DÉLI-BÁB.
The ordinary travelling conveyance of Hungary is the _leiterwagen_
or _szekér_, a long skeleton cart, with sides like ladders,
already described, which, from the convenient habit it has of
accommodating itself to the manifold vicissitudes of Hungarian travel,
and of wriggling and writhing itself into shape under circumstances
that would utterly break up any English vehicle, together with the
capacity it possesses of being dragged through quagmires that in this
country bear the name of roads, is admirably adapted to its purpose.
They know only part of a country who study it merely in its
outward aspects and do not acquaint themselves with the lives and
characteristics of its inhabitants. Before leaving England, therefore,
we determined to throw off our national prejudices and mix with the
people as much as possible, becoming Magyars on the plains, Slovaks
and Rusniaks in the northern and north-eastern Carpathians, Wallachs
in Transylvania and Yougo-Slávs in Croatia. For this reason too we
determined not to keep to the iron-roads, but to travel across country
by _szekér_--curiously enough pronounced _shaker_--or any
other conveyance to be met with. The _szekér_ is by no means so
uncomfortable a vehicle as might be imagined, for well filled with hay
in addition to a couple of air-pillows--which no traveller in Hungary
should omit to carry--one may journey in it day after day without very
much fatigue.
Starting from so small a place as Fűred--where thus early in the
season we feared nothing else could be obtained--our expectations
at any rate did not soar beyond that humble means of locomotion
even if our ambition took a loftier flight. But our guide, on the
contrary, threw, figuratively speaking, cold water upon that modest
vehicle--in fact, very cold water indeed--venturing to insinuate at
the anomaly that would be presented by an august _Ángol_, and
his _tekintetes asszony_ (worshipful lady), as he persisted in
styling us, travelling in so undignified a manner, and did his utmost
to dissuade us from proceeding across-country by inducing us to return
to Sió-Fok, and there take the train to Pest, at which place we could
purchase a travelling carriage if we would, and journey through Hungary
in a manner becoming an “illustrious family” from _Ángolország_
(England).
Talleyrand says somewhere in his philosophy that “the tongue was given
to conceal the thoughts,” and András’s opposition to our travelling
in a “shaker” bore, we felt sure, no reference to the maintenance of
_our_ dignity, but simply to that of his own. The Hungarians are
proverbially proud, ostentatious and fond of display, and there never
was a truer proverb than that of their own creation: “_Sallangos a
Magyar_” (the Magyars are fond of trappings). This being the case,
the prospect of sitting side by side with the driver on the bench of
a _paraszt-kosci_, or peasant’s carriage, as a _szekér_ is
often designated--it was amusing to hear the scornful way in which
he pronounced the word--was far more than so pompous an individual as
a Magyar guide could view with complacency. It was to him therefore
a source of no small chagrin that we intimated our intention of
persisting in our contemplated cross-country journey to Pest.
András in his ordinary attire, and András dressed in the livery of
his master, were two entirely different personages. We could scarcely
recognise him when he presented himself on the morning of the day
on which we were to start, arrayed in the tightest of pantaloons
of dark green cloth, braided with yellow, and hussar-jacket of the
same. The livery was somewhat faded, it is true, but he presented,
notwithstanding, quite a martial appearance; his moustache by the
agency of some external application stood out perfectly straight,
and, extending far beyond the region of his face, added a fierce and
Mephistophelean character to his countenance.
To the eyes of the English traveller the costumes or rather liveries of
the servants of the “nobles” and gentry are very striking. There was
a time however, and not so long ago, when they wore a full military
uniform, resplendent with gold and silver lace, each gentleman having
his valet, who was dressed and armed like a hussar, and who waited on
him with the soldier-like accompaniments of sabre and spurs. The other
men-servants of his establishment were similarly equipped; whilst the
ordinary costume of their masters consisted of gay-coloured broad-cloth
richly embroidered with gold, a velvet fur-lined mantle thrown over
one shoulder, a girdle or sash of some costly material encircling the
waist, and a hat adorned with splendid plumes.
These beautiful “relics of barbarism” are, alas! fast dying out. The
ladies have relinquished their national costumes for those of Western
Europe, and the nobles only wear theirs on festive and grand occasions,
unless they desire to make, as in 1870, a political demonstration
against some Imperial laws, when to a man the Hungarians present
themselves in all their former glory of plume, embroidered sash, and
kingly mantle, and cause the streets of Pest to look like scenes from
an opera.
We were just starting for an early cruise on the lake, when András
overtook us bristling with importance, his very hair standing erect
in his eagerness to communicate something. He had that moment, so he
informed us, by a piece of unprecedented good luck, heard of a britzska
belonging to a dead Pole from Gallicia; that is to say, trying to
correct himself, it had _once_ belonged to a dead Pole. Here,
getting hopelessly entangled in speech, and unable to right himself,
he came to a standstill, till growing calm by degrees he at length
explained that a Polish gentleman, who had sought health in the healing
waters of Fűred, had not only failed to find it, but had committed the
misdemeanour of dying in a certain inn in the neighbourhood before he
had paid the bill. The britzska consequently became the property of the
landlord, and was for sale.
Although the sum demanded was four hundred gulden, he, András, believed
that by judicious bargaining it might be obtained for three hundred.
At any rate would “their Graces” only come and see it? It was in an
_álás_, or shed, in the village hard by.
Following him, we soon came to the place where it was reposing,--a
heavy, time-worn, battered, and oppressed-looking thing, typical,
doubtless, of the fortunes of its late owner, whilst so ancient was
its general appearance that it might have conveyed Arpád or even
Attila himself across the Carpathians when they and their conquering
armies made their first entry into Hungary. It possessed, however, the
modern luxury of a hood and glass shutters, and was constructed so as
to enable the traveller to lie down in it at full length, and we were
forced to admit that the whole did unquestionably form a very snug
arrangement for journeying through a country like this, where there are
such violent and rapid changes in the temperature.
The paper currency of Hungary was at this time more than usually
depressed. We obtained everywhere twelve florins and about eighty
kreuzers in exchange for our English sovereign, so that three hundred
gulden--a gulden being equivalent to two shillings--represented in
reality only £25 10_s._; we therefore informed him that if he
could strike the bargain for that sum he might, and left him to do the
haggling.
We were doubtless not a little influenced in our compliance with
András’s wishes by a conversation we had had that morning with a
German, whom we happened to meet whilst walking on the shores of the
lake.
“Brigandage in Hungary,” he remarked, “is not yet a thing of the past.
You will be journeying across the lonely Alfőld, and doing so in a
manner befitting a person of distinction is, believe me, the only thing
that will exempt you from an attack, should chance lead you in their
way. You English have a proverb, ‘There is honour amongst thieves;’
and it is one that might well have emanated from this country, for the
innate pride of these Magyar ruffians causes them to regard with such
respect and veneration all whom they conceive to be of pure blood,
that instead of robbing them they will often afford them safe conduct
through their fastnesses; and whilst a caravan of merchants crossing
the Alfőld in broad day may fall a victim to their avarice, the haughty
noble driving in his carriage, attended by one solitary servant, may
travel in perfect safety throughout the livelong night. If you travel
in your own carriage, you may be mistaken for one of these nobles; and
rather than rob you, they will probably help you on your journey.”
It is scarcely necessary to say that András succeeded in his
negotiations, and in little more than an hour’s time--instead of the
much-despised _paraszt-kosci_--our _britzska_, to which were
harnessed four miserable-looking horses, quite in keeping with the
equipage itself, drew up to the hotel.
Our charioteer, a man of sinister appearance with deep-set eyes and
raven hair, is smoking a pipe. He wears the usual hussar-jacket thrown
rakishly over one shoulder and a bunch of flowers in his hat. Giving
half-a-dozen flourishes with his whip, he tickles the ears of the
leaders. The last bag has been deposited. The hamper containing the
cold fowls, the yard of bread, the half yard of garlicky sausage and
the bottles of _badacsony_, reposes safely in a net beneath the
carriage. We take our places: a struggle ensues on the part of the four
lean, long-tailed horses at starting, all of which manifest a decided
will of their own--but suddenly we are off.
Between Fűred and the mountains of Transylvania stretches an
uninterrupted plain. The country in this locality, however, is less
thinly populated than that of the Pettaurfeld, which we passed
through on entering Hungary from Venice. On the road we meet waggons
containing barrels and piles of merchandise drawn by beautiful white,
meek-eyed oxen, and often driven by Jews, who all over Hungary are
the “middlemen” between the producer and the consumer. It is to the
Jews that the farmer sells the wool from his numerous flocks, and the
“noble” the produce of his estates. They are Jews who buy the grapes
and the wheat and the maize, and who drive hard bargains with the lowly
peasant for his little plot of sunflowers, poppies or hemp, and who are
the medium of nearly all the commerce in the country.
[Illustration]
Our route now leads us in a northerly direction. At first the plains
softly undulating are dimpled here and there with shady hollows; whilst
like golden islands in an ocean of vivid green lie long stretches of
yellow colza and ripening corn. On the gently rising upland yonder
a dark round speck appears against the sunlit sky; gradually it
elongates, and we hear a voice singing in a quivering treble some
national idyll. It is a husbandman emerging from the hollow and
trudging homewards along the crest of the undulation. Then all is
silence and solitude once more, till coming to a standstill at one of
the primitive wells by the roadside, we hear the distant rumble of a
waggon as its wheels grind heavily along, the driver of it singing,
as he goes, a melancholy ditty in the minor key. Then one by one the
villages and solitary farms lying on the horizon die away; and we
enter the boundless plains. How lonely we feel, and what tiny atoms of
creation, with no objects to measure ourselves by save birds of prey
and the white clouds sailing far up in the great, blue, glorious sky!
Our carriage, though imposing only in the matter of size, proved very
comfortable, its ponderous hood shielding us from the heat of the sun,
save where, taking mean advantage of weak places in its constitution,
it shot fiery arrows in upon us, scarcely less piercing than those that
pour down upon the head of the traveller in the desert.
The sun reflects itself in the white and dusty road. Above the soil
on either side there is a flickering motion of the air like the haze
from a lime-kiln. Everything is hot and dusty; not an insect is seen
hovering about the low bushes which now and then skirt our pathway.
All nature is taking its siesta in the dreamy noontide, and nothing
is awake but the scarlet pimpernel that with wide-open unblinking eye
looks straight up at the blazing sun. We now come to a marshy district,
where a lonely heron is contemplating its lovely image in a small still
pool, and then away we go again out into broad purple patches of newly
upturned soil, bands of emerald corn, and speckled streaks of tobacco,
with its large red and green leaves, and on through cool labyrinths of
maize, till we come to vast tracts of uncultivated land, where wild
horses with flying manes go scampering across its surface with all the
natural grace of untamed things.
As day advances and the shadows of the clouds begin to lengthen across
the plains, a breeze springs up and plays about us softly, rustling
the large white, surplice-like sleeves of the driver’s garment, but
not sufficiently strong to stir his black and flowing locks, which,
weighted with some unctuous matter, rest calmly on his shoulders. Our
nearest town is Veszprim, but at the pace we are at present going we
are scarcely likely to reach it before nightfall, if then. But what
does it matter, when we have the whole of to-morrow, and the next day,
and the day after that, aye, and our whole lives, to do the distance in
if necessary? How delightful to enjoy for once the true feeling of rest
in this world of hurry-scurry, where we are but too often compelled to
live at high pressure! Let, oh! let us for once take life easily under
the broad and peaceful canopy of heaven, and reduce the _dolce far
niente_ to a science!
Borne leisurely onwards by the monotonous jog-trot of our steeds, the
scream of a falcon now and then, as it whirls overhead, is the only
sound that breaks the stillness. Nothing is here to remind us of that
busy world which seems somewhere quite outside the atmosphere of our
present lives, and which, so far as we are immediately concerned,
might belong to some wholly different planet, even if it exists at
all. Mother Earth here folds us in an entirely different lap; all
the symbols of our old lives have vanished, and the present is far
too vague and dreamy to be linked with any real memories. And as we
recline languidly and luxuriously in the warm shade of our comfortable
carriage, our past experiences are for the time buried in the Lethean
stream; whilst the things of men--the tragedies of life and death, the
deeds of cruelty and wrong, the hunger and struggle with hard times
which exist in that world that lies beyond the circle of our visible
horizon--seem no longer real, but only a hideous fancy.
Presently we espy what in the distance appears to be a river.
“Is it old Father Danube turning up unexpectedly?” we ask each other;
exclaiming, after a pause, “No, it cannot be a river, it is a broad
lake with a green island in its midst. See how the trees are reflected
in the water!”
“What is the name of that lake yonder?” we inquire of András, who is
half asleep on the box. “It surely cannot be the Platten-See again; it
is the wrong side of us for that, and we must have left all sight of it
behind us hours ago.”
“_Déli-báb!_” replied András laconically, in a drowsy voice,
aroused from his half-somnolent state only to subside into it again.
Amongst the numerous myths which the fertile imagination of those
pastoral nomads the ancient Magyars conjured up, dwelling on these vast
steppes surrounded by rivers, trees and the ever-recurring phenomena of
nature, not one is so poetical or so philosophical in its conception as
Déli-báb, the “Fairy of the South,” and the ideal personification of a
mirage.
How ingenious and at the same time suggestive is the parentage
that is assigned to this national fairy of the Magyars!--“Daughter
of old Puszta of the Alfőld”--her home; “Sister of Tenger” the
sea--which form she most frequently represents. “Loved by Szél”--the
wind, which, fanning the quivering haze--the chief cause of the
phenomenon--perpetually changes its aspect.
How often too has she furnished a theme to the Hungarian poets! Have
not Eötvös, Vörösmarty, and the impassioned Petőfi, sung of the
deceptive beauty of this land sprite when--scarcely less delusive
than the Sirens of ancient Greece, who from their rocky island called
so sweetly to passing sailors “Come and rest! Come to our cool green
caves, O men of many toils and many storms! and we will charm your
cares away”--she lures the weary traveller onwards many a mile, and
then, mocking, fades away?
It is impossible to travel far on the plains on a sultry day without
observing this beautiful apparition. Often it pursues the traveller for
many hours together, whilst not unfrequently it is seen to encircle the
whole horizon. Now it simulates a steeple and houses poised in mid-air;
now a river or a lake; but, generally, a broad expanse of ocean, with
long stretches of sandy beach and narrow promontories of marshy shore,
near which are masts of vessels, with tall trees and copses and stones
reflected clearly in the water.
[Illustration]
We have nothing in prosaic England to compare with the poetical
superstition _Déli-báb_; but the resemblance between some of
our national fables concerning good and bad fairies and those of
Hungary, which are of Finnish origin, is very striking. Not to
mention Mermaids and others, which until the middle of the last
century were believed to inhabit the waters of the Theiss, there were
sorcerers who were invariably accompanied by the conventional black
cat; whilst Satan (_őrdőg_), whose particular personification in
this case is supposed to be of Tartar or Persian origin, is always
represented--though of ante-Christian era--with large ears and a
long tail; his abode _Pokol_, where, amidst a band of numerous
subjects, he dwells in heat and darkness.
We have passed the episcopal town of Veszprim, with its melancholy
houses and grass-grown streets, passed its numerous vineyards, and once
more, out on the broad and silent plains, see at long intervals little
sleepy farms lying half-hidden amongst the green recesses of Indian
corn, and surrounded by a blaze of wild flowers.
At still longer distances we come to small villages, almost every one
of which is called _Kis_ or _Nagy_--_something_; adjectives signifying
“little” and “great,” and which, when reversed, apply to villages far
beyond our sight.
All, whether _Kis_ and _Nagy_, are exceedingly alike. Each house has
a white gable pierced with its one small window; beneath which, on a
bench placed against the wall precisely in the same position as that
of its next door neighbour, sit peaceful women and girls knitting and
gossiping. These benches, with one of which each house is provided, are
called by the appropriate appellation of _Szóhordók_, “word-bearers.”
This uniformity in the villages of the Alfőld is very striking and
peculiar, and cannot fail to arrest the attention of all who, leaving
the iron-roads which now link all the large towns and cities of Hungary
together, travel across the open country.