A REMINISCENCE OF SOUTHERN AUSTRIA.
BY DAVID KER.
There are few stranger places in the world than the hilly region around the head of the Gulf of Venice, and few stranger people than the Slovaks who inhabit it. Almost within sight of busy, bustling, populous Trieste, with its bristling masts, and crowded quays, and rattling carriages, and smart modern hotels, you come suddenly upon a district dotted with quaint little antique villages that seem to have been dropped by Santa Claus out of his basket of toys—villages which might well have Rip Van Winkle for chief magistrate, and the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus for tenants.
Up here on these warm dreary hill-sides, far from the busy world below, no one ever seems to be in a hurry, to get angry, or to excite himself in any way. The heavy wagons that creep along the broad white dusty road seem to go or not as they please, their "drivers" being usually fast asleep inside them. These four or five sallow, bearded, low-browed peasants in gray frocks and high boots, who are munching their black bread and garlic in the shade of yonder tree, instead of chattering and laughing like their Italian neighbors of the valley, are silent as statues. This meek little church of crumbling stone was built before the Turks entered Constantinople, and the language of its builders is spoken here still.
So completely, indeed, does the whole of this strange region reproduce what the world was centuries ago that I feel quite out of place as I look out at it through the window of a modern railway car, and hear a call for "tickets" in the midst of the enchanted ground. But even the railway itself seems to have borrowed something of the character of its surroundings. For a whole hour we zig-zag at a creeping pace up a seemingly endless succession of terraced ridges crowned with dark clumps of thicket. Suddenly two or three beautiful little patches of green sunny vineyard peep out at us from between two huge black cliffs, down one of which, like a fly walking on a wall, comes a sturdy peasant, brown and shapely as a bronze statue, showing all his splendid teeth in a grin of indulgent contempt at sight of the crawling train. The faint tinkle of a bell makes me look up to see a herd of goats feeding high above my head, while the next moment I catch sight of a little red-tiled cottage tucked away in the cleft of a rock as if playing hide-and-seek.
At length our train struggles up to the summit of the mountain with a shrill whistle of triumph. We thrust our heads out of the window to see where we have got to, when, lo! right under our feet lie the clustering white houses, and shining church domes, and countless masts, and bright blue waters of Trieste which we left behind more than an hour ago, as if bound by the same spell which kept poor Christoval tramping round and round the church all night, thinking he was going straight home.
But at this point a new turn is given to my thoughts by the sudden entrance of a group as picturesque as any painter could wish: three children—a bright-eyed little fairy of eight, with cheeks as round and rosy as the apple which she is eating, a sturdy boy of eleven, whose sunburned face is browner than his flat leather cap, and a tall, slim, golden-haired girl about a year older, taking charge of the other two in a protecting, motherly way which is simply irresistible.
But the first glance shows me that their journey, whatever its object may be, is one of no ordinary importance to themselves. All three have a grave, preoccupied look, the elder girl especially. Instead of prattling merrily, laughing, shouting, and pointing out passing objects to each other, as children usually do on a railway journey, they sit close together in a corner, and talk in whispers.
Even the grand scenery through which we pass, new as it evidently is to them, seems quite unheeded. Frowning precipices; sombre pine woods; black, tomb-like gorges; rock ledges just wide enough for the train itself; over-hanging water-falls which go leaping and foaming from crag to crag down a seemingly endless descent; queer little painted wooden station-houses, placarded with regulations in Italian, German, and Slovak; brawny peasant women, with their hard sallow faces framed in scarlet kerchiefs, waving signal flags on the very verge of the precipice—go by without remark.
The illustrated journal which I contrive to let fall as if by accident on the seat nearest to them remains equally unnoticed for awhile. But at length I see the younger girl's eyes beginning to turn that way. Presently she slips off her seat, and sidles up to the tempting paper; and then, having satisfied herself that I was not looking at her, she seizes it in her plump little hands, and is soon deep in one of the greatest enjoyments of childhood—"looking over a whole lot of pictures."