On her return the Princess wrote to her mother—“How shall I describe to you the magnificent country through which we drove, our eight horses with postillions cracking their whips and shouting, the three or four hundred peasants who accompanied ventre à terra, their mantles of white goat’s hair streaming in the wind, and their high, white fur caps on their heads! What shall I say about the nice people in Moldavia, and of the proud feeling it was to hear on every railway line, on every bridge and highroad, that my husband had had it made, and then to gallop onward! And then returning here, after thousands had greeted us, again to clasp the best beloved amongst all those thousands, healthy and blooming, in my arms!” Does not untold happiness resound in these words? And now the Princess of Wied was soon expected, a pleasure which Princess Elizabeth and her husband were eagerly looking forward to. In July 1871 the wedding of Prince William of Wied had been celebrated at the Hague. A few weeks later the Princess of Wied first visited her children at Bucharest, and held her first grandchild in her arms. Bright happiness filled their hearts and their home.
For the health of the little Princess it became desirable to spend the summer with her in mountain and forest air. It is the only remedy against the attacks of fever to which every one is subjected soon or later in the Roumanian plains. From this time the Prince resided in the Carpathians in the summer. There in the valley of the Prahova, two thousand nine hundred feet high, upon a precipitous rocky mountain, stands the monastery of Sinaia. A Prince Cantacuzéne had built and named it after the Temple on Mount Sinai. It had been used till then as a Hospice for the many caravans of ox-carts which, laden with maize, proceed day and night almost uninterruptedly over the mountain paths to Transylvania. The peaks of the Carpathians tower in fantastic forms behind the monastery. Carmen Sylva has enriched them with poetic legends in her poems. First comes Virful-cu-Dor (the Heights of Longing), then Furnica, Piatre Arsa, the two Jipi which arise like the teeth of a giant. The deafening waterfall Urlatoare (the Howling One) rushes down to the Prahova valley, and the Omul and Caraiman, eight thousand nine hundred feet in height, stand dark and threatening with their mighty rocks.
Woodbury Compy.
CASTLE PELESCH.
These are all names which we have learnt to know and love through the “little book” from Carmen Sylva’s “Kingdom.” Huge mountains crowned with verdure stretch into the plain. Their feet are clothed with forests of beech and oak, whilst their heights are covered with fir-trees. From the monastery you attain the deep solitude of a forest which is here as beautiful as a dream. Gigantic old trees rear their branches to heaven. If one falls, oppressed with the weight of years, it is allowed to remain there till, covered with creepers and moss, it completes the woodland scenery, and young trees grow out of the mouldering trunk. Ferns and orchids of endless varieties and unusual height delight the friend of nature. In this magnificent vegetation every foot of land is covered with multitudes of botanic species, one might say the history of the forest. The most beautiful flowers of the Alps, Edelweiss and Almenrausch, are found on the heights of the foremost mountains. Not far from the monastery the Pelesch casts itself down from Bucegi to the valley below in a foaming waterfall, “wildly escaping from its bounds as if it would take the world by storm.” Its seething waves flow down endlessly, and the river winds hither and thither, and has often devastated the country in its course. It is a beautiful and ever varying picture of steep mountains, shady valleys, and running brooks.
The white walls of the monastery welcome the wanderer from afar. The one-storied building is of very humble dimensions, and surrounds the square court of the monastery, which is devoid of any ornament, and in the centre of which a church stands. The inhabited part is ornamented with wooden arcades, and old Byzantine paintings still adorn the outside walls. Thirty monks, types of the eastern clergy, here enjoy in peaceful repose the blessings of this pious institution. Half of this humble habitation had been allotted to the Prince. Lightly built additions in fir wood had been made to the principal building in order to make it at all habitable. If the banner of Roumania had not waved over the entrance, and sentries paced up and down the verandahs, one could easier imagine that an artist had made his home here than that this was the residence of a Prince. We can scarcely conceive with what simplicity and content the princely pair here bore the greatest discomfort for many years. The Princess, for instance, heard the ticking of the clock in the neighbouring cell of an old monk in her dressing-room. The monks dined in the refectory; the Prince in a passage which had been arranged as a dining-room. At first provisions arrived from Kronstadt only twice in the week. But no deprivations seemed worth mentioning here, for in Sinaia as in Monrepos was forest air and liberty in which the Princess delighted.
Higher up in the valley, under the shade of high trees, the Prince had built a shooting-box, and surrounded it with a simple garden. Under its roof the Princess arranged a tiny room very artistically. One gazes through coloured windows upon the groups of fir trees of a hundred years’ growth. A simple desk covered with cloth, a pair of chairs, and a low table laden with books, paint brushes, and colours are all its furniture. It is the sanctum of the Princess, to which she retires when the stream of visitors who unceasingly come out to Sinaia have fatigued her. Here she can write, paint, and compose poetry undisturbed.
Scientific men, musicians, and painters are constantly invited to Sinaia, and are often for weeks the guests of the princely pair. Here they lead an ideal life. Intercourse with distinguished people, be they artists or learned or otherwise clever men, is the great delight of the Prince and Princess. They love to gaze, as it were, into the workshop whence thought has sprung, and have a deep regard for the earnestness of labour in art or science. Gaiety and cheerfulness reign in these circles. Often the Princess will read to the assembled company at breakfast a poem she has just completed, that treats of their conversations or the events of the day, with youthful cheerfulness. By noon the winged words have already been set to music by one of the musicians, and presented to the Princess as a duet, trio, or quartette, according to the voices of those present. In the evening these new compositions are performed, and the young people end the day with dances and games.
Long walks and climbing parties are undertaken during the fine weather. Accompanied by the sound of the waves of the restless Pelesch, one climbs along grassy walks into the steep beech woods. In a convenient costume for mountaineering, the Princess, hat in hand, leads the way for the joyous company. She feels at home in the woods or in the mountains: they are her kingdom, and there her fancy is free. The following poem was composed on the 12th of September 1873, under the trees near the shooting-box:—