Csepel is a strip of 38 miles or so with an average breadth of 3 miles, on each side of which the arms of the divided river run almost straight. There are at least a dozen villages planted along the island and some 20,000 inhabitants live there.
Apart from this curious feature of the landscape, any one who has come down from the higher reaches of the Danube may feel disappointed at the scenery; he has had his fill of variety and grandeur, of precipitous rocks and sudden turns, and he finds himself instead in the midst of flat land bounded only on the far horizon by hills. The great stillness, the monotony, the evidences of the simple agricultural life of the dwellers in the plain, all contrast with the rush of rapids, the endless change of scene and the suggestions of war and brigandage presented by the stern ruins of the keeps perched defiantly on their high bosses. Nevertheless, in the plain is to be found the true Hungarian life and glimpses of the peasantry. The Hungarian is not a mountain-man like the Transylvanian or Tyrolese. In the long-gone ages it was the boundless plain which tempted his forefathers to settle here, and at the present time it is the boundless plain which holds his heart in captivity.
The great soda lakes lying flat like mirages are deserted by birds in the winter but become the resting-place of numerous flights of geese in spring and autumn. The little villages are half-buried in vineyards and show only the steeple of a church or the white walls of the tiny houses. Great water-mills float placidly everywhere, even though their numbers have been reduced by the adoption of steam. The vast reaches of cultivated land looking rich in the sunlight are varied by the flocks of sheep being watered at a primitive trough and well; just so did Jacob water the flocks when he met Rachel. The immediate banks of the river are mostly sand-hills and reeds, fringed by straggling willows which give scanty shade, and the bed of the stream, ever varying in depth, needs careful navigation.
Kalocsa is the seat of an archbishop, and contains a famous college and an astronomical institute in which observations of value and importance to the whole world have been made. A branch line joins this town with Kiskaros, the birthplace of Alexander Petöfi.
Then we come to Mohács, ever memorable as the scene of the disastrous battle when the Turks so completely overwhelmed the Hungarians that the nation was ground beneath the heel of the conqueror for generations. This was in 1526, and out of 30,000 Hungarians only 6000, it is said, were left alive.
WASTE LANDS NEAR KALOCSA
Shortly after we come to the Francis Canal, connecting the Danube with the Tisza, Hungary’s second river. It was opened in 1802 but became choked and useless. By the energy of Zürr Stephen, who enlarged it and cut two new canals connected with it, it was once more turned into a useful waterway. When joined by the Drave, the river gains in size and importance, but it is not until we pass into the spurs of the Carpathians that the scenery once again grows grander, and after seven or eight miles we find a steam ferry where a whole train is carried bodily across the Danube. Ruined forts and towering crags now spring up once more, and on a lump or rock 200 feet high is the fortress of Peterwardein, with the little town at the foot; this was called after Peter the Hermit, whose birthplace it is supposed to be. Not far off the little town of Karlovicz nestles among its vineyards; it is renowned for its vermouth.
Where the Theiss or Tisza flows into the larger river the larger plains on each side are broad and level. This is a well-loved river and carries with it the hearts of the Hungarians, more even than the Danube, which has such a cosmopolitan character. The Tisza belongs to Hungary, from source to outlet, and traverses the great plain which so embodies the Hungarian’s ideas of his country. It runs across such flat ground that the fall is very small, consequently the windings are absurdly exaggerated, and the river has the appearance of a twisted bit of ribbon falling in heaps.
With the junction of the Save on the right bank the Danube forms the southern boundary of Hungary itself, separating it from Servia, whose capital, Belgrade, is just at this corner, which appears a most dangerous situation for a capital. After this the navigation gets more difficult, and many fortified places on the hills which have played a share in the relentless wars against the Turks stand up conspicuously on their isolated promontories. There is endless diversity of scenery, endless variation in the swiftness of the current as the bed of the river widens or contracts.