Queen Elizabeth and her ladies in waiting spend the summer months at Castle Polesch, at Sinaia, about sixty miles from Bukharest in the Carpathian Mountains. It is an imposing but gloomy edifice of gray stone and red brick, situated in a wild forest, and looks like a very ancient, although it is a very modern castle. It has been surrounded by villas and hotels which attract the wealthy classes from Bukharest society.
The lack of an heir to the throne of Roumania was supplied by the selection of Prince Ferdinand, a nephew of King Carol, and a son of Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern. He was born August 24, 1865, was proclaimed crown prince of Roumania in 1889, was married in 1893 to the Princess Marie, daughter of the Duke of Albany, and a granddaughter of Queen Victoria. They have two sons, Carol, born in 1893, and Nicholas, born in 1903, and three daughters.
The good people of Bukharest take great pride in their city and they call it “the Paris of the Balkans.” So far as gayety and glamour and sin and wickedness are concerned the term applies. It might be said also that the extravagance of everybody who has money to spend, the exorbitant prices that are imposed upon strangers for everything they eat and drink and do, the giddy costumes and conduct of the feminine patrons of the cafés, and the gay crowds that pervade the streets from the time the lamps are lighted until they are extinguished, are all quite up to the Paris standard. Men of experience assert that Bukharest is a wickeder city than Budapest, and that is saying a good deal. Every stranger is surprised to find such handsome residences, such luxurious hotels, such imposing public buildings and such fine mercantile houses and business blocks in the capital of so primitive a country as Roumania, and there is a striking contrast between the city and the country life in that little kingdom. Outside of the larger cities the peasants cling tenaciously to their ancient customs and costumes and habits of life. No country in Europe, unless it be Dalmatia, has so much of what artists call “local colour.”
In the villages on market days you can see crowds of peasants, both men and women, wearing the national dress, which is artistic and attractive. In Bukharest, however, the women wear Paris gowns and Paris hats, and the hobble skirt is as common these days as it is in any city of Europe. The extravagance of the people is seen on every block. The cafés are numerous, and they are always crowded; the public vehicles are smarter than any you see in London, or Paris, or New York, and they are drawn by magnificent Russian horses, black as ebony, with long, flowing manes and tails. The coachmen wear a gay livery—a long tunic of velvet, generally blue or black and heavily embroidered with gold braid. Nearly all of them are Russian exiles. They belong to a dissenting religious sect called the Skoptski, which is proscribed by the orthodox Greek Church. But the cab charges are quite as high as they are in New York, and twice as high as they are in Berlin. It is asserted that there are more automobiles in Bukharest than in any other European city in proportion to the population, and there are taxicabs galore.
The hotels are as fine as any in Europe and their charges are higher than those of Paris or New York. Everything is French—French cooks, French waiters, French bills of fare—and French charges. A friend who came straight to Bukharest from Monte Carlo and occupied similar rooms at the most expensive of the hotels at both places asserts that the charges at Bukharest were 15 and 25 per cent. higher than at Monte Carlo.
One is surprised at the number of jewellery stores and the gorgeous displays of diamonds and other precious stones, which are pointed out as evidence of the extravagance of the people, and it goes without saying that merchants would not offer such things for sale unless there was a demand for them. We did not have an opportunity to see the women of Bukharest in full dress, but from the toilettes displayed at the cafés and at other public places one can infer what might be seen indoors on occasions of display. The Roumanian women are famous for their dress and for their good looks. It has been said that they combine the beauty of the Magyar, the grace of the Viennese, the style of the Parisienne and the passion of the Neapolitan. They are said to be brilliant conversationalists also, quick of perception and nimble of wit. Most women of the upper class are educated at home by French governesses, who do not contribute so much to their intellectual as to their social attractions. As one broad-minded gentleman put it, “the Roumanian girl is a natural flirt. She can’t help it, and her French governess adds refinement to the art and makes her self-confident to recklessness.”
It is not fair, to judge women or men upon a short acquaintance, and, although the stranger who visits Bukharest for a few days must necessarily carry away an impression of frivolity and extravagance, I am very sure there must be an undercurrent of earnestness and goodness where there is so much froth. The cafés are always open and one would think that the people of Bukharest never go to bed. The population is about the same as that of Washington, but there are ten times as many street lamps, twenty times as many restaurants and cafés, and twice as many theatres. The gambling houses are wide open, and it is said that very high stakes prevail. The Roumanians are a nation of gamblers and many Russians go to Bukharest to play. They find much to attract them in other respects, and perhaps the reputation of the city has been injured by visitors from other lands.
In Bukharest one can hear genuine Tzigany orchestras and genuine gypsy music, of which that heard in London and New York is only a mild imitation. In every restaurant and café there is a band—sometimes only two or three and sometimes a dozen musicians—constantly playing those ravishing rag-time barbaric melodies that have been conceived in the semi-savage brains of some gypsy genius. Occasionally a Tzigany girl sings to the accompaniment of the orchestra, wild, weird strains of the native music, which cannot be transplanted without losing its force and fascination. While we cannot understand the words, the meaning of the music is as plain as if it were written in English capital letters.
The Roumanian language is more like the Italian than the Russian, and has a Latin origin, because the population of the country is descended from the Roman legions that were sent up in the year 104 A.D. by the Emperor Trajan to hold the barbarians at bay and the name of the country is properly “Roman-ia.” It is a liquid language and flows freely off the tongues of the people, who talk faster than any Frenchman you ever saw and gesticulate like the Italians. If any one should hold the hands of a Roumanian woman she would become dumb instantly.
The architecture of the business section is solid and regular, and would remind you of Frankfort, or Leipzig, or Dresden, or any city of similar size on the European continent, but the shop windows are more like those of Paris. We were told that the merchants put nearly all their goods in their windows, and that may be true, but they certainly arrange them with a great deal of taste. There is a number of newspapers, all intensely partisan, including a humorous publication of merit. Its cartoons are equal to those of any of the German funny papers.