The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1849-07-18
miscellaneous.
From the NJ Y. Tribune.
HUNGARY AND ITS POPULATION

this country, to which the eyes of the world are
turned with fear and hope, according as the sym
pathies of the beholder engaged on the side OF
absolutism or of liberty. We have spoken of the
Magyars and the great quarrel in which they stand
opposed TO the Austrlans and Russians with the
Indignation natural to any unprecedented mind in
contemplating the most outrageous and gigantic
injustice, and with the ardent desire that they may
triumph, and, riumphing, strike TO death that reac-
ton which has been steadily, and often Savagely
and boodily, at work in Europe, ever since the re-
volutlon OF February came to shock the old world
and proclaim the elevation of the people 10 the en-
joyment of their rights OF course in these articles
we have dwelt mainly social and political consde
rations, and have had the space TO present such
daguerreotype of the country and people of the
Magyars as is greatly needed. We now supply
this deficiency by translating from the French of
M. Auguste Degerando the following vivid and pic
turesque description. Mr. Degerando is well known
one of the most interesting and authentic writers
on Hungary, which he traversed just before the
breaking out of the present revolution. The fol-
lowing article has just been condensed and prepared
by him for a leading journal of Paris
Our purpose, friendly reader is to conduct you
into new country, where your eyes and your
mind will be asonished If you chance TO be in
one Of those moments when every one yields to the
first distraction which offers, mount with us upon
this boatwhose heated furnaces announce its speedy
better, enter this low and swift carriage with which
five small but ardent horses are about TO dash away
You see the ground flies from beneath our feet
The country we are traversing does not yet exhibit
any thing striking; all around we seeonly the
peaceful plains of Austria. On, on, still on!-these
posts striped with black and yellow, the unlucky
color which the House of Hapsburg has had the
fancy to adopt, mark the boundaries of the domains
of his Apostolic Majesty. But we do not stop
there; like the steeds of the ballad, ours pass
through cities and villages and only stay their feet
when they touch the plains which gave them birth
Now look around you. As far as your eve can
reach spreads the immense, the boundless plain.
Nothing troubles the majestic and savage solitude
of nature, except it be the grave and silent stork.
No road is marked on the burning sand or on the
thick heritage beneath your feet You would doubt
whether that strange soil were inhabited did there
not appear, from time to time, on the horizon
horseman with garments streaming IN the wind; or
if you could not here and there perceive vast fields
of grain with thick stalks bending in waves; or
if your were not struck by the sound of the
shepherds trumpet distant bell. The vigorous
race which dwells in this region has true passion
for the soil il inhabits. Mountains are horror to
the Hungarian they arrest his eye and check
his horse. What beautiful country is mine ~
he says, waving his hand horizontally from left TO
right as if TO describe its surface; in am free ~
In behodng this country and these men one
spontaneously demands if he is not in another con-
tinent Nothing can be truer than this impres sion
Europe finishes al the frontier of Austria. Hun
gary belongs 10 Asia.
In spite of the diversity of language and manners
you feel that the same civilization prevails among
the nations between the Atlantic and the Carpathans
There nature has been subjected to man, whose
active and industrious hand has triumphed over the
soil. He has made the earth subservient to his
wants. His roots are fixed in 1t, if may speak,
so deeply that from time immemorial his history is
COMPOUNDED with that Of the region he inhabits On
that vanquished soil he has built an edifee, So
ciety which every where presents nearly the same
characteristics, which has been modified and is still
modified by analogous laws IN every country.
In Hungary a new world opens before you.
What first strikes you there is the desert those
infinite steppes which stretch out under burning
sky. There the mirage shines by day, and by
night the fires Of the caravans Around these STEP
pes are mpenetrable forests and mountains, whose
SUBMITS no foot has ever reached. Every where
on these ilimitable prairies you meet herds of
tie horses bufaloes like those Of pastoral and no
madic tribes To complete the spectacle, the rare
though large villages are Of low houses white and
pitched in lines like tents. Their occupants do not
form nation, out twenty different and separate
races, if they had just arrived and were seeking
for some new abiding place. Around these bivouacs
lie cultivated fields, where the fertility of nature
supplies the place of human industry. Man is less
the master than the slave of the soil The rivers,
often dry, refuse TO transport him; and then filed
by the heavy rains, they food the whole country.
Amid this unconquered nature live still fresh the
recollections Of frghuu nvasiOns and interminable
combats, Of populations driven forth or extermi-
mated and the inhabitants still preserve the attitude
they have acquired during ten centuries Of war.
DO not seek IN those deserted fields for the ami
mated panorama you left al home, for the hum Of
hive in lator. You will find there the silence
Of camp reposing the day after battle.
said that the camp was reposing, but misiook;
IT is in motion already. And tins 1t is which rem
ders sti more striking the contrast between Eu-
rope and Hungary. BY observing the efforts Of the
Magyars TO become civilized, we can better Judge
the present state oftheir country. The institutions
TO which they have just gwen generous devel-
opment came from the Orient The people which
brought them retain their Asiatc manners and
physlognomy. Their costume would alone betray
their origin, as would their primitive tastes which
belong to themselves, and their language which DIFF
fers from all those Of the European continent, and
hardly be compared with any but the Turkish.
At this day the herdman OF the cavalier living amid
his hocks in the broad plains, waiered by the
Danube, and the laborer in mustaches and clinking
spurs cutyating that almost virgin SOIL are the true
sons Of those Magyars, who ten centuries AGO set
forth from the steppes Of Asia.
The curiosity OF the tourist largely satihed, Il
from the soil he turns his observations 20 the In
habtants Of Hungary. Nothing is more varied
than that population. In the west are the Germans,
(of these there are l,05l sis, besides 10000 in
Transylvania) introduced into the country since
the time Of the House Of Hspsburg. Living on the
borders Of Austria, they a sort Of reflex Of the
two countries between which they are placed
Hungsrians in costume, they have remained Swa-
bans IN feature and bearing and wear the dress Of
the hussar IN the most pacific fashion. II by the
vicinity Of their mother country they have pre-
served their individuality, they are su under the
Hungarian Influence, and the Magyar language
gains ground among them, notwithstanding the
constant current Of immigration from Germany.
At the other extremity Of the country towards
Trsnsylvana dwell the Walachians, (of these
there are 81 544, beside 100 900 in Trsnsylva-
MAJ descendants Of colonies planted by Trsjan.
THIS people shows us Italian origin by ts ply 7que,
it's language, It's habits, and even IT'S supersupns.
Picturesque in its originality, It has borrowed some
thing from the nations which surround il; there is
something Oriental in those Romans in red boots,
garments Of embroidered linen, with their hair
plated and adorned with coins
The Sclaves, who, with the Wallachans, are the
aboriginese Of Hungary, have not so strongly
MARKED n phvsioonomv as thew. Eusayed al DIFF