I remember when the Canterbury settlement was established in New Zealand, it was intended in a great measure to provide for the classes I have alluded to above; but the distance was too great, the mere cost of going out was a most serious drawback, at the very least ten times the amount required to land one bag and baggage in the centre of Hungary, or better still in Servia, among some of the most beautiful scenery in the world, the richest soil, the best climate, and the finest fishing and shooting that could be desired, where game laws and river preserves and licences are still utterly unknown.
I hate croaking; still, if one hears rumbling noises underground for any space of time, one is justified in apprehending an earthquake. For several years I have been hearing these subterranean noises, and year after year they have become more and more threatening, and the earthquake must come at last. But as a volcanic eruption, acting as a safety valve, often saves a country from the effects of a physical earthquake, so the timely exodus of an excessive population may save a country from a moral one.
By the very nature of my profession, I have innumerable times been willingly or unwillingly let into the secrets of the private affairs of scores of families; and I have watched with perfect dismay the misery, the poverty, the utter wretchedness that were screened from the eyes of the world by the decent exterior which was kept up in order to preserve appearances.
If with Asmodeus we could but lift up the roofs of a few thousands of houses in these prosperous islands and see the difficulties, the make-shifts, and the make-believes which are resorted to, and that in many cases where one would least expect them, it would make our very hearts bleed at all the anxiety, all the wretchedness, all the scalding tears which would be disclosed—all brought about by that great delusion "keeping up appearances." Well, all this living under false pretences, which is the distinguishing characteristic and the great evil, the real "social evil" of the present time cannot go on for ever. It is an evil of long standing, no doubt, but it has gone on increasing from year to year, like a falling avalanche, with constantly increasing velocity. The earthquake must come at last, if not averted by an emigration en masse of those educated classes to which I have alluded above; and the best, finest, healthiest, most fertile, and most accessible country, outside the British dominions, I hold to be, roughly speaking, that tract of Southern Europe bounded on the North by the Saave, on the South by the Bosphorus, on the East by the Danube, and on the West by the Adriatic.
"But, my dear Sir," I think I hear some reader say, "that is Turkey in Europe!" No doubt it is, but the Turks won't be there for ever, their time is nearly run out; the period of their wretched misrule over the Christian populations of Europe is nearly accomplished, and I still hope to live long enough to see those barbarous hordes recrossing the Bosphorus into Asia Minor, on their way back to the Steppes of Khiva and Bokhara, from whence they originally emigrated. They have ever shown themselves irreclaimable barbarians throughout. Look at the present condition of European Turkey, after centuries of Ottoman dominion; contrast it with the nascent state of Roumania, which only quite lately succeeded in shaking off its Moslem chains. Let us look at both countries, as they present themselves opposite to each other on the banks of the Danube. On the left bank of that river we have Giurgevo in Roumania, the port of Bukharest, where, notwithstanding centuries of slavery and misgovernment, the natives, now under the government of an enlightened Christian Prince, are all activity and progress—while on the right bank at Rustchuk, just opposite, in dark contrast to the Christian, who is trying to turn to account all the advantages of his country, the indolent, uncivilized Turk is still lazily dozing away, leaning against his ancient painted and bedizened araba, drawn by a pair of patient oxen, waiting for the chance of some solitary, silent traveller!
A new era is dawning, however, over these south-eastern regions, but much of their prosperity and future happiness may depend on the model they will propose for themselves in their efforts at civilization; whether the brilliant glitter of Parisian veneering and varnish, or the less attractive, but more solid advantages of British institutions. A great future is before the Danubian Principalities, may they use their opportunities with wisdom, and may they prosper!
CHAPTER IV.
STEINBRÜCK—THE SÖMMERING—FIRST VIEW OF THE ADRIATIC—TRIESTE—SHOCKS OF EARTHQUAKE AT BELLUNO—AUSTRIAN IRONCLAD 'LISSA'—CAPTAIN R. BURTON—FLYING VISIT TO SAN CANZIANO—SUBTERRANEAN COURSE OF A MOUNTAIN STREAM—THE KARST—WILD SCENERY—A THUNDER-STORM—CHURCH OF SAN CANZIANO—STUD FARM.
