-waiter appeared, bringing with him the landlord, a respectable
middle-aged man, who, bowing repeatedly, assured the gentlemen of his
extreme annoyance at the whole affair, especially as it compromised the
fame of his noted house. Indeed, he would gladly refund the loss were
the two pairs of boots not forthcoming.
Forthcoming! How could they be forthcoming when at this moment the clock
was striking six, and the Eilwagen (Margaret termed it the _oil-wagon_)
was to start at once, and we with it, though minus breakfast? The
British lamb departed hurriedly, but we were detained to be told of
another complication. Not only were the boots gone, but the royal
imperial post-direction of Austria, after duly weighing and measuring
our luggage, had adjudged it too heavy and bulky for the roof of its
mail-coach. It would, however, restore our money, and even suggest
another mode of conveyance, but take us by its Eilwagen it would not.
"The delay is indeed advantageous, mein Herr," said the landlord,
addressing my father, who walked about in slippers, "as time will
thereby be gained for a thorough investigation of the boot question."
One trouble always modifies another. The disappearance of the boots made
us bear the departure of the Eilwagen philosophically. Nay, at the
conclusion of a substantial breakfast of hot coffee, ham and eggs we
began greatly to enjoy ourselves. Rejected by the post-direction for the
Eilwagen, we felt at liberty to choose our time of departure. For the
present, therefore, acting as our own masters, we leisurely sauntered
out of doors, admired the clean, attractive exterior of the roomy inn,
and smiled at the fresco of the huge elephant, which, possessed of
gigantic tusks and diminutive tail, carried a man, spear in hand, on his
back. A giant bearing a halbert, accompanied by two youths in tunics,
completed the group. An inscription informed us that this was the first
elephant which had ever visited Teutschland, and that the inn derived
its name from the fact of the august quadruped sleeping there on its
journey, which took place in the sixteenth century. The worthy landlord
had also ordered a fresco to be painted on his inn to the honor of the
Virgin. She was depicted standing upon the crescent moon, and her aid
was invoked by the good man in rhyme to protect the house "from
lightning's rod, O thou Mother of God! From rain and fire, and sickness
dire;"--but, alas! there was no mention of thieves.
We were deploring the fact when the worthy Wirth appeared in person,
attended by a slim youth in blue-and-silver uniform, whom he introduced
to us with considerable emphasis as representing the police. The officer
of justice stepped forward and with a low bow took the length and
breadth of the Welschers' offending, and promised that the Austrian
government would do its best to see the distinguished, very noble
Herrschaft righted. We cannot be quite certain that he promised that the
emperor would seek the boots in person, but something was said about
that mighty potentate. At the assurance of governmental interference how
could the British lion fail of being pacified? He declared that the
landlord had acted as a gentleman, shook hands with him, and returning
to the house exchanged his slippers for his second pair of boots--very
inferior in make and comfort to the missing treasures--and then
conferred with the landlord as to the best method for the continuance of
our journey.
The Herr Wirth, with whom and the whole household we had now become
excellent friends, declared that with our unusual amount of luggage the
only plan was a "separat Eilfahrt," which means a separate
express-journey to Bruneck. It had, however, its advantages: we should
travel quickly and with the greatest ease. As we were willing to accede
to his proposition, he handed us over to his clerks in the royal
imperial post-bureau, who, having received a round sum of florins,
filled in and sanded an important document, which being delivered to us
conveyed the satisfactory information that we four individuals, whose
ages, personal appearance and social position the head-official had
magnanimously passed over with a compassionate flourish, were, on this
fourteenth day of June, 1871, to be conveyed to the town of Bruneck in
the caleche No. 1990; which said vehicle would be duly furnished with
cloth or leather cushions, one foot-carpet, two lamps, main-braces,
axletree, etc., including one portion of grease. So far, well and good,
but on our inquiring when the said No. 1990 would be ready to start, the
head-official merely looked over his spectacles at his subordinate, who
in his turn, leaning back in his tall chair and stroking his beard,
called out, "Klaus! Klaus!"--a call which was answered by a tall,
stolid-looking man, also in livery, who seemed to occupy the post of
official hostler.
"Klaus," demanded the second chef, "the Herrschaft ask when the vehicle
will be ready."
Klaus gave an astonished stare, and articulated some rapid sounds in a
dialect quite unintelligible to us.
"Precisely," returned the subordinate. "The horses are sent for, and
when they arrive the Herrschaft will be expedited forthwith."
Whereupon the clerks of the post-direction became suddenly immersed in
the duties of their office. We took the hint and good-naturedly retired.
It certainly looked like business when outside we perceived Klaus
dragging forth with all his might and main, from a dark and dusty
coach-house, a still dustier old coach. Darker it was not, for the color
was that of canary, emblazoned with the black double-headed Austrian
eagle. This, then, was the caleche No. 1990. It had the air of a veteran
officer in the imperial army who had not seen active service for many a
long day.
Klaus was too busy to pay much attention to us. He pulled the piece of
antiquity into the street, and with an uneasy expression, as if he knew
before-hand what he had to expect, he tried and tugged at one of the
door-handles. "Sacrament!" he muttered as he at last let go and began
hunting in the boot of the coach, under the driver's cushion and in
secret nooks and corners, which proved, at the best, mere receptacles
for fag-ends of whipcord and cobwebs.
"It is gone, sure enough, the key of the right-hand door." I am afraid
it had disappeared three years before, at least, to the fellow's
knowledge, for he added in an apologetic but hopeful tone, "It matters
not the least, for, see you, all the inns are on the left-hand side."
A glimpse into the coach-house had convinced us of the fact of this
vehicle alone being at our disposal; so we determined to manage as best
we might, and bore even philosophically the smell of the musty,
dust-filled cushions, which Klaus triumphantly pulled out of the open
door and beat, as it were, within an inch of their lives.
Briefly, to make two long hours short after several tedious quarters of
expectation, a square-set, rosy-faced and middle-aged postilion appeared
round the far corner of the village street, resplendent in silver lace
and yellow livery, leading three gaunt but sturdy horses. In ten minutes
my father was seated on the box and we ladies inside, receiving the good
wishes of Klaus, of the landlord, the men and the maids, now all smiles
and curtsies, and with the postilion blowing triumphantly his horn we
dashed out of the quaint, dreamy little cathedral town of Brixen.
The road speedily began to ascend, and we looked down from a
considerable height on the vast Augustine monastery of Neustift, with
its large church, its picturesque cluster of wings, refectories and
separate residences of every stage of architecture, lying snugly amongst
vineyards, Spanish chestnuts and fig trees. Ever upward, by but above
the waters of the rapid Brienz, until at the fortress of Muehlbach we
entered the Pusterthal proper.
This old fort commands the valley and spans the road. Our driver, who,
according to Austrian regulation, went on foot wherever the ascent was
particularly steep, could not enter into our admiration of its romantic
position. Hans--for such was his name--could not perceive any grace or
beauty in a scene which had often disturbed his imagination and awakened
his fear. "Ah," said he, "it is a God-forsaken spot. It is here that
many slaughtered Bavarians wander about at night with candles, seeking
for their bodies or their souls--I know not which. Look you! My
grandmother came from Schliers in Bavaria, and the two countries speak
the same language. However, in my father's day, in 1809, Emperor Franz
drove the Bavarians and French out of this part of the Tyrol. It was in
April, when the Austrian Schatleh came marching through the Pusterthal
with his soldiers, and drove the Bavarians before him. Though these were
only a handful, they would not make truce, but broke down all the
bridges in their retreat. They wanted to burn the bridge at Lorenzen,
only the country-folks with blunderbusses, cudgels and pitchforks
protected it, and made them run; so they marched on, pursued by the
Landsturm, to this fortress, where they fought like devils until many
were killed, and the others, at their wits' end, managed to push on to
Innsbruck. Yes, glorious days, and long may the Tyrolese cry God,
Emperor and Fatherland! But those wandering spirits make my flesh
creep. Ugh!"
The road now allowed of the horses being put to a lively trot,
interrupting further conversation. We drove steadily on, stopping at
comfortable inns in large well-to-do villages, where even the poorest
appeared to enjoy in their houses unlimited space. The landlords
politely demanded our journey-certificate, solemnly inserted the hour of
our arrival and departure, and confirmed the important fact of our
remaining exactly the same number of travelers as at the beginning of
our journey. We exchange Hans for a youthful Jacobi, and Jacobi for an
aged Seppl, who all agreed in their livery if not in their ages; each
stage also being at a slightly higher elevation, so that by degrees we
had changed the Italian vegetation, which had lingered as far as the
neighborhood of Brixen, for the more northern crops of young oats and
flax. Yet one prominent reminder of comparatively adjacent Italy
accompanied us the greater portion of the three hours' drive. Hundreds
of agile, swarthy figures were busily boring, blasting, shoveling and
digging for the new railway, which is to convey next season shoals of
passengers and civilization, rightly or wrongly so called, into this
great yet primitive artery of Southern Tyrol, the Pusterthal already
forming, by means of the Ampezzo, a highway between Venice and the
Brenner Pass. As the morning advanced the busy sounds of labor ceased,
and we saw groups of dark-eyed men reclining in the shade of the rocks,
partaking of their frugal dinners of orange-colored polenta--_plenten_,
as our Seppl called it.
So onward by soft slopes bordered by mountain-ridges, all scarped and
twisted, having dark green draperies of pine trees cast round their
strong limbs, with bees humming in the aromatic yet invigorating breeze
fresh from the snow-fields, and swallows wheeling in the clear blue air,
until we reached a fertile amphitheatre. A confusion of flourishing
villages was scattered over its verdant meadows, and here and there on a
jutting rock or mountain-spur a solitary mediaeval tower or imposing
castle stood forth, the most conspicuous of all being a fortress
situated on a natural bulwark of rock. Half around its base a little
town, which appeared stunted in its growth by the course of the river,
confidingly rested. A hill covered with wood screened the other side of
the castle, whilst exactly opposite a broad valley ran northward, hemmed
in by lofty snow-fields and glaciers that sparkled in the noonday sun.
Natural hummocks or knolls covered with wood broke the uniformity of
this upland plain, which still ascended eastward to the higher, bleaker
Upper Pusterthal. This valley continues to mount to yet more sterile
regions, until, reaching the great watershed of the Toblacher Plain,
which sends part of its streams to the Adriatic, the others to the more
distant Black Sea, it gradually dips down again to the fruitful
wine-regions of Lienz.
[Illustration: BRUNECK.]
We have now, however, to do with Bruneck, where our venerable 1990 had
safely deposited us at the modern inn, the Post. We might almost style
it the fashionable inn, for it was kept by a gentleman of noble birth
and the representative of the province, who, having a large family of
growing children, had wisely let his gentility take care of itself and
permitted his guests to be entertained at their own rather than at his
expense. As the noble landlady was suffering from headache, the dapper
waitress took charge of us, provided us with rooms, and then installed
us at the early _table-d'hote_, where a number of the officers of the
garrison, with some other regular diners, whom we learnt to recognize in
time as the town bailiff, the apothecary and the advocate, were
despatching, in the midst of great clatter and bustle, the inevitable
_kalbsfleisch_ and _mehlspeis_.
The lady who had recommended us to go to the Pusterthal had likewise
assured us that the Post at Bruneck would satisfy all our requirements.
In this she was mistaken. It is true that tastes differ, especially
amongst tourists, who may be divided into two classes--those who merely
care for the country, let them disguise it as they will, when they can
endue it with the features of their town-life; and those who love the
country for the sake of Nature, and thus endeavor to carry trails of
freshness back with them to town. Now, it was all artificial dust and
din that we desired to get rid of. We had traveled in search of verdant
meadows, brawling streams and sweet-scented woods. We could not find
solace and relaxation in sitting at the windows of our respectable inn
to watch every passer-by on the dusty boulevard below, in spending half
the day indoors, let it be ever so comfortably, or in merely turning out
in the evening to shop in the puny town, whilst we bemoaned the want of
a circulating library and a brass band. It was even more intolerable, as
the Post had been built perversely with its back to the fine view of the
glaciers. Moreover, the whole establishment was in the hands of
bricklayers, painters and glaziers, who were enlarging and repairing it
for the comfort and convenience of future but certainly not of present
visitors.
As trade was evidently flourishing, we had not the slightest hesitation
in ringing for Maria, the _kellnerin_, and consulting with her about the
mode of our procuring country lodgings as soon as possible. Maria was a
good-natured girl and willing to serve us, but our ideas could not be so
easily carried out as we had anticipated. One of us had the folly to
suggest vacant rooms being to let in the castle.
"Gracious!" replied Maria, casting her eyes up to the sky. "In the
castle! Why, that's crown property, and filled with the military.
Really, I don't know how I can help you, since the gentlemen officers
have engaged for themselves every apartment inside or outside the town."
We spoke of the many neighboring villages, which were filled with grand
old houses.
Maria declared they were better outside than inside, and that the Bauers
who dwelt in them could scarcely find bedding for their cattle, much
less for Christian gentlefolks. "There is the Herr Apotheker's house at
Unterhofen, but he will not let that. There is the Hof at Adelsheim:
it's out of the question. There is also Frau Sieger's in the same
village, but that is let to the Herr Major for the season. Look you! you
had better go to Frau Sieger. Stay, I will send Lina with you."
Lina proved to be one of the blossoms of the noble family tree. She led
my mother and me to Frau Sieger, but what came of our afternoon's
expedition deserves to be told in a fresh chapter.