siash.

The country round Reschitza is rather pretty, but more tame than what we
had seen in other parts. We returned to Oravicza by a shorter route,
riding the whole distance in one day, which we did easily, for the roads
were not so bad, and it was not much over thirty miles. In Hungary it is
frequently more a question of roads than of actual distance.

CHAPTER VII.

Election at Oravicza--Officialism--Reforms--Society--Ride to
Szaszka--Fine views--Drenkova--Character of the
Serbs--Svenica--Rough night walk through the forest.

We got back to Oravicza just in time to witness an election, which had
been a good deal talked about as likely to result in a row. There were
two candidates in the field: one a representative of the Wallachian
party; the other a director of the States Railway Company. In
consequence of a serious disturbance which took place some years ago,
the elections are now always held outside the town. The voting was in a
warehouse adjoining the railway station. A detachment of troops was
there to keep order, in fact the two parties were divided from each
other by a line of soldiers with fixed bayonets. It was extremely
ridiculous. The whole affair was as tame as possible; no more show of
fighting than at a Quakers' meeting. Of course the States Railway
representative had it all his own way, the officials, whose name is
legion, voting for him to a man. A trainful of Wallacks arrived from
some distant place, but their ardour for their own candidate was drowned
in the unlimited beer provided for them by their opponents.

From what I heard about politics, or rather about the Parliament, it
seems to me that their House of Commons, like our own, suffers from too
many talkers. The Hungarian is at all times a great talker, and when
politics open the sluices of his mind, his speech is a perfect avalanche
of words. His conversation is never of that kind that puts you in a
state of antagonism, as a North German has so eminently the power of
doing; on the contrary, the listener sympathises whether he will or no,
but on calmer reflection one's judgment is apt to veer round again.

The members of the House of Commons number 441, and of these 39 are
Croats, who are allowed to use their own language by special privilege.
The members are paid five florins a-day when the House is sitting, and a
grant of four hundred florins a-year is made for lodgings. There is this
peculiarity about the Hungari