The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1892-04-16


am thus explicit regarding the thor
oughfares of Galicia, because without
THIS, those who travel with me can hardly
know Galicien folk and their ways.
Their roads furnish the outward seeming
OF their lives and affairs. Upon these
roads every form of traffic, threading to
and from score of countries and sharply
DEFINED peoples, is seen. From them
every variation in outdoor daily life, as
pect OF quaint husbandry, ceremonial be-
tween classes. and hint and tint of pecu-
ilarity and color in national fact and feel
ing, comes close and clear to the traveller
npon his legs. And l have nowhere else
IN Europe seen such variety and wealth
| OF roadside shrines.
should think that in the two or three
Thousand miles of the great stone roads of
Gallcla, huge wooden or stone crucitiX,
| or tlny brick or stone shrine, might be
found on the average at the distance OF
every half an English mile. Most of the
cruelnxes are of wood hewn out of beech
or oaken logs. Whether of wood or stone,
as ii from some great burden, every one
leans, and this very leaning lends a
strangely suggestive sadness and loneli-
ness TO the landscape
They are most frequent in districts
nearest the Carpathians which form the
Hungarian boundary. The Ruthenian
peasants being of Russian stock are all
ans are without exception Roman Catho-
lies. They are equally pious, and you
can never pass crucifix or shrine without
witnessing group of both in rapt devo-
tlon, many OF whom are groveling pros
trate upon the earth before the sacred re-
nlnders OF Calvary. At Whitsuntide
| one Will see crowds of these simple and
plous devotees crawling upon all tours,
Whlle trailing huge wooden crosses from
thelr necks and shoulders, around every
roadside shrine in all Galicia.
AT the little inn where I tarry in Cra-
COW made the acquaintance of youth
OF twenty who had tired of Tratas peas
ant life and had come to the great city to
seek his fortune as kellner or ServitOr.
He had led the dogs life of the city inn
long enough to pine for his old mountain
nome with an unutterable longing. /
bought his freedom of his landlord mas
ter Tor eighty marks, and thus secured
the most devoted guide traveller ever
knew to the shepherd hut homes of the
Wild and almost untraversed Tatra
mountains.
These comprise western spur of the
oarpathian range where the latter, be-
tween Galicia and Hungary, are broken
by the great panoramic valley of Arva,
and reappear beyond, in lesser ranges,
such as the Liptau and Neutra Noun
tains and the Little Carpathian range.
The entire region reminds one strikingly
of the wilder and grander portions of the
English Lake district where the lordly
Helvellyn rears his craggy, mist-crowned
crest above the shadowy Vale of st. John,
only that the elevations are vastly higher,
the glens and valleys more dark and
shadowy, the cascades more impressive
and sublime, and the forests more deep,
vast and impenetrable to all save those
who know their secret ways, while the
splendid olden sturdy Umbrian peasantry
of English WeStmoreland and Cumber-
land, who are both shepherds and ag-
r1culturistS, have here their congeners in
purely shepherd peasantry, whose lives
and ways have been changeless for more
than thousand years.
We went by rail to the little village of
Jordanow, and crossed a northern spur
of the Tatra, thus coming directly into the
valley of the Arva and the great highway
from CracoW to Buda-PeSth. Along this
road we tramped for day in company
with every manner of picturesque fellow
traveller, lodged at Arva Varallya, and
the next morning set our faces toward
the east and the 1atra flights.
The glories of this mountain Journey
were unrivaled. Wild, rugged, grand
nature, unchanged from creation by the
hand OF man, was mine for complete en-
Joyment. This, too, was entrancingly va
ried by occasional simultaneous views of
marvellous character. Our way led
mainly along the southern or Hungarian
slopes. But now and then my guide,
Ludwig, who seemed to move straight as
the light OF a mountain bird to his own
eerie, brought me to the very peaks of
the dividing nights.
To the north the country sloped across
Galicia along the great Polish plain into
Russian Poland. Winter still held all
this land of terror and famine in its steely
frl-ac nr1lJ inc oli o,o Il
some oft the sheltered southern valleys be-
tween the Carpathians, were the green's
and gladness of spring beginning to be
manifest. To the south, another cline.
indeed another world. Hungary, land OF
wine and dance and song, encircled bv its
mighty wreath OF mountains, and, visible
as lar as Buda-Pesth, lay spread before
our gaze disk of throbbing green and
bloom.
That night we came to Ludvig's people.
The reunion was touching and iovful.
Between 200 and 300 souls comprised this
one mountain side band. Perhaps there
are 100000 folk of the same sort in the
Iatra range. They are all shepherds.
principally goatherds, and the number of
animals they care for must reach mill
ions. For about four months of the win
ter they retire to such towns as
NiedZwiec, Jablonka, Neumarkt. Thur-
DORM, DunaJec, Mdgura, Repisko and
Kriwan-although many remain in their
huts upon the mountains profiting by
woodcraft in trapping and sharing ami
mails and blrdS-so filling up and over
whelming the villages that they become
winter cities.
They call themselves Podhalians. Their
language is mixture or dialect of the
ancient Magyar and the Germanic
tongue. Their food is simply oats, either
boiled into thick porridge or made into
thin bread OF oatmeal and salt, baked
before the Goals like the Scotch ban
mock" goat-milk whey, the wild noun
tain fruits and such small game as they
can secure in the mountain forests. They
neither have nor wish any other. Unlike
the tIallclan peasant, who is a slave to
brandy, and the Hungarian peasant, who
loves and can secure good and CHEAP
VINE, they drink no liquor of any sort
whatever, and are huge in frame. hand
some in face and physique, robust and
powerful, and live to an extraordinary
old age.
The band which I visited was fair ex-
ample of them all. 1t had lust come
upon the southern slopes of the mount
aims from the valleys with its herds. but
Its members had already built mount
ain village of thirty huts. These were of
tree limbs, bark and leaves, large and
comfortable, but all opening to the south.
All the band, including women. were
dressed in the untanned skins of the
goat, with hoods and sandals of the same
material. They do not remain long in
these sylvan huts, but, as the summer
advances, leave them, never to return to
the same strueturers, for the higher graz
ing lands, where new homes are built
with each change of location. Each band
really comprises one immense family.
patriarchal in system, and, as nearly as |
could Judge, to great extent communal
in regard TO their little gainings. By ma
ture they are full of sentiment, and are
rude poets and artists of no mean quality.