CHAPTER III—LIFE AMONG THE MAGYARS.
A City of renown—Overwhelmed by the Floods—Lying in Clover—What I Saw in the Hungarian Capital—“The Poor Folk’s Bath”—Rather Warm Quarters—Life Among the Magyars—The “Miffs,” of an Imperial Couple—Her Majesty’s Choice—A Model Captain—Charles Matthews and the Bowery Boy—Facts and Fancies of a Snoring Match—The “Judge” and the “Doubter”—The Man Who Wouldn’t Believe—Who were the “Hamals,” and What They Did—People in Strange Garments—Baggy Breeches versus Slop—The Fortress of Belgrade—Servia, and What I Saw of Its People—The Assassination of Prince Miloch—Rather Bad for Poetry.
PESTH was founded by the Romans, who were attracted by the mineral springs in the vicinity. They built a fort and established a sort of water-cure, though not on a large scale.
The city has had a rough time, and a hard struggle for existence. It has been captured and pillaged more than a dozen—some say eighteen—times, and for nearly a century and a half it was in the hands of the Turks, who were not particularly gentle in their treatment of the inhabitants. It has been burned, and it has been overflowed; the last great inundation was in 1838, when two thousand houses were destroyed in Pesth, and six hundred in Buda, on the opposite bank.
Query.—Isn’t there a chance that the “Beautiful Blue Danube” will get high again some time, and sweep away all the fine warehouses along the quay, together with a few million dollars’ worth of the merchandise stored there?
I couldn’t help thinking of that as I contemplated this busy, energetic Chicago of Austro-Hungary, and resolved that I would not leave my trunk over night at the steamboat landing. I entrusted it to a Hungarian trager, who strapped it on his back and motioned me to follow, like a downcast and silent mourner, as he led the way to the hotel I named. I know of but one hotel in all Europe—the Grand Hotel at Paris—which can surpass in extent, completeness, and magnificence, the Grand Hotel Hun-garia at Pesth.
I passed four days very pleasantly at Pesth, visiting its Museum of Antiquities, its Gallery of Paintings, and going to the races, where I saw some fine horses of Hungarian stock, and also some fine ones of Hungarian stock crossed with English. I went to one of the famous baths of Buda, where I bathed and then breakfasted at the restaurant attached to the establishment. Buda, by the way, is directly opposite to Pesth; the two cities were long distinct, but they are now united into a single municipality under the name of Buda-Pesth, and the union is strengthened by a beautiful bridge on the suspension principle. This bridge was completed in 1848, and, though a work of peace, its early uses were singularly warlike. It was inaugurated on the 5th of January, 1849, by the passage of the Hungarian army under Kossuth, pursued by the Austrians. Four months later, the Austrian army retreated over the same bridge, pursued by the Hungarians. Turn about is fair play.
Buda has a more picturesque site than Pesth, as it stands partly on a hill, and is dominated by the Blocksberg, a mountain that overlooks the river, and is crowned by a fortress. There are several baths in Buda, some of them of great extent, and all having hot water from natural springs. You can bathe in a public room, or you can have a bath to yourself; and you have the advantages of a restaurant in the building, so that you may command your breakfast or dinner, and have it brought to your room if you choose, along with anything liquid you wish to select from a wine-card. Then there are gardens attached to the baths, where bands of music entertain the ear, and groups of the youths and maidens and adults of Buda-Pesth sit in the shade and regale themselves after the manner of the German in his sommer-garten.