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cidents of the chase 355 CHAPTER XXXV. Tokay vineyards--The vine-grower's difficulties--Geology of the Hegyalia--The Pope's compliment to the wine of Tallya--Towns of the Hegyalia--Farming--System of wages at harvest--The different sorts of Tokay wine 364 _Map of the Banat and Transylvania with Mr Crosse's route._ ROUND ABOUT THE CARPATHIANS. CHAPTER I. Down the Danube from Buda-Pest--Amusements on board the steamer--Basiash--Drive to Oravicza by Weisskirchen--Ladies of Oravicza--Gipsy music--Finding an old schoolfellow--The _czardas_. One glorious morning in June 1875, I, with the true holiday feeling at heart, for the world was all before me, stepped on board the Rustchuk steamer at Buda-Pest, intending to go down the Danube as far as Basiash. Your express traveller, whose aim it is to get to the other end of everywhere in the shortest possible time, will take the train instead of the boat to Basiash, and there catch up the steamer, saving fully twelve hours on the way. This time the man in a hurry is not so far wrong; the Danube between Buda-Pest and the defile of Kasan is almost devoid of what the regular tourist would call respectable scenery. There are few objects of interest, except the mighty river itself. Now the steamer has its advantages over the train, for surely nowhere in this locomotive world can a man more thoroughly enjoy "sweetly doing nothing" than on board one of these river-boats. You are wafted swiftly onward through pure air and sunshine; you have an armchair under the awning; of course an amusing French novel; besides, truth to say, there is plenty to amuse you on board. Once past Vienna, your moorings are cut from the old familiar West; the costumes, the faces, the architecture, and even the way of not doing things, have all a flavour of the East. What a hotch-potch of races, so to speak, all in one boat, but ready to do anything rather than pull together; even here, between stem and stern of our Danube steamer, are Magyars, Germans, Servians, Croats, Roumanians, Jews, and gipsies. They are all unsatisfied people with aspirations; no two are agreed--everybody wants something else down here, and how Heaven is to grant all the prayers of those who have the grace to pray, or how otherwise to settle the Eastern Question, I will not pretend to say. Meanwhile th
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