Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1876-08-11
PROM RELGRlpET no sEMENpRIA.
in Gay Attfre-WOmen with their
Fortunes on their Heads-A Beau
tfful Country.


Picturesque Peasants = shepherds
IN Gay Attfre-WOmen with their
Fortunes on their Heads-A Beau.
tiful Country.
The News correspondent writes as
follows of his trip from Belgrade to Sc
mendria: THE peasants we met and
passed we're very picturesque, and all,
without exception, showed their good
manners and kindly nature by o touch
of the cap and a genial sa~lutation in the
Servian tongue. The first person we met
was a fine old gentleman driving q wag-
on; he had a soldierly face, looking out
from the outstanding hairy collar of a
fur mantle, under which be wore a breast
cloth Of brilliant c%olors, a white kilt, and
part. colored hose rolled into a roll at
the knee. White robes are the general
wear among the male population Of rural
Seryia. The shepherds we passed were
all thus attired with gay sashes and
bright-colored greaves OF hose. For the
most part their head.coverir is either
the fez or q beehive-shaped hat of rough
straw. The women wear on their heads
o kind OF skullcap with o tassel, and
around the cap, resting on their braided
hair, are fiat bandeaux Of silver coins.
As in Greece, the women carry their for
tune On their heads. The better class
peasant women, Of whom we met one or
two on our journey, wore gold coils in
their hair, and also worked into a kind
OF breastplate or %stomacher; and in full
dress l am told that the rows OF ducats
extend over the shoulder aud down the
back as far as the waist. Servia has no
paper money, and perhaps in hardly any
country is there 80 much gold in proper
lion to the number of its inhabitants.
Last month, preparatory to the assess
ment Of the enforced loan, a return OF
the gold in the possession Of the subjects
Of the State was called for, and although
no doubt a good deal of the buried gold
(burying is a system OF banking in great
vogue in the rural districts of Servia) was
not set down, the sum total OF the return
was 10000, 900 of ducats, or about fifteen
millions sterling
Beyond the rise overlooking Belgrade
we ~trsversed for some distance an undu
lating tract Of very fertile land, with &C.
easiOual beautiful glimpses of wood and
water, and great stretching slopes Of cul
ture studded with copses. In places we
passed through surroundings that closely
reminded Que of a park in one of the
North Of England counties; and, taken
as a whole, but for the vineyards and the
tall maizs-stalks, growing like sunAow-
ers. but without the ugly yellow disk
atop, the aspect OF this part Of the road
was very English. For as we proceeded
there we're hazel copses, and streams
iringed by stumpy alders and graceful
willows, whose dropping boughs laved
their foliage ia the water, and villages of
the tiniest houses-hke dolls houses
nesting in the sheltered dips at the foot
Of the wooded slopes, Further in, as the
culture became sparser. we traversed
long reaches OF young lakewood, the re.
mains, or rather the scions of the great
oak forests that once densely covered
the whole face of the country. The
oaken underwood's darker green con.
trasts with the more vivid verdure Of the
wild vine, which is the great parasite Of
the Servian woods, and which weayes the
branches of the osken cOpses together in
an inextricable tangle, through which
not even the pasiuring cattle can make
their way, and which are frequented only
by the hairy and fearlully ugly swine
that form so large a proportion of the
material wealth of Servia. Once OF
twice we catch glimpses among the up
lands to our right Of huge piles of Stag
the exurvie of the mines which werC
worked on a very large scale in these
hillforest regions by the Romans, anC
which yielded lead, copper, silver and
, gold"