he Carpathian takes a bend, forming
the frontier of Roumania. The highest point seen from thence is the
Schuelerberg, upwards of 8000 feet, and a little farther off the
Koenigstein, and the Butschrtsch, the latter reaching 9526 feet. Hardly
less picturesque is the view from the Castle Hill. Quite separated from
the rest of the town is the quarter inhabited by the Szeklers. This
people constitute one of four principal races inhabiting Transylvania.
They are of Turanian origin, like the Magyars, but apparently an older
branch of the family. When the Magyars overran Pannonia in the tenth
century, under the headship of the great Arpad, they appear to have
found the Szeklers already in possession of part of the vast Carpathian
horseshoe--that part known to us as the Transylvanian frontier of
Moldavia. They claim to have come hither as early as the fourth century.
It is known that an earlier wave of the Turanians had swept over Europe
before the incoming of the Magyars, and the so-called Szeklers were
probably a tribe or remnant of this invasion, the date of which,
however, is wrapped in no little obscurity.

This is certain, that they have preserved their independence throughout
all these ages in a very remarkable manner. "They are all 'noble,'" says
Mr Boner, "and proudly and steadfastly adhere to and uphold their old
rights and privileges, such as right of limiting and of pasture. They
had their own judges, and acknowledged the authority of none beside.
Like their ancestors the Huns, they loved fighting, and were the best
soldiers that Bem had in his army. They guarded the frontier, and
guarded it well, of their own free-will; but they would not be compelled
to do so, and the very circumstance that Austria, when the border system
was established, obliged them to furnish a contingent of one infantry
and two hussar regiments sufficed to alienate their regard."[17] In
another place Mr Boner says, "The Szekler soldier, I was told, was
'excessive,' which means extreme, in all he did."

In the view of recent events, it may be worth while to recall to mind a
few particulars of General Bem's campaign in Transylvania. In no part of
Hungary was the war of independence waged with so much bitterness as
down here on these border-lands. The Saxons and the Wallacks were
bitterly opposed to the Magyars; and on the 12th of May, in the eventful
'48, a popular meeting was held at Kronstadt, where they protested
vehemently against union with