testant religion by
the emperor Leopold. That prince has left behind him the character
of an extraordinary piety, and was naturally of a mild merciful
temper; but, putting his conscience into the hands of a Jesuit, he
was more cruel and treacherous to his poor Hungarian subjects, than
ever the Turk has been to the Christians; breaking, without scruple
his coronation oath, and his faith, solemnly given in many public
treaties. Indeed, nothing can be more melancholy than in travelling
through Hungary, to reflect on the former flourishing state of that
kingdom, and to see such a noble spot of earth almost uninhabited.
Such are also the present circumstances of Buda (where we arrived
very early the twenty-second) once the royal seat of the Hungarian
kings, whose palace was reckoned one of the most beautiful buildings
of the age, now wholly destroyed, no part of the town having been
repaired since the last siege, but the fortifications and the castle,
which is the present residence of the governor general Ragule, an
officer of great merit. He came immediately to see us, and carried
us in his coach to his house, where I was received by his lady with
all possible civility, and magnificently entertained. This city is
situated upon a little hill on the south side of the Danube. The
castle is much higher than the town, and from it the prospect is very
noble. Without the walls ly (sic) a vast number of little houses, or
rather huts, that they call the Rascian town, being altogether
inhabited by that people. The governor assured me, it would furnish
twelve thousand fighting men. These towns look very odd; their
houses stand in rows, many thousands of them so close together, that
they appear, at a little distance, like old-fashioned thatched tents.
They consist, every one of them, of one hovel above, and another
under ground; these are their summer and winter apartments. Buda was
first taken by Solyman the Magnificent, in 1526, and lost the
following year to Ferdinand I, king of Bohemia. Solyman regained it
by the treachery of the garrison, and voluntarily gave it into the
hands of king John of Hungary; after whose death, his son being an
infant, Ferdinand laid siege to it, and the queen mother was forced
to call Solyman to her aid. He indeed raised the siege, but left a
Turkish garrison in the town, and commanded her to remove her court
from thence, which she was forced to submit to, in 1541. It resisted
afterwards the