The following book extract is a traveller's account of the region near Machliniec shortly after its establishment. Pages 432 to 468 inclusive were copied by Brian Merz in 1988.
The following pages consist chiefly of a condensed translation of a work in five volumes, published by Mr. Kohl last year, under the title of "A Hundred Days in Austria," comprising an account of a tour throgh Bohemia, Austria, Hungary, and the Military Frontier. To this has been added the concluding volume of that gentleman's work on Russia, containing his remarks on the Bukovina, Galicia, and Moravia; which, as not referring in any way toRussia, were omitted in the two first parts of the Foreign Library; but which, on account of their intrinsic value, have been deemed a fitting sequel to the Austian tour.
During the sixty years they have ruled over Galicia, the Austrians have supplied it with many excellent roads; and this is not the least important of the benefits which the Poles have received from the Germans. The course of these roads is directed by the course of the Carpathian mountains. Galicia is an oval, or rather a crescent shaped country, with its straight side resting on its firm mountain wall. The rude character of these mountains, makes this side less passable and habitable, and the population increases in density, the further we recede from the Carpathians. Their mountains themselves contain only solitary huts and a few small hamlets. Where the valleys widen, small towns and villages make their appearance, and at the foot of the mountains, lies a line of larger towns, connected by the great road parallel to the Carpathians. This great artery of Galician life and commerce begins at Sutshava, the furthest town of Bukovina, where the wild untravered Moldavia touches on Austria, follows the Carpathians northward to Tshernovitze, passes through Kalomea in the valley of the Pruth, and then through Stanislavov [Ivano-Frankovsk], in the valley of the Dniester, crosses Lemberg [L'vov], the central point of Galicia, and then bends round like the Carpathians, and passes through Cracow towards Moravia and Vienna.
On this road lie the principal market-towns of the country, and not only the goods which the nineteen circles of Galicia exchange with each other, but also those which Moldavia sends to Austria, the cattle which the inhabitants of the steppes send to the markets of Brun and Omutz, the carts of fancy wares which Vienna manufactures for Russia, the furs and the tea which the inhabitants of Kiev send to the west, the Moravian Silesian manufactures which the Jews of Brody smuggle into the Russian empire, all these are conveyed to and fro on this road, which is of the greatest importance to the commerce between the two mighty empires, and particularly to the intercourse between the cites of Vienna, Odessa, Lemberg, Prague, Cracow, Kiev, and Moscow. It is the more frequented because it is the only great road within a considerable distance. It is one hundred and thirty (German) miles long. Smaller roads run from place to place, parallel with it, but none of these are of any considerable length.
There are besides, three principal roads which intersect the country in a transversal direction, cutting through the Carpathians; one at the eastern end running from Bukovina to Transylvania, on at the western end from Cracow to Hungary, and one in the middle from Lemberg to Hungary. The Carpathian mountains offer one great facility for road making, by their quantity of mountain streams, which are so useful for conveying the materials required into the plains. In Northern Poland, the sea has assisted the work, by scattering over the plains fragments of rock and masses of stone, but the eastern part of Russian Poland is without any such advantage. As the bad roads of Russia had damaged our kalesch so much that a fundamental repair was necessary, we were obliged to part with it in Bukovina, that it might be sent back to its native country. We had now the choice between the Lemberg diligence, which goes only once a week, and had set off the day before, the Galician extra post which is but a very inconvenient and disagreeable vehicle, and a Jewish hackney coachman, whom we eventually decided upon choosing. His coach was covered, had three horses, was so large that we might have lived in it with all our families, and was driven by a Rusniak enveloped from head to foot in black sheep skin. These people always drive quicker than German coachmen, though not quite a la Russe, and with our Rusniak matvei, we daily travelled from twelve to thirteen (German) miles. This kind of conveyance is certainly not very elegant, but it is large and convenient. The vehicles are called in German "brodyer bauten," and in Rusniak "budas."
As we had plenty of room inside, we took up tired pedestrians for a lift, every now and then, and thus had the advantage of learning much of the condition of the country, from the lips of the people themselves. Our travelling companions of the first day were three Walachian noblemen, from Bukovina, stout gentlemen, with long thick beards, who sat, wrapt in thick furs, in an uncovered droshky, and were driving to Vienna to make complaints against the Hofrath of Bukovina, in the name of some nobles who had been offeded by him. They spoke tolerably good Vienna German, and were obliging and friendly towards us.
The kingdom of Galicia with its dependencies, Lodomiria and Bukovina, may be divided into four principal parts, through each of which flows a large river. These four rivers are the Pruth, the Dniester, the Bug, and the Vistula. The district of the Pruth, contains about two hundred square (German) miles with 300,000 inhabitants; the district of the Dniester, six hundred and ten square miles, and 1,800,000 inhabitants; that of the Bug one hundred and ninety square miles, and about 450,000 inhabitants; and that of the Vistula, six hundred and sixty square miles, and 1,900,000 inhabitants. The population of the country groups itself in masses round the rivers, as is generally the case. The district of the Pruth is all but entirely occupied by the Moldavians or Walachians; the Rusniaks have taken possession of the Dniester, and all its tributary rivers; and the lands of the Bug and Vistula are occupied by the Poles. The proportions of the different elements of the population in Galicia, are about as follows: Walachians or Moldavians 300,000 Rusniaks or Ruthenen 1,800,000 Poles or Masuren 2,300,000 Total 4,400,000
It is among the heights of the Carpathians, that these races offer the most striking contrasts to one another; for those who are settled among the solitary mountains differ strikingly from the inhabitants of the valleys and plains. The Huzzulen of the Black Mountains differ greatly from the Walachians, the Goralen of the central Carpathians from the Rusniaks, and the Slovaks of the Western Mountains from the Poles. The Rusniaks inhabit that part of Galicia which gave the whole country its name, the old Russian Grand Duchy of Halitsh, which was, for some time, united with the Grand Duchy of Kiev, afterwards flourished as an independent kingdom, and was then conquered by the Poles in the fourteenth century. These Rusniaks are a small Russian race, related to the Cossacks and Malorossians, as the Bavarians are to the Saxons. Though they call themselves Rusniaks, I was told, by an intelligent and well educated man among them, that it was considered more accurate and refined to call them Ruthenen or Russinen. The Hungarians call them "Orashoks," as they do all the Russians. Their total number in Galicia is nearly two millions.
A smaller mass of 400,000 Rusniaks has spread into Hungary across the Carpathians. Their language differs much from that of Great Russia, and yet with our Moscovite Russian we could make ourselves understood. The inhabitants of Little Russia are perfectly understood by the Galician Rusniaks, yet many things about them, their costume for instance, prove there is a great difference between the two races. The Rusniaks, like other Malorossian races, are wanting in that agreeable and obliging manner towards strangers, which distinguishes the Great Russians. They appear unfriendly, cold, and reserved towards those whom they see for the first time. It may be that the long pressure of the Polish yoke has operated disadvantageously on the development of their character. In the mountains, they are said to have preserved their ancient manners in greater purity. Robbery and murder are very rare among them, and the statistics of the Austrian criminal courts prove that crimes are as uncommon among the Rusniaks of the east, as they are plentiful at the opposite end of the empire, among the Italians of the west.
Some races among the mountains are said still to preserve a purely patriarchal state of society, a family remaining as long as possible under one roof sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, grandchildren, and great grandchildren, all living together under the dominion of the patriarch head of the family. Like the inhabitants of Little Russia, the Rusniaks live better and are more cleanly than the Poles. Their tables also are more abundantly supplied; in this particular, the lower classes of Galicia retrograde as we go from east to west. The inhabitants of Bukovina live best, the Masuren worst, and the Rusniaks are between the two. Here bread, soup, meat, fish, and cakes are all Russian, both in taste, appearance and mixture. Brandy is as much in request as among the Russians, and drunkenness very common, as is always the case in those regions of ice and snow, where the poor frozen serf flies eagerly for refuge from the cold, to the deleterious "fire water."
The Rusniak peasant, like those of Little Russia, makes all his furniture and household utensils himself: he is his own architect, carpenter, coachmaker, and shoemaker. he is generally very frugal and careful (except where brandy is in question), and in every Rusniak household will be found a little box, to which the master of the house alone has a key, where he deposits his savings, often a considerable sum, with whose amount, however, not even his wife or children are acquainted. Formerly all the inhabitants of this country, nobles, priests, princes, and peasants, were all Rusniaks. Many noble families even now claim descent from the princes of Halitsh, as Galicia was formerly called.
The Poles have Polonized the country during their four hundred years of dominion over it; but it is only with the nobles that they have completely succeeded. The old Galician families of Potocki, Jablonowski, Dieduskicki, Skarbeck, &c., were originally Russian; but by intermarriage with Polish families, by continual intercourse with Polish grandees, and by sharing their privileges, rights, and constitution, they have become so assimilated to the Polish nobility, in language, manners, and customs, and finally by their adoption of the Catholic religion, that they are no longer to be distinguished as belonging to a separate race. The great Rusniak nobility, therefore, has lost all its Russian character, and become completely Polish. It is different with the petty nobles, the Schlachtitzen, who stand nearer to the people, and with the people themselves, that is the peasantry. The Poles who did not, like the Germans, encourage the education and civilization of the people, had not means enough to assimilate the lower classes of Galicia to their own. The Rusniak peasant clings with warm attachment to this old habits, and unlike the Poles, Magyars, Slovaks, and other neighbouring nations, seldom intermarries with foreigners; above all things he avoids connexion with the Poles, whom he hates and despises as much as the Russians do. The peasants, the Schlachtitzen, and the clergy, have remained completely Rusniak here, in dress, language, and habits.
The Rusniaks, immediately after the introduction of Christianity among them, adopted the Greek religion, in common with all the Russian nations, Wladimir the Great. Under the Polish dominion, they clung constantly to this their chosen religion. The utmost which the endeavoursof the Poles could accomplish (even in the last days of the republic, when they were most energetic and successful) with the assistance of the Jesuits, was a union of the Catholic church with the Greek Rusniak church; i. e. an acknowledgment of the supremacy of the Pope, all the practices and privileges of the old Greek Rusniak church being preserved unaltered. This union took place about one hundred and forty years ago, with the consent of the reigning Metropolitan: "a traitor, a bad man, the betrayer of his church he was," said a Rusniak priest, with whom I once conversed on the subject. The work of union proceeded, although very slowly, on account of the aversion of the people to Polish Catholicism. The uniting Metropolitan was succeeded by others who refused to unite, and the people repeatedly protested against it. The present Metropolitan is only the fifth who has consented to the union. In this way the work of union proceeded but slowly, though its progress continued under the Austrian sceptre. Many congregations, in particular that of a very wealthy church in Lemberg, founded by some Walachian nobles, resisted for a very long time, and have only very lately united themselves with the Catholic church. Some have not yet yielded.
Catholicism is at the same time advancing and retrograding among the Russo Slavonic races; for whilst Austria is uniting churches with Rome in the south, Russia is attacking her in the north. While Catholicism advances from the west towards the east, the Greek chuch proceeds form the east towards the west. The two millions of Rusniaks subject to Austria, have long kept their eyes fixed on the occurences of the east. They feel an unconquerable hatred to their beardless priests of the union, and will stretch a friendly hand to the Russian Greeks, when they advance towards them, were it only that the venerable old beard might again grow on the chins of their priests. It was a great mistake in Austria to seize the sovereignity over so many Rusniak Poles. The sympathy towards Russia is as deep rooted as the antipathy felt towards that country by the Poles.
The clergy of the united Greek church in Galicia, is entirely Rusniak; the Polish tendencies of the nobility have had no influence upon them. As is universally the case in the Greek church and throughout Russia, the Rusniak nobles have never sought admission into the church; on the contrary, the priests have invariably risen from among the people. In the Polish Catholic church, the heads of the clergy are all the scions of noble families; whereas the supreme head of the Rusniak Greek church, the Metropolitan himself, is generally the son of a peasant. In the same manner and in the same degree as the Poles succeeded in Polonizing Galicia, they assimilated to themselves various other parts of that vast tract of country lying between the Baltic and the Pontus, which had fallen to their share in the prosperous days of the republic. Everywhere they made the Lithuanian and Russian nobility completely Polish, by placing them on an equal footing with their own, and giving them a share in all the rights and privileges of native Polish noblemen; but everywhere, beneath this Polish surface, the people, with whom the Poles used no such assimilating means, remained untouched and unchanged in manners, customs, language, and ideas.
Polonization, however, succeeded best with the Lithuanians, the race least related to the Poles, for the Lithuanian clergy became Roman Catholic; it succeeded least with the Russians and Rusniaks, whose Greek clergy offered a permanent and effectual opposition. Still less did the Cossacks become Polonized, who were never thoroughly subjected to the Poles; and the influence of the latter upon the German province of the Baltic, Prussia, Courland, and Livonia, was very slight. In those countries, Lutheranism and German nationality were preserved in all their purity. It is interesting to observe how, during the events of later years, the sympathy for the misfortunes and degradations of Poland has been awakened in these different countries, in precise proportion to the Polonization of each. In the last insurrection of Poland against Russia, for instance, Lithuania imediately rose with her; the half Polish Podolia and Kiev murmured, and conspired, and designed, but never came to open rebellion. Polish Rusniak Galicia sighed and applauded, and lent the assistance of pecuniary contribution, and silent prayers. The Baltic provinces were indifferent and inactive; though Courland contained more friends to the Poles than Livonia, where the traces oftheir old dominion were quite effaced. The Cossacks willingly aided the Russians with their pikes, in the subjection of the Poles, to whom they had often lent a forced and unwilling help.
We arrived late in the evening at Sniatyn, the first town in the land of the Rusniaks, where we drove up to a Jewish hotel. We found a beetroot sugar manufactory at this place, and learnt that these manufactories are numerous in the district and pay well. We here drank a "Seidel" of Hungarian wine, and as we found it very refreshing, we took a "Pfiff" in addition. Seidel is the Austrian word for measure, and Pfiff for glass. Hungary supplies her neighbours so well with all kinds of good and bad wine, that we appeared to be in a land of grapes and sunshine, instead of ice and snow. In Southern Galicia, howver, we had, sometimes, to drink sour Modavian wines. Upon the table in the inn lay a piece of paper, on which some fair Polish hand appeared to have been trying her pen. Such pieces of paper have often a value and interest in the eyes of a traveller, as unconstrained manifestations of the national mind. There was the name of the writer, written two or three time over Elizbeta Visnievska. Then came Yasnie (Most Illustrious) twice over, and finally the connected words "Powinszovanie dla Yasnie Velmoznei Pani naszei Matki: (Humblest representation to our illustrious and powerful lord Matki) the name was unfinished. The fragment, however, was sufficient to open to us a long perspective in to the feelings and ideas of the people, whose fears, hopes and cares centre so exclusively in their illustrious and powerful lords, that even in trying their pens, their lord's name is the one which occurs to them.
Coming from the south, Sniatyn is the first town which, soul and body, from the houses and steeples down to the dogs and cats, is the property of one nobleman. In the evening we had badly baked Kulatshi with our tea, an odd kind of cake, common throughout Rusniak Galicia. The soft dough is first drawn out to a long pliable string, and then twisted into the shape of a crown of thorns, and so put into the oven. The inhabitants of Little Russia make a similar cake, which they call Kulitschi, but the Kalatchi of the Great Russians is differently shaped. This night in bed we recognized an old northern acquaintance, in the Tarakanen, a disgusting, great, long legged insect, common among the Lettes, Esthonians, Great Russians, and Poles, but never seen among the Little Russians. They are here called Tshipalki, and in Poland Prussaki. The way to Stanislavov led us the next day along the Pruth, through Kolomea, the last town on the Pruth, and over an elevated road dividing the valleys of the Pruth and the Dniester.
In the valley of the Pruth the high summits of the Tshorna Goira towered at our side, but in the valley of the Dniester the Carpathians were quite hidden from our sight. This is the case the whole way from the Pruth to Stanislavov and Stry, where the highest points of the mountains are never more than seven or eight miles from the traveller, and yet are never visible to him. No mountains were to be seen; we appeared to be travelling continually in a plain, and not even on the horizon could we discover any traces of mountains. This is the case throughout Galicia, till we come to Cracow. It may be partly because the Carpathians rise highest at their two extremities, in Bukovina and Moravia, and have in the middle no towering pinnacles rising above the rest; and partly because the whole of Galicia is a high country, gently rising from the Polish plains to the mountains. On the Hungarian side the Carpathians rise much more abruptly from the plains stretching away at their feet, and in that country the horizon is everywhere bounded by hills.
In the Pruth valley we noticed the peculiar race of fat tailed sheep, common in Walachia; they are plentiful here, as thoughout Moldavia and Walachia, and from these districts they have spread through South Russia, where they are known as Walachian sheep. In the interior of Galicia they are unknown, and only the common Polish sheep is there to be seen. Towards the west the Carpathians have checked their spread; for the Huzzulen and Goralen have not the fat tailed, but the common sheep. The cattle here is not so fine as in the Russian and Moldavian plains. The large silver gray oxen of the steppes are still to be seen, but they are mixed with the small black cattle of the Carpathians. The still larger Hungarian race is never seen on this side of the mountains.
Many a seidel and pfiff were emptied by our Walachian fellow travellers, before we stopped for the night; particularly at the Armenian publichouses by the wayside. These Armenian publichouses alternate in Galicia with the German and Jewish inns, but are in smaller numbers than the last named. The Armenian hosts are generally mere wine dealers, and do not let lodgings and beds to travellers. Many of them have become very rich in this country, and a few have even been raised to the rank of nobles. There are several powerful Armenian noblemen in Poland. In the same way the Poles have sometimes raised Jews to the rank of nobles, and allowed them to share all the privileges of the aristocrocy. The Jewish inns are the oldest in the country; the towns are full of them. Their accommodations are such, that if they can provide the traveller with nothing but a roof; provisions and beds he must bring with or seek elsewhere. The houses are large, the courtyards and stables spacious and convenient, the rooms small, but better furnished than would be expected. Bedsteads there are, but no beds, because their usual customers either require none the Polish servant, coachmen, and peasants, usually sleep in their clothes and furs or if any are required, the traveller brings his own with him. As we were in neither of these positions, many expedients were proposed. Some proposed to buy beds for us, some to borrow them of their neighbours, others to vacate their own to us; we however generally preferred a clean sheet spread over some hay and straw.
Regular inns, with beds, we did not find till we came to Lemberg. Provisions were as scanty as beds; when we asked for them we were referred to the neighbouring tradcteur (triteur), who would provide us with what we wanted. The man who mediates between the traveller and the host in Galicia, who acquaints the traveller with the advantages and capabilities of the inn, and sees to the fulfilment of his wishes, is called the factor, and is always a Jew. The word factor is no doubt and abbreviation of factotum; for as the inn itself has nothing, and does nothing, it is the factor who procures and arranges every thing for the traveller. In the Galician towns, particularly in the more western ones, German inns, ("Catholic inns," the people call them), are fast rising to rival these Jewish hostelries. When we came to a town, we were always asked wether we would drive to the Catholic or the Jewish inn. We always decided for the Catholic, but our Rusniak servant was a Jew, and always arranged matters so that we were obliged to put up with his Israelite brother.
A few miles before Stanislavov, we came to a pine forest, the first we had seen in coming from the Black Sea. In Bessarabia and Bukovina there are no pine forests, and the sight of these beautiful, dark, leafy masses, supported on tall, smooth, stately columns, was an agreeable surprise to us. From the upper valley of the Dniester the pine forests stretch, one after the other, in close succession to the land of the Estonians and Finns, where they border on the northern birch forests. The town of Stanislavov, has now no fewer than 15,000 inhabitants, and is the second town of Galicia. It lies between two small rivers, both called bistiza, in the valley of the Dniester, and is, without doubt, the most repectable of all the Dniester towns, from Sambor and Stry, to Chotini, Bender, and Ackermann. It formerly belonged to a Count Potocki, whose family is widely spread, wealthy, and powerful, in all the countries from Bohemia to the Pontus. The people of Stanislavov still speak of a countess Potocka, who after the custom of Polish nobles, kept up a little standing army in the town, and the ruins of a fortress, which she erected for her own ends and those of the republic, are still shown to stangers. Stanislavov is now a free imperial city. It carries on an important trade with Galicia and Podolia, has a good gymnasium, is the capital of a large circle, and is the residence of many far famed noble families, among which those of the Counts Idushicki and Yablonovski may be named as the principal.
The town is on the whole, well built, and rich in elegant buildings, palaces, churches, &c. The fancy shops, plentifully fitted out with the pretty toys of Vienna, astonished us not a little. The apothecaries' shops were orderly and good, and the coffee houses splendid, and I think a traveller, coming from the west, would be just as much astonished to find so elegant and refined a little city on the borders of civilized Europe, as I was to find western elegance and luxury meeting me so soon after my leaving the dreary steppes. Walking through the streets in the evening, we found every place well lighted, and met German watchmen continually; and late at night felt quite at home, on hearing a horn blown from the towers.
In one of the public houses, late guests were still carousing together. We entered, and found the place full of Jews, in long black silk talars, with long, flowing, black beards. They were half tipsy, and were singing loose drinking songs, to the same peculiar tunes to which, in this country, they chant the psalms of David in the synagogues. The next morning public worship was performed in the churches; but it was also market day, and business proceeded as usual in the "ring," as the marketplace is called in all Galician towns. The word is no doubt a Germanization ofthe Polish word for market, "Rynek;" but the people of the country believe it to be a genuine German word, and the expression may have arisen from the rings of booths and shops, which surround the market places. On the corner houses of the market places in Galicia, is always inscribed the Polish word Rynek, and under it the German "der Ring."
The streets, like the market places, have always both German and Polish names inscribed at their corners, and are paved with flint from the bed of the Dniester. The market places and streets swarmed with a gay and busy crowd of Armenians, Jews, Poles, Germans, Rusniaks, Goralen, and Hungarian soldiers. From the market the flood of life poured on to the churches and to the public houses. We entered the principal church of the town, a Catholic one. Its size and architecture merited the name of a cathedral, and we were pleased no less by the beautiful organ and other decorations, than by the noble style of building and its vast extent. The chancel, choir, organ, and altar, were adorned with various valuable and excellent carvings in wood, and the church was as full of statures in stone and wood as of men and women. A curious fancy of the priest's was displayed upon the altar. It was decorated with large glass bulbs, containing blue, red, and yellow fluids, behind each of which stood a lamp, whose rays streamed through the church with all the colours of the rainbow.
In Russia apothecaries have similar glass bulbs before their windows. In the market place, rock salt from Fossulna and other places at the foot of the Carpathians, was one of the most abundant articles for sale. It is the custom here to cut this salt into all kinds of elegant shapes, like cream cheese with us. We saw these little snow white forms arranged on all the tables of the Jewish merchants. They have fine saws, with which they cut the large pieces into smaller ones. At Stanislavov we enjoyed again the satisfaction of feeling ourselves in a town, which sensation one quite losses in the great, dreary, desert Russian cities. The houses were here close to each other, and stood in crowded groups; high roofs rising above lower ones, and churches and steeples towering over all. The streets ran all manner of crooked ways, and even the avenues of the town (the Russian towns have none), the long poplar avenues, and the dusty roads, spreading out in every direction, appeared to us both cheerful and stately, as did the view of the whole from the western heights, over which our Broder Baude rolled away, the next morning at eight o'clock.
Upon these hills the road divides itself. The principal road goes on towards Stry by a circuitous route. A bad byroad leads to the town of Halitsh, which although much famed in the Russian annals, is now no more than a small place inhabited only by Polish Jews, and bears no traces of its former greatness. This is the case with all Russian towns of bygone prosperity, which, not being built of solid stone like our old cities, do not bequeath to posterity any tokens of their ancient splendour. We had hired our coach and its driver for the longer road, and had paid him extra money on purpose; but the shorter suited him better he had laid a plot with a brother driver who was going the same way, and when we came to the cross road, both turned off towards Halitsh. We screamed out the carriage windows so did the passengers in the other coach, but as persuasion and threats were in vain, our only way was to get out, and seizing the horse's reins, to turn them back again by main force, which done, the ill humoured Jewish drivers, after much noisy altercation, submitted, and quietly drove down the prescribed road.
Behind Stanislavov, we saw the first manured field. In the valley of the Pruth and throughout Bukovina, no manure is ever used, because the soil is so rich and productive that it needs none, as is also the case all over Moldavia and Southern Russia. This kind of soil ceases in the valley of the Dniester, and, as we proceed north west, every thing grows more and more barren and scanty, till we reach the sandy plains of Poland, which partake of the desert nature of those of Brandenburg and Prussia. In Bukovina six or eight oxen are always harnessed to the plough, after the custom of Stout Russia and Moldavia. Here the plough is driven with only a pair of oxen or horses, and sometimes only with one. The whole state of agriculture and housekeeping is different here from what it is in Bukovina. Grain is no longer threshed by horses in the open air, but with flails in large barns; hay or corn are no longer kept in great heaps in the open air, but in sheds and barns; nature appears more niggardly and less liberal, man more careful and painstaking. The furrows are drawn in the peculiar manner common throughout Poland; six small furrows lie close together, and then comes a great, boad, deep one. This gives the fields a curious but not unpleasing appearance.
Maize is no longer cultivated here, and consequently we no longer meet with any of the national dishes prepared from it by the Moldavians. The potato, on the contrary, becomes more and more plentiful; in no part of Poland, Posen excepted, is this root so much eaten as in Galicia. The Germans, as everywhere, are zealous partisans of this vegetable. "The people here," said a Galician to us one day, "eat very little bread on weekdays, though plenty on Sundays; and they only eat meat on high festival days, at weddings, christenings, and so forth, while the Moldavians and South Russians, eat meat every day.
The slavery of the peasants here is still very abject, as it is all over Poland. Monsieur Dupin has drawn a map of civilization in France, on which he has shaded the wild and uncultivated regions quite dark, the more cultivated, lighter, and so on to the white regions of perfect refinement and civilzation. If a similar map to indicate the extent of slavery in Poland were to be drawn, the whole country ought to be painted black as ink, without a single white spot; no doubt, however, there would begradations in blackness. The blackest hue of all would be found in Lithuania, where the slavery of the peasants is of the most oppressive character, and where the timid yielding pliable nature of the people offers no resistance to oppression. In Galicia particularly in Rusniak Galicia, a few faint streaks of a lighter shade might be admitted. Slavery is older in Poland than in Russia; the Poles first introduced it among the Malorossian races, and history shows how much trouble it cost them to do so. The Russians have always kept within bounds in the infliction of their fetters upon subject nations. The effect of this is manifest among the Rusniaks of Galicia, in a certain independent and lofty bearing, whilst the Lithuanian serfs, prostrate before their master, seem to have lost all dignity and self respect.
In northern Poland, two thirds of the time and strength of the peasant is at the disposal of his lord, whilst in Galicia he has only to work for his master from sixty to one hundred days. They call this taskwork "Robbot." Only fifteen or twenty days in the year are exacted as Robbot from the crown peasants. Besides the Robbot, there are many irregular tasks and services of different kinds, and tributary offerings of butter, eggs, fruit, money, &c., which are not regulated by law, but by a vague rule of custom, liable to be interpreted according to the will of a tyrannical and oppressive master. The Austrian government is unceasing in its endeavours to change these undefined duties, but much remains to be cleared away in this Augean stable of Polish slavery, and in most instances, the Galician, like the Lithuanian master, can do pretty much what he pleases with his serfs.
An important innovation in Galicia is the general prevalence of German agricultural colonies. They have entered the country partly at the invitation of private noblemen, and partly at that of the government. North of the Carpathians, among the Poles and Russians as far as the Caucasus and the sea of Asoph, these German colonists are always called Suabians, whilst south of the Carpathians, in Hungary and Transylvania, they are everywhere known by the name of Saxons, whether they come from the Elbe, the Rhine, or the Danube. The study of the German colonists in these countries, of the old customs which they have retained, and the new ones which have crept in among them, the different influences of the different races among whom they have settled, upon their costume, language, and manners, would be one full of interest. Whoever imagines Galicia to be an uninteresting country is very much mistaken. The mere contemplation of the influence of the different elements of the population upon each other, cannot fail to be deeply interesting to every thoghtful mind.
The road from Stanislavov to Stry passes through Kalush and Bletrov, and through the valleys of the rivers Lomiga and Stiza. In the first valley we dined, in the second we passed the night. All these Carpatian mountain streams are pretty much alike. They are each ten or twelve miles long, and flow very rapidly in a north eastern direction into the Dniester. Each consists of two streams which unite together about two miles above the spot where they flow into the Dniester. Each has a town at its mouth, and another further up the valley. The Mogilos, or grave hillocks of the Mongolian races, are very abundant in Bukovina and round Stanislavov, but here they appear to cease altogether. Southern Galicia is amost as thickly sown with these Mogilos as the steppes of Southern Russia.
In every village and town we found, in the middle of the market place, a large stone effigy of some holy martyr, or canonized hermit, or a Madonna, clad in nun's attire, bearing the infant Christ, or a priest, bearing the consecrated Host; all so many monuments of the supremacy of Catholicism over the Greek religion, for the latter, not approving of sculpture in the service of religion, has banished all such images from the churches, streets, and market places. Throughout all the countries subject to the Greek church, such monuments are never found in the towns and villages, and an oil painting here and there in some chapel, a fresco painting on the wall of some church or cloister, or, oftener, a simple cross, made of two pieces of wood, rudely nailed together, are the only visible symbols made use of. The catholics taught the Rusniaks to erect effigies of this kind, such as are to be seen in Bohemia and Bavaria; but they do not appear to be much reverenced by the people, for I never saw a Rusniak cross himself before any of these images, although he does so in every church, and before every old Greek picture, as piously as any Russian.
At Kalush we dined at a Jewish tacteur's, named Schnitle. A few Austrian soldiers were playing at billiards with some civilians, and a Jewish marker was calling out the numbers in Polish. The Austrian soldiers and officers in Galicia always appeared to me merry and cheerful; Poland appears to agree with them very well. They are always making a noise, and are to be met with at every billiard, card, or dinner table. There is something complacent and self satisfied about them. This cheerfulness and merriment of the Austrians in Galicia must be a thorn in the side of the Poles. The German traveller, on the other hand, might rejoice at seeing his countrymen living here as rulers and conquerors, did not many a disagreeable conviction disturb this feeling; among others, the knowledge that the Austrian has no feeling of national patriotism about him and if commanded, would just as readily direct his musket at a Saxon or Prussian, as at a Russian or Pole. This place had been half burnt down a week before. The wooden walls and roofs of the houses had been entirely destroyed, and only a row of tall chimneys, with the ovens and hearths to which they belonged, still towered like pillars from the dust and ashes beneath. In Northern Poland I had often seen villages destroyed by fire, which always presented the same appearance.
It was Sunday, and in the market place of the little town I appeared to be in the middle of Germany; for German peasants were standing everywhere around, dressed in blue cloth, the young in jackets with silver buttons, the old in long coats. Some were standing in groups, others leaning against the wooden railings in long rows, and all enjoying the Sunday dolce far niente. They told us that they got on very well, and that by feeding and selling cattle, they earned a good deal of money. "The Germans are the only people in Poland who eat meat every day," said a Jew to us once. It must be confessed, that upon the whole, it is very pleasant to be a German, for a German patriot has a very extensive fatherland, and everywhere finds his countrymen prosperous and repected.
We drank tea at Dalina, a little town lying between two hills of the Carpathians. Though it was Sunday, we found the market place of Dalina full of life, bustle, and traffic. The law forbids the holding of a market on a Sunday, yet, all through Galicia, the principal business of the week is carried on on Sundays, probably according to the old Malorossian custom, for we remarked the same thing throughout Southern Russia, Odessa not excepted. It is much to be wondered that more ethnographers and travellers do not visit these countries, to give us some account of the life led in these cities of the Carpathians, and to perpetuate a few of the interesting pictures which daily present themselves. In fact, while sitting on the wooden bench at the door of the little inn, we could in a few moments, with a little portable camera obscura, have collected several pictures, wanting neither in general nor in picturesque interest. We were particulary struck by the universal cheerfulness which appeared to animate all; not only the leisurely buyers and promenaders, but the merchants and men of business, seemed full of Sunday gaiety.
The round satisfied countenance, merry eye, and white uniform, of the Austrian soldier, contrasted agreeably with groups of dark furred Rusniaks. The young Rusniak girls, arm in arm promenaded in long rows up and down before the gay booths, richly stocked with fancy wares. Their peculiar head dress, a long white handkerchief, fastened together at the forehead, and waving behind and by the side like a long banner, became them remarkably well. The Goralen, a poetical and musical race, of great physical strength, and much given to tobacco smuggling, had descended in great numbers from the mountains, to trade in cattle; and both men and women were easily known by the two thick plaits in which they arrange their black hair, and which they wind round the head from the forehead to the ears. Here and there a tall Magyar, of slow gait and dignified manners, wandered through the crowd, and here and there was a barefooted monk in his great brown cowl.
The long black talar of the small, meager, Polish Jew, an indispensable agent in Polish commerce, was seen on every side. The Jew arranges and consolidates everything, forms and witnesses agreements, and holds together the whole fabric of society; everything moves and lives here in a Jewish element. The Jew is either himself the merchant, or the broker who mediates between him and his customers; the Jew guides and settles all business, the Jew pours out the brandy which gives the purchaser fresh courage for bargaining, and it was a Jew who brought us the coffee which sweetened our contemplation of these interesting groups.
Near Dalina we crossed the Sviza, one of those little rivers of the Carpathians spoken of above, but which was now a lifeless insignificant piece of water. In spring, however, when the melting of the mountain snow swells its current, it is, like all these rivers, very useful to the Huzzulen and Goralen. The Huzzulen float the wood of the Carpathians down to the Dniester, where they dispose of it to the inhabitants of Halitsh, who convey it to its further destination. Great orchards of plums are to be seen in all the villages here; this fruit thrives amazingly in Galicia, where it yields the far famed Zvetschenmuss, which the Galicians call Povill, and which forms no inconsiderable article of commerce with Hungary, Northern Poland, and the Ukraine. This Galician Povill is everywhere welcome as an agreeable and nourishing kind of food, and Lemberg contains large warehouses full of tubs of Povill. While travelling in Galicia great plum orchards were often shown us, which brought in annually many thousands of florins. This cultivation of plums decreased as we proceeded northward.
In the evening we drank tea at Balekhov, for we had not yet learnt to dispense with this agreeable Russian custom. The Polish word for tea, "Herbata," signifies more properly herb, and in fact there is little more of the genuine Chinese beverage in the article itself than in its name; so that we often thought with longing of the delightful Russian "Tshai," genuine in word and fact. The harmonious but monotonous and melancholy tones of an Harmonica attracted us from our tea table to the lawn before the house, where we saw two or three German carriers lying on the ground. They were Silesians from Teschen, handsome, powerful men, in short blue jackets and trousers, all richly set with large silver buttons, and with gay woolen caps on their heads. They were conveying cloth from the farfamed manufacturing town of Biala to Tshernovitze, in Bukovina, whence it is sent to Russia, Walachia, and Turkey. Both the Silesian and Moravian carriers travel through the whole Austrian empire, from the confines of Russia to the Adriatic Sea. They use the same great waggons covered with white linen cloths which are common in Germany. With these heavy vehicles they can only travel on regular roads, and though with their powerful horses and great strong waggons, they can transport heavy and bulky goods with greater ease and security than the native carriers, yet in districts unprovided with roads, they are obliged to yield to the latter. The Rusniaks and Slovaks are the only native Galicians who carry on this business on a large scale. Where there are good roads the German waggoners are preferred, but everywhere else the Rusniaks.
The Russians everywhere seem to have a particular tendency to this wandering way of life, for as in Galicia, the Moldavians, Poles, and Masuren, always stay at home, while the Rusniaks are found wandering about everywhere; so in Lithuania, Livonia, and Esthonia, the carriers and drivers are all Russians. The restless, busy, nomadic life of a waggoner or driver suits the Russian character. Breslau, Posen, Kiev, Bukovina, Ofen, and Pesth, may be named as the boundary points in the great circle which the Rusniaks frequent as carriers. Laden with wine, salt, honey, corn, and Povill, they intersect the Carpathians, where their light little cars, built in the Russian fashion, are better than the heavy, solid waggons of the Germans.
The making of roads, however, is narrowing their territory more and more, and enlarging that of the Germans. It may be imagined, therefore, with what unfavourable eyes the Rusniak regard the fine new "Imperial road," as it is commonly called, which intersects the whole of Galicia. The different branches of transpot in Galicia, are divided among the different elements of the population, in about the following manner. The Germans convey the produce of Austria and Silesia along the high roads to Turkey and Russia. The Rusniaks travel about in the interior with home produce, along the natural paths of the country. The Jews never convey goods, but only travellers. The Huzulen and Garolen are in possession of the rivers and streams and occupy themselves with water carriage.
We set off from Balekhov at three o'clock, the next morning. Every thing still slumbered under the black veil of night; the Carpathians seemed to have unquiet dreams, for a storm was raging among them. Every thing was dark and silent in the Rusniak villages, and only here and there the forge of some industrious smith gleamed through the night. We shuddered with cold and drowsiness, and were very glad when we arrived to breakfast at "the Imperial free city of Stry." Before the gates of the city we saw a board stuck up, on which was written in large letters "Hier ist Viehseuche." [Here a contagious epidemic is raging among the cattle.] A great herd of Podolian oxen stood lowing before the gate, and an Austrian soldier was translating the melancholy inscription for the Malorossian cattle dealer, who then sorrowfully turned away with their beasts to avoid the town by a circuit. At the inn of Stry, a Polish lady of rank, with her attendants, was just entering a huge old fashioned coach, such as we had not seen for a long time. Five horses were harnessed to it; three before the other two. The host was putting some packets of "Stry sausages" into thelady's carriage, assuring us at the same time that we must take some with us, as no travellers ever left Stry without some specimens of this esteemed and farfamed delicacy.
Stry is a Polish city, but a good deal Germanized, that is to say cleared of all its Polish dirt and rubbish, furnished with proper gates and walls, and with a few good buildings, and well paved throughout. The old Polish dustholes, once so common in Galicia, have all been swept away by the Austrian government. To see them in their old unchanged, unsophisticated condition, the traveller must go to Russian Poland, particularly to Lithuania. Stry is, as has been said, a free city, "Volnoi Gorod." This name must not call up in the reader's mind the image of one of our German free cities. The expression has in Hungary and Galicia nothing to do with political freedom and independence, but merely denotes that no private nobleman is master of the place. The Imperial free cities are called so as opposed to the Dominikalni Gorodi, or cities belonging to private persons. Next to these private cities, where the one nobleman possesses all the land and houses, where all the citizens pay their rent to him, where he names the magistrates and Burgermeisters of his own authority, and where criminals are tried in his name; next to these come the Cameral Stadte, (Kameralni Gorodi), where the emperor is the same to the towns as the private nobleman is to the Dominial Stadt.
As the morning dawned, the market place of Stry became more and more filled with Jewish brandy dealers, and bread selling Germans. As the sun rose, the Jews began to pray, and while pouring out brandy for the peasants, popping their money in their pockets, and going up and down into their cellars to fetch fresh bottles, they continued gabbling over their prayers, uninterrupted by their various avocations.
From Stry our road lay through the valley of the Dniester. It is here a fine broad river, bordered by beautiful meadows, which are flooded every spring. On the other side of the Dniester arises that narrow range of hills intersected by many small streams, which spreads out from the Carpathians, dividing the Dniester from the Vistula, and proceeding further in a south easterly direction towards Podolia, separates the valley of the Dniester from that of Bug. The Dniester is here, as everywhere on its course towards the Pontus, very deep and rapid. I now crossed this river, over which I had passed so often, probably for the last time in my life, at the little fishing village of Rosvadov. Even here, scarcely ten miles from its source, the river already contains a great quantity of fish. The Jews of the Dniester pay four thousand florins rent for the bridge and road tolls of this district, and they make scarcely as much profit as is necessary to enable them to live a miserable life of dirty squalor, with their wives and children. Throughout Galicia the Jews generally rent all the tolls of the roads and bridges.
At Nikolayev, or Mikolayev, as the Poles say, who always turn the Russian ns into ms, we saw a very old Greek Rusniak church. This little building rests, like most Rusniak churches, under the shade of a grove of venerable oaks, whose lofty tops far overshadow the old towers. The church is entirely built of wood, the walls of great trunks of beeches laid crossways on one another; the three towers which rise into the air, like old decayed branches, are built of pinewood and covered with wooden shingles. The roof of the church was so low, that my head reached up to it, and when at last the priest drew back the curious old bolts, and the thick oaken door grated like that of a prison as it opened, we felt as if entering the interior of a hollow tree. The church was filled with a dim twilight; for the only apertures for light were the little windows in the towers, and the waving shade of the dark oak trees playing round the place, weakened the effect of the few rays of sunshine which shone down through these apertures, upon the glittering pictures of saints on the walls. Before the door was inscribed upon the walls, in old Slavonic numbers, rough as if hewn with an axe, the date 1633.
The church was dedicated to the famous Russian saint, Nicholas, who stands in high veneration with the Rusniaks. His picture hung in the centre of the Iconostase, and had just the same physiognomy and the same decorations as in Russia. Iconostase, altar, and holy vessels, were just as we see them in all old Russian Greek churches, and scarcely any traces of the modifying influence of Catholicism were to be discovered; a little sculpture had, however, crept in here and there. The image of Christ upon the crucifix, carried by the priest, was not merely traced as the Russians, in fulfilment of the commandment against graven images, are accustomed to have it, but stood out in relief from the cross. I pointed this out to the priest. He said, certainly this was wrong, but it could not always be helped, for those crosses were often presents from Catholics. I also noticed two or three insignificant modifications in the service; for example, the altar remains visible to the congregation during the whole service, whilst in Russian it is hidden from them at certain times by the drawing of curtains, and the closing of the doors of the Iconostase.
In the middle of the church was a great stone, about a foot and half high; this was the pulpit. The priest told me that every Sunday he stood upon this stone and preached some moral discourse to the congregation in the Rusniak language, although he could speak Polish, and his congregation could understand it. Behind the altar was a collection of old Slavonic church books browned and blackened by time, which were all printed in Lemberg or Kiev, and the older ones in the farfamed Russian monastery of Potshayu. The whole Iconostase stood awry, and the pictures hung awry on the walls, which like the whole church, looked as if about to fall in. The patron and owner of the church was one of the wealthiest nobles in Galicia, Count R______. For thirty years the congregation had in vain been endeavouring to get their master to rebuild the church. "That man is a freemason and jacobin," said the priest. "He has built mills, manufactores, breweries, and a great theatre at Lemberg, but not one church. Six of his churches are already in this deplorable state; yet he prefers paying the fine imposed by the Metropolitan every year, to laying out any thing upon rebuilding them."
I could find it in my heart to wish that the count may not alter his mind; for if a new church were to be built, what would be the consequence? It would be made larger than the present one, and then the old overshadowing oaks with their venerable thousand years would fall, the old stone would be replaced by a mahogany pulpit, the old well thumbed Slavonic books would give way to new ones in elegant bindings, and the interior of the church would bear witness only to the skill of the Lemberg masons, and not to the thousand heartwrung sighs and fervent prayers, which have ascended to Heaven from beneath the lowly roof of that little old, time worn Rusniak temple. I could not help wishing therefore that the church might long preserve its uneven walls and old oaks, and I told the priest he would do wisely not to mourn over the backwardness of his patron, but rather to do all he could to preserve the old church in its present state. It is always easy to build a new church, but very difficult to build one two hundred years old.
In this church we copied the title of the metropolitan of the United Greek church, which is interesting on account of the present position of that church. It runs thus: "Michael Lewicki z Bozega Milosierdzia i zu wladza S. Stolicu, Apostolskiei Metropolita Halicki, Arzubickup Lwowski, Biskup Kamenicki." (Michael Lewicki, by the Grace of God and under the sanction of the Holy Apostolic Chair, Metropolitan of Halitsh, Archbishop of Lemberg, and Bishop of Kameniez.) In his official German title, the following words are always added to the foregoing: "Excellency, Privy Councillor, and Doctor of Theology." Although he now resides in Lemberg, he is always styled Metropolitan of Halitsh, the old capital. His old Bishopric of Kameniez, has long ago fallen to Russia; still he does not regard it as "in partibus infidelium," but as "in partibus fidelium," and would much like to join it. The united Greeks are far from bearing the Union with patience; on the contrary they bear it only as an unavoidable necessity.
In the publications of the Metropolitan, the Pope is always called "Nahu Pasterz Grzegorz XVI." (our Pastor Gregory XVI.[1831\_1846]) The Priests are not called Popes, but pastors (Pasterz), or clergymen (Kyonzui.) The word "Pope" is here used only as contemptuous appellation. " A man is fined a ducat here, if he calls a Priest Pope," said the Priest, "but if any one just fresh from Hungary of Russia calls me so, I do not complain." This feeling has probably arisen from the influence of Catholicism; and may not be shared by the people, who are very much attached to their old Popes. To our surprise, we found the common Russian superstition, that the chance meeting with a Pope is an evil omen, prevailing here also. If a Rusniak meets a Pope in going out, he sits to avert the threatened evil. There is another superstition current here, which I never met with in Russia, namely, that to meet a Jew forbodes good fortune and prosperity. This reminded me of many similar strange prejudices in Germany, such as that to dream of a fire signifies money, and that it is unlucky to wish a hunter success when he sets out.
That remarkable tract of country which separates North from South Galicia, the land of the Poles from that of the Rusniaks, commences behind and Nidolayev, is about 700 or 800 feet above the level of the sea, and 400 or 500 feet above the valley of the Dniester. It is very bare and quite flat, and consists of masses of chalk, full of petrifactions, as in Podolia. The little rivers which rush down from it into the Dniester, flow through deep sharply cut channels. We saw no trees but birch trees. Towards Lemberg the road became a little less even, and we drove over the wave like undulations, now up and now down. The roads were here paved with the soft chalk of the Plateau, and were therefore very bad. On this table land the races began to mix. We entered a village which was peopled half by Poles and half by Rusniaks. Upon the whole, however, the Rusniaks form still the majority. We now, for the first time, met with the small Polish horses, and in the inns and public houses Polish landlords became more frequent.
Here also, for the first time, we again enjoyed the long unseen spectacle of a smooth mirror like lake. Throughout Moldavia, Walachia, and South Russia, there are no good sized inland lakes. It is a remarkable fact, and not a little characteristic of the structure of the ground, that throughout the whole extent of the Carpathian mountains, a district more than 100 (German) miles long, and fifteen or twenty wide, there is not one considerable basin of water, while the Alps are full of them. Not one of the numerous streams, which flow down from the Carpathians into the Dniester, forms a lake. In our Broder Baude, we had taken up, from time to time, specimens of all the different classes of Galician population; giving a lift now to a Rusniak, now to an Armenian, now to a Jew, now to a priest, and now to a German mechanic. We found the more opportunity for this, as the land of pedestrians begins at Bukovina. Throughout Russia, where there are scarcely any footpaths, no one goes on foot; neither tradesman nor peasant neither monk nor pedlar, except perhaps the poor hardworn soldier.
A few miles from Lemberg, we gave a lift to an Austrian soldier. He was a Pole, but spoke German; he had served for ten years, and was to serve four more. He looked very well off. He told us that he rubbed his white clothes over every week with chalk. The coat given him by the Emperor was to last him two years, the cloak three years; he received three shirts for two years, two pair of trousers for each year, and one pair of boots every nine months. There is no doubt, that the Polish soldiers in the Austrian service are three times as well fed and clothed as the Russian soldiers. Here we again saw the genuine old Polish bow, which we had never seen since leaving Poland. The Polish peasant never bends forwards when saluting another, as we do, but sideways, in the most extraordinary manner. When they do the thing quickly, it is only a jirk of the left shoulder. Generally, however, the Poles bow so low that they almost lose their balance, bending over sideways, and kissing the hem of the garment of the saluted person, sideways. Even the very dogs do not approach their master strait forwards, but creep sideways towards them.
The usual Polish salutation which accompanies the bow, is "Padam da nog," (I throw myself at your feet,) or else still more strongly, "Padam pod noshig," (I throw myself under your feet). These phrases are continually used in common conversation; for servility is as inherent a part of the Polish, as obedience of the German character. Even the young Polish elegants at the balls of Warsaw, Lemberg, and Wilna, talk of throwing themselves "at the feet" and "under the feet" of their partners. The Polish beggars also sometimes place their caps on the ground, and bow down low over them, in saluting a superior. At Brodki, a village near Lemberg, a young Jewish barmaid, who wore a hood decorated with pearls, worth a hundred ducats, told us that the Jewesses of Lemberg often wear jewels to the value of from one thousand to two thousand ducats, about the head. She also made us acquainted with a Polish beverage called Malina, made of the whitest and sweetest honey, and the best raspberries. This beverage is as common here as mead is in the north. Late in the evening the bustle and crowd on the road, and the noise and tumult of the public houses, showed us that we were approaching the capital of the country, the far famed and much praised city of Lemberg or "Lvov."