ld, with a martial, austere yet dreamy physiognomy,
with strongly-marked features, a proud and sombre gaze, and her head
crowned with superb gray hair braided and tied with red ribbon. "Ah!"
said this woman to him, with an accent in her voice which startled him,
"if all these men round about us here were not women, _or if they were
women like me_, we should soon be free from our tormentors!" It was the
fiery words of such women as this which awoke the Servian men from the
lethargy into which they were falling after Kara George had exhausted
himself in heroic efforts, and which sent them forth anew to fight for
their liberties.

[Illustration: THE OXEN OF THE DANUBE.]

At night, when the moon is good enough to shine, the voyage up the
river has charms, and tempts one to remain on deck all night, in spite
of the sharp breezes which sweep across the stream. The harmonious
accents of the gentle Servian tongue echo all round you: the song of
the peasants grouped together, lying in a heap like cattle to keep
warm, comes occasionally to your ears; and if there be anything
disagreeable, it is the loud voices and brawling manners of some
Austrian troopers on transfer. From time to time the boat slows her
speed as she passes through lines or streets of floating mills
anchored securely in the river. Each mill--a small house with sloping
roof, and with so few windows that one wonders how the millers ever
manage to see their grist--is built upon two boats. The musical hum
of its great wheel is heard for a long distance, and warns one of the
approach toward these pacific industries. The miller is usually on the
lookout, and sometimes, when a large steamer is coming up, and he
anticipates trouble from the "swell" which she may create, he may be
seen madly gesticulating and dancing upon his narrow platform in a
frenzy of anxiety for the fruits of his toil. A little village on a
neck of land or beneath a grove shows where the wives and children of
these millers live. The mills are a source of prosperity for thousands
of humble folk, and of provocation to hurricanes of profanity on the
part of the Austrian, Italian and Dalmatian captains who are compelled
to pass them. Stealing through an aquatic town of this kind at
midnight, with the millers all holding out their lanterns, with the
steamer's bell ringing violently, and with rough voices crying out
words of caution in at least four languages, produces a curious if not
a comical effect