e varied scenery made the ride most enjoyable.

Arriving at Steirdorf, I spent some hours in visiting the ironworks,
blast-furnaces, coke-ovens, &c. The coal produced here is said to be the
best in Hungary. The output, I am told, is 150,000 tons; but only
one-third of this is sold, the rest being used by the States Railway
Company for their own ironworks, and for the locomotive engines of their
line.

Professor Ansted,[9] who made a professional visit to this part of the
country in 1862, remarks that "the iron is mined by horizontal drifts or
kennels into the side of the hills. The coal is mined by vertical
shafts. The ironstone is of the kind common to some parts of Scotland,
and known as blackband. There are as many as eight principal seams."

I had sent a man in advance from Oravicza to take my horse back, as I
intended returning by rail. This mountain railway between Oravicza and
Auima-Steirdorf is a remarkable piece of engineering work. In a distance
of about twenty miles it ascends 1100 feet, in some parts as much as one
foot in five. They have very powerful engines and a cogwheel
arrangement, the line making a zigzag up the mountain-side. The effect
is very curious in descending to see another train below you creeping
uphill, now at one angle, now at another.

Considering the expensive nature of the works, and the paucity of
passengers, I almost wonder that the States Railway Company did more
than construct a narrow gauge for the mineral traffic. This company, I
believe, is of Austrian origin, assisted by French capital--in fact, its
head office is in Paris. It obtained large concessions in the Banat
during the Austrian rule in Hungary, acquiring a considerable amount of
property at very much below its real value; in consequence the company
is looked upon with some degree of jealousy by the Hungarians. Of
forest-land alone it owns about 360 square miles. It has a large staff
of officials, mostly Germans, who manage the woods and forests on a
very complicated system, which pays well, but would probably pay better
if simplified. It has also a monopoly of certain things in its own
district, such as salt, &c.

The prevalence of bribery is one of the causes seriously retarding
progress in Hungary. There is as yet no wholesome feeling against this
corruption, even amongst those who ought to show an example to the
community. They have also a droll way of cooking accounts down in these
parts, but there is a vast dea