Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family Part 19

For produce of the state forests, appears the very insignificant sum of one hundred and twenty-five dollars. The interior of Servia being so thickly wooded, every Servian is allowed to cut as much timber as he likes. The last item in the budget sounds singularly enough: two thousand three hundred and forty-one dollars are set down as the produce of sales of stray cattle, which are first delivered up to the captain of the district, who makes the seizure publicly, and then hands them over to the judge for sale, if there be no claimant within a given time.

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

Agriculture and Commerce.

Upon the whole, it must be admitted, that the peasantry of Servia have drawn a high prize in the lottery of existence. Abject want and pauperism is nearly unknown. In fact, from the great abundance of excellent land, every man with ordinary industry can support his wife and family, and have a large surplus. The peasant has no landlord but the Sultan, who receives a fixed tribute from the Servian government, and does not interfere with the internal administration. The father of a family, after having contributed a _maximum_ tax of six dollars per annum, is sole master of the surplus; so that in fact the taxes are almost nominal, and the rent a mere peppercorn; the whole amounting on an average to about four shillings and sixpence per caput per annum.

A very small proportion of the whole soil of Servia is cultivated.

Some say only one sixth, others only one eighth; and even the present mode of cultivation scarcely differs from that which prevails in other parts of Turkey. The reason is obvious: if the present production of Servia became insufficient for the subsistence of the population, they have only to take in waste lands; and improved processes of agriculture will remain unheeded, until the population begins to press on the limits of the means of subsistence; a consummation not likely to be brought about for many generations to come.

Although situated to the south of Hungary, the climate and productions are altogether northern. I never saw an olive-tree in Servia, although plentiful in the corresponding lat.i.tudes of France and Italy (43--44 50'); but both sorts of melons are abundant, although from want of cultivation not nearly so good as those of Hungary. The same may be said of all other fruits except the grapes of s.e.m.e.ndria, which I believe are equal to any in the world. The Servians seem to have in general very little taste for gardening, much less in fact than the Turks, in consequence perhaps of the unsurpa.s.sed beauty and luxuriance of nature. The fruit-tree which seems to be the most common in Servia is the plum, from which the ordinary brandy of the country is made.

Almost every village has a plantation of this tree in its vicinity.

Vegetables are tolerably abundant in some parts of the interior of Servia, but Belgrade is very badly supplied. There seems to be no kitchen gardens in the environs; at least I saw none. Most of the vegetables as well as milk come from Semlin.

The harvest in August is the period of merriment. All Servian peasants a.s.sist each other in getting in the grain as soon as it is ready, without fee or reward; the cultivator providing entertainment for his laborious guests. In the vale of the Lower Morava, where there is less pasture and more corn, this is not sufficient, and hired Bulgarians a.s.sist.

The innumerable swine which are reared in the vast forests of the interior, at no expense to the inhabitants, are the great staple of Servian product and export. In districts where acorns abound, they fatten to an inconceivable size. They are first pushed swimming across the Save, as a subst.i.tute for quarantine, and then driven to Pesth and Vienna by easy stages; latterly large quant.i.ties have been sent up the Danube in boats towed by steam.

Another extensive trade in this part of the world is in leeches.

Turkey in Europe, being for the most part uncultivated, is covered with ponds and marshes, where leeches are found in abundance. In consequence of the extensive use now made of these reptiles, in preference to the old practice of the lancet, the price has risen; and the European source being exhausted, Turkey swarms with Frenchmen engaged in this traffic. Semlin and Belgrade are the entrepots of this trade. They have a singular phraseology; and it is amusing to hear them talk of their "marchandises mortes." One company had established a series of relays and reservoirs, into which the leeches were deposited, refreshed, and again put in motion; as the journey for a great distance, without such refreshment, usually proves fatal.

The steam navigation on the Danube has been of incalculable benefit to Servia; it renders the princ.i.p.ality accessible to the rest of Europe, and Europe easily accessible to Servia. The steam navigation of the Save has likewise given a degree of animation to these lower regions, which was little dreamt of a few years ago. The Save is the greatest of all the tributaries of the Danube, and is uninterruptedly navigable for steamers a distance of two hundred miles. This river is the natural ca.n.a.l for the connexion of Servia and the Banat with the Adriatic. It also offers to our summer tourists, on the completion of the Lombard-Venetian railway, an entirely new and agreeable route to the East. By railroad, from Milan to Venice; by steamer from thence to Trieste; by land to Sissek; and the rest of the way by the rapid descent of the Save and the Danube. By the latter route very few turnings and windings are necessary; for a straight line drawn from Milan to Kustendji on the Black Sea, the point of embarkation for Constantinople, almost touches Venice, Trieste, Belgrade, and the Danube.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

The Foreign Agents.

So much for the native government. The foreign agents in Belgrade are few in number. The most prominent individual during my stay there was Baron Lieven, a Russian general, who had been sent there on a special mission by the emperor, to steer the policy of Russia out of the shoals of the Servian question.

On calling there with Mr. Fonblanque, I found a tall military-looking man, between forty and forty-five years of age. He entered at once, and without mystery, into the subject of his mission, and concluded by saying that "Servia owed her political existence solely to Russia, which gave the latter a moral right of intervention over and above the stipulations of treaties, to which no other power could pretend." As the public is already familiar with the arguments pro and contra on this question, it is at present unnecessary to recur to them.

Baron Lieven had in the posture of affairs at that time a difficult part to play, inasmuch as a powerful party sought to throw off the protectorate of Russia. The baron, without possessing an intellect of the highest order, was a man of good sound judgment, and in his proceedings showed a great deal of frankness and military decision, qualities which attained his ends in all probability with greater success than if he had been endowed with that profound astuteness which we usually attribute to Russians. This was his fifth mission into the Turkish dominions; so that, although not possessing the language, he was yet well acquainted with the Turkish character and Eastern affairs in general. His previous mission had for its object to announce to the Sultan that, in accordance with the stipulations of the treaty of the 15th of July, 1840, the military and naval forces of the Emperor of Russia were at the service of his Highness.

Baron Lieven was accompanied to Servia by his lady, a highly talented person, who spoke English admirably; and the evenings spent in his hospitable house were among the most agreeable reminiscences of my residence at Belgrade.

The stationary Russian consul-general was M. Wastchenko, a stout middle-aged gentleman, with the look of a well-conditioned alderman.

M. Wastchenko had been originally in a commercial establishment at Odessa; but having acquired a knowledge of the Turkish language he was attached to the emba.s.sy at Constantinople, and subsequently nominated Russian consul at Belgrade, under the consul-general for the princ.i.p.alities of Wallachia and Moldavia; but his services having been highly approved by Count Nesselrode, he was advanced to the rank and pay of consul-general. M. Wastchenko possesses in an eminent degree what Swift calls the aldermanly, but never to be over estimated quality, Discretion; he was considered generally a very safe man. In fact, a sort of man who is a favourite with all chanceries; the quality of such a mind being rather to avoid complications than to excite admiration by activity in the pen or the tongue. M. Wastchenko was most thoroughly acquainted with everything, and every man, in Servia. He spoke the language fluently, and lived familiarly with the princ.i.p.al persons in Belgrade. He had never travelled in Europe, and, strange to say, had never been in St. Petersburg.

The present Russian consul-general in Servia is Colonel Danilefsky, who distinguished himself, when a mere youth, by high scientific attainments in military colleges of Russia, rose rapidly to a colonelcy, and was sent out on a mission to the khan of Khiva; the success of which ensured his promotion to the Servian consulate-general, an important position as regards the interests of Russia.

From the circ.u.mstance of there being three thousand Austrian subjects in Belgrade, the consul-general of that power has a ma.s.s of real consular business to transact, while the functions of the other agents are solely political. France has generally an agent of good capacity in Servia, in consequence of the influence that the march of affairs in the princ.i.p.ality might have on the general destinies of Turkey in Europe. Great Britain was represented by Mr. Consul-general Fonblanque, a gentleman whose conduct has been sharply criticized by those who suppose that the tactics of party in the East are like those in England, all fair and above-board: but let those gentlemen that sit at home at ease, experience a few of the rude tempestuous blasts which fall to the lot of individuals who speak and write truths unpalatable to those who will descend to any device to compa.s.s a political object, and they would sing another song.

I now take leave of Servia, wishing her Prince and her people every prosperity, and entertaining the hope that she will wisely limit all her future efforts to the cultivation of the arts of peace and civilization. From Belgrade I crossed to Semlin, whence I proceeded by steam to Vienna.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

VIENNA IN 1844[26]

Improvements in Vienna.--Palladian style--Music.--Theatres.--Sir Robert Gordon.--Prince Metternich.--Armen Ball.--Dancing.--Strauss.--Austrian Policy.

Vienna has been more improved and embellished within the last few years than during the previous quarter of a century. The Graben and the Kohlmarket have been joined, and many old projecting houses have been taken down, and replaced by new tenements, with the facades put back, so as to facilitate the thoroughfare. Until very lately, almost every public building and private palace in Vienna was in the Frenchified style of the last century, when each petty prince in Germany wished to have a miniature Versailles in his village capital.

All the new edifices are in the Palladian style; which is suitable, not only to the climate, but to the narrow streets, where Greek architecture would be lost for want of s.p.a.ce, and where the great height of the houses gives ma.s.s to this (the Palladian) style, without the necessity of any considerable perspective. The circ.u.mstance of many of the architects here being Italian, may probably, in some measure, account for the general adoption of this style. It is singular, that although Vienna possesses in St. Stephen's one of the most beautiful specimens of Gothic architecture, not a single edifice in this taste of recent date is to be seen, although a revival of it is noticeable in several other parts of Germany.

Music is one of the necessaries of existence in Vienna, and the internal consumption is apparently as great as ever: there is now-a-days no Mozart or Haydn to supply imperishable fabrics for the markets of the world; but the orchestras are as good as ever. The Sinfonia-Eroica of Beethoven catching my eye in a programme, I failed not to renew my homage to this prince of sweet and glorious sounds, and was loyally indignant on hearing a fellow-countryman say, that, though rich in harmony, he was poor in melody. No; Beethoven's wealth is boundless; his riches embarra.s.s him; he is the sultan of melody: while others dally with their beauties to satiety, he wanders from grace to grace, scarce pausing to enjoy. Is it possible to hear his symphonies without recognizing in them the germs of innumerable modern melodies, the precious metal which others beat out, wherewith to plate their baser compositions,--exhaustless materials for the use of his successors, like those n.o.ble temples which antiquity has raised in the East, to become, in the sequel, the quarries from which whole cities of lowlier dwellings are constructed?

At the Karnthner Thor I heard the Huguenots admirably performed.

Decorations excepted, I really thought it better done than at the Academie Royale. Meyerbeer's brilliant and original conceptions, in turning the chorus into an oral orchestra, are better realized. A French vaudeville company performed on the alternate nights. Carl, the rich Jew manager of the Wieden, and proprietor of the Leopold-Stadt Theatre, is adding largely to his fortune, thanks to the rich and racy drolleries of Nestroz and Schulz, who are the Matthews and Liston of Vienna. The former of these excellent actors is certainly the most successful farce-writer in Germany. Without any of Raimund's sentimental-humorous dialogue, he has a far happier eye for character, and only the untranslatable dialect of Vienna has preserved him from foreign play-wrights.

Sir Robert Gordon, her Majesty's amba.s.sador, whose unbounded and truly sumptuous hospitalities are worthy of his high position, did me the honour to take me to one of Princess Metternich's receptions, in the apartments of the chancery of state, one side of which is devoted to business, the other to the private residence of the minister. After pa.s.sing through a vestibule on the first floor, paved with marble, we entered a well-lighted saloon of palatial alt.i.tude, at the further end of which sat the youthful and fascinating princess, in conversation with M. Bailli de Tatischeff ex-amba.s.sador of Russia.

There, almost blind and bent double with the weight of eighty years, sat the whilom profoundly sagacious diplomatist, whose accomplished manners and quick perception of character have procured him a European reputation. He quitted public business some years ago, but even in retirement Vienna had its attractions for him. There is an unaccountable fascination in a residence in this capital; those who live long in it become _ipsis Vindobonensibus Vindobonensiores_.

Prince Metternich, who was busy when we entered with a group, examining some views of Venice, received me with that quaker-like simplicity which forms the last polish of the perfect gentleman and man of the world; "_les extremes se touchent_," in manners as in literature: but for the riband of the Golden Fleece, which crossed his breast, there was nothing to remind me that I was conversing with the statesman, who, after the armistice of Plesswitz, held the destinies of all Europe in his hands. After some conversation, the prince asked me to call upon him on a certain forenoon.

Most of the diplomatic corps were present, one of whom was the amiable and well-known Marshal Saldanha, who, a few years ago, played so prominent a part in the affairs of Portugal. The usual resources of whist and the tea-buffet changed the conversational circle, and at midnight there was a general movement to the Kleine Redouten Saal, where the Armen Ball had attracted so crowded an a.s.semblage, that more than one archd.u.c.h.ess had her share of elbowing. Strauss was in all his glory; the long-drawn impa.s.sioned breathings of Lanner having ceased for ever, the dulcet hilarity of his rival now reigns supreme; and his music, when directed by himself, still abounds in those exquisite little touches, that inspire _hope_ like the breath of a May morning.

Strange to say, the intoxicating waltz is gone out of vogue with the humbler cla.s.ses of Vienna,--its natal soil. Quadrilles, mazurkas, and other exotics, are now danced by every "Stubenmad'l" in Lerchenfeld, to the exclusion of the national dance.

On the third day after this, at the appointed hour, I waited upon Prince Metternich. In the outer antechamber an elderly well-conditioned red-faced usher, in loosely made clothes of fine black cloth, rose from a table, and on my announcing myself, said, "If you will go into that apartment, and take a seat, his Excellency will be disengaged in a short time." I now entered a large apartment, looking out on the little garden of the bastion: an officer, in a fresh new white Austrian uniform, stood motionless and pensive at one of the windows, waiting his turn with a most formidable roll of papers. The other individual in the room was a Hungarian, who moved about, sat down, and rose up, with the most restless impatience, twirled his mustachios, and kept up a most lively conversation with a caged parrot which stood on the table.

Two large pictures, hanging from the wall opposite the windows, were a full length portrait of the emperor in his robes, the other a picture of St. John Nepomuck, the patron saint of Bohemia, holding an olive branch in his hand. The apartment, although large, was very simply furnished, but admirably decorated in subdued colours, in the Italian manner. A great improvement has lately taken place in internal decoration in Vienna, which corresponds with that of external architecture. A few years ago, most large apartments were fitted up in the style of Louis XV., which was worthy of the degenerate n.o.bles and c.r.a.pulous financiers for whom it was invented, and was, in fact, a sort of Byzantine of the boudoir, which succeeded the n.o.bler and simpler manner of the age of Louis XIV., and tormenting every straight line into meretricious curves, ended with over-loading caricature itself.

I found Prince Metternich in his cabinet, surrounded with book-cases, filled mostly with works on history, statistics, and geography, and I hope I am not committing any indiscretion in saying that his conversation savoured more of the abstractions of history and political philosophy than that of any other practical statesman I had seen. I do not think that I am pa.s.sing a dubious compliment, since M.

Guizot, the most eminently practical of the statesmen of France, is at the same time the man who has most successfully ill.u.s.trated the effects of modifications of political inst.i.tutions on the main current of human happiness.

It must be admitted that Prince Metternich has a profound acquaintance with the minutest sympathies and antipathies of all the European races; and this is the quality most needed in the direction of an empire which comprises not a nation, but a congregation of nations; not cohering through sympathy with each other, but kept together by the arts of statesmanship, and the bond of loyalty to the reigning house. The ethnographical map of Europe is as clear in his mind's eye as the boot of Italy, the hand of the Morea, and the shield of the Spanish peninsula in those of a physical geographer. It is not affirming too much to say that in many difficult questions in which the _mezzo termine_ proposed by Austria has been acceded to by the other powers, the solution has been due as much to the sagacity of the individual, as to the less ambitious policy which generally characterizes Austria.

The last time I saw this distinguished individual was in the month of November following, on my way to England, I venture to give a sc.r.a.p of the conversation.

_Mett_. "The idea of Charlemagne was the formation of a vast state, comprising heterogeneous nations united under one head; but with all his genius he was unequal to the task of its accomplishment. Napoleon entertained the same plan with his confederation of the Rhine; but all such systems are ephemeral when power is centralized, and the minor states are looked upon as instruments, and not as princ.i.p.als. Austria is the only empire on record that has succeeded under those circ.u.mstances. The cabinet of Austria, when it seeks the solution of any internal question, invariably reverses the positions, and hypothetically puts itself in the position of the provincial interest under consideration. That is the secret of the prosperity of Austria."

_Author_. "I certainly have been often struck with the historical fact, that 1830 produced revolutions then and subsequently in France, Belgium, Poland, Spain, and innumerable smaller states; while in Austria, with all its reputed combustible elements, not a single town or village revolted."

_Mett_. "That tangible fact speaks for itself."

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