Читать книгу The Story Teller of the Desert—"Backsheesh!" or, Life and Adventures in the Orient - Thomas Wallace Knox - Страница 79

From Belgrade to Basiasch, the scenery of the Danube is much like that above the mouth of the Save. At Basiasch, the railway from Pesth and Vienna reaches the river, and we took on board several passengers who had come by rail from those cities. The quick route from Vienna to Constantinople is by this railway, but it is a dreary ride, and, unless one is in a hurry, he had better stick to the river. our journey at daybreak, but I was up before the call, and out on deck.

We were to be transferred, and were transferred, to another boat, an odd-looking affair with powerful machinery, and with two wheels on each side. Her steering-wheel was astern, directly over the rudder, and though she was small she required all the strength of two men to control her.

On such a boat we left Moldowa, just as day broke in the east, and steamed down the river with the rapidity of a railway train. The banks seemed to be flying past us, or we flying past them, and the spray was dashed quite over the boat, drenching the deck passengers who were huddled forward and by no means leaving dry the erste classe astern. The blush on the eastern horizon extended, and as daylight became clear and full we entered the mountains, and were among the boiling rapids which mark this part of the Danube in the season of low water.

On the right bank appeared the wonderful fortress of Galumbutz, built by Maria Theresa. Out of the river rises a pyramid of rocks, and from base to summit this pyramid is covered with towers and walls, and pierced with windows and port-holes. The foundations of the fortress were Roman, and the tradition is that Trojan Helen was once imprisoned there. Almost in face of this fortress is the famous cave known as the Muckenhole, whence came a species of mosquitoes that annually kill thousands of cattle along this portion of the Danube valley. There is a legend that they arise from the putrefaction of the dragon killed by St. George; they issue from the cave in clouds, and extend their ravages more than a hundred miles in every direction. The government walled up the entrance of the cave in the hope of destroying the pest, but without success; the probability is that the insect inhabits the entire country, and only goes to the cave in bad weather.

The river makes many bends and zig-zags, and at times we went unpleasantly near the rocks. The scenery in this part is wild, and the land generally too rough for cultivation. Along the left bank there is an excellent road, which extends from Moldowa to Orsona, the frontier town of Austro-Hungary, and keeps constantly on the river bank. On the opposite shore there are traces of a Roman road cut into the mountain side, but evidently never completed.

Two hours on this four-wheeled steamer brought us to Drenkova, where we landed and were consigned to carriages and carts. The first-class passengers had carriages that were reasonably comfortable, as they had stuffed seats, and backs to lean against, but the others were thrust into arabas or common carts, some of them having straw to sit upon, some rough seats without backs, and some neither straw nor seats. Sometimes the “araba” is drawn by horses, and sometimes by oxen; in Turkey it is generally drawn by oxen, with an arrangement swinging over their backs to keep away the flies, and the cart has in hot or wet weather an awning over it to protect the travelers. In the present instance we had horses and a driver, the latter a native of the country, and black enough to be half Indian and half negro. He was amiable and anxious to please us, and we got up quite a conversation of signs, as we had not a single word in common. I tried him in English, French, German, Russian, and Italian, and he tried me in Moldavian, all to no purpose. What an inconvenience you find in this thing of languages. Wouldn’t I like to twist the neck of the fellow who proposed to build the Tower of Babel?

The Danube was at its lowest, otherwise we should have saved this land travel, and could have passed the upper Iron Gate by water. As it was, we looked upon the rapids and whirlpools, and on the rocks scattered here and there in the channel, and were not altogether sorry to be on land. At one place the channel for boats is only seventy feet wide at low water, and the current is very swift. The name Iron Gate comes from the Turkish, Demi-Kapour, and is intended to mean a hindrance to navigation, rather than a narrow passage barred with a formidable door. The right bank in this locality is simply magnificent. The mountains are steep and rugged, their summits covered with trees, and their sides presenting enormous masses of grey rocks, capriciously veined with red porphyry, and here and there showing deep crevices that appear to be the mouths of caverns.

After three hours of this sort of travel we were transferred to a small steamer where we managed to get an apology for dinner, and where, when the little cabin was full of men and women, a Hungarian passenger with an enormous mustache and a loud voice opened his valise, removed his coat and vest, and coolly proceeded to change his shirt.

He was not at all abashed to display his back and shoulders to the party, but went on with his toilet very much as if in a room by himself.

Nobody interfered with him, and after he had finished his change he was the best dressed man on the boat, as he could boast a clean shirt while the rest of us were dusty with our ride from Drenkova.

From time to time the Danube in this part of its course expands into large basins like mountain lakes. One of these is particularly beautiful as it seems to be completely enclosed and reveals no passage for the river. By and by, as the steamer moves along, an opening is discovered and we enter a deep gorge with steep mountain walls two thousand feet high on either; hand and with a width to the river from wall to wall in one place of only two hundred yards. The noise of the wheels is echoed and re-echoed from side to side, and the scene forcibly recalled to me the prettiest and wildest portion of the Saguenay in Canada, the Rhine near the Seven Mountains, and the Amoor in the Hingan defile. We are in the defile of the Cazan (Turkish for Caldron) the grandest part of the whole Danube from Ratisbon to Galatz. Everybody is moved to expressions of admiration, all save the “Doubter,” who declares that the Danube disappoints him and is a wearisome and uninteresting stream.

We land at Orsova (pronounced Orehova) to pass once more into carriages and go beyond the Lower Iron Gate. Picturesque Wallachians surround us, with their immense hats of wool and their boots of red leather. We halt a moment at a little brook which has the Austrian custom-house on one side and the Roumanian on the other; a Roumanian official examines our tickets, and allows us to pass without examination.

Speaking of the custom house reminds me of a funny incident.

When I entered Servia at Belgrade I had in my trunk a box of Austrian cigars which I bought in Pesth. Coming out of Belgrade and going on board the steamer I had the same cigars; the Austrian customs-official insisted that all cigars brought into Austria must pay duty, and he demanded a tax on mine in spite of the fact that the cigars came originally from Austria and were only going again into the country of their manufacture. Luckily their weight was less than the quantity allowed to each traveler, otherwise he would have compelled me to pay the tariff. He would listen to nothing except the letter of the law.

The Lower Iron Gate is less picturesque than the Upper. The mountains fall away from the river, and the stream spreads out over a rocky bed about fourteen hundred yards wide and a mile in length. The river falls about twelve feet in a mile and a half, and is filled with whirlpools and rapids, with everywhere a swift current broken into waves that dash over the deck of the steamer in the season when the high waters prevent the passage of boats. Below the rapids the river becomes practicable, and there is no other natural obstacle to navigation below this point and the sea.

At a little distance below the Iron Gate we found the steamer that was to carry us down the Danube, and we were speedily installed in her comfortable cabin, once more and much to our delight we found ourselves on an “accelerated” boat, though it proved less agreeable than the Franz Josef.

Before we leave the Iron Gate let us have a little gossip on the question of the Danube.

From the days of the Romans there has been talk of a canal around the Lower Iron Gate; and on the right bank of the river and near the Servian village of Sip, there were traces of the work begun by the Emperor Trajan to this end. In modern times the subject has been discussed, surveys have been made and estimates completed for a series of canals that should carry boats around both the Iron Gates and render the Danube navigable for its entire length. The money could be raised without difficulty, but there is an obstacle to the work in the shape of the political objections of Turkey. No matter on what basis the enterprise is proposed, Turkey has always set her face against it; the “Sick Man” is fearful that a canal round these falls would still further impair his health and therefore he says “No,” and repeats it with emphasis. Time and again the subject has been discussed at Vienna and Constantinople, and always with the same results—Turkey’s opposition.

On one occasion Austria announced that nolens volens the canal would be made, and thereupon Turkey stood up on her ear—she cannot stand easily on her feet—and threatened to go to war when the first spade full of dirt was lifted, and on more than one occasion Turkey has proposed to close the Danube to commerce by sealing up its mouth and permitting nothing but fish and water to pass either way. I am not sure that she did not want to prevent the ascent or descent of the fish through fear that they would carry something contraband. Turkey is a goose and doesn’t know the necessities of the nineteenth century. She ought to close business as a nation and sell out to somebody of decent intelligence.

It was near sunset when we went on board the steamer below the second Iron Gate. We had made five changes in the day; large boat to four-wheeled one, four wheeler to carriages, carriages to boat, boat to carriages at Orsova, and carriages to boat again. We steamed on during the night, and in the morning when I went on deck I had my first view of Turkey. As there were no houses in sight at my first glimpse I did not think it very different from any other country, but as soon as we sighted a town, and the domes and minarets of the mosques came into view, the scene was changed. Northward lay the great plain of Bulgaria, while to the south was Bosnia, a province of the Ottoman empire. The southern bank was more hilly and broken than the northern, and villages were more numerous there. They looked pretty at a distance, but when you approached them nearly, the beauty vanished.

The first Turkish town I saw was the reverse of attractive, and the picture grew no better very fast, as we descended the river. The streets, as I saw them from the boat, were dirty, and there were piles of rubbish just above the landing. The people on shore were as dirty as the streets, and I speedily made up my mind not to ask for a consular appointment to any of the Turkish towns on the Lower Danube.