The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-04-17

| LemOerg, passes south, cutting through the
! Carpathian range to Munkacs in Hungary.
The third zigzags southwark from this city,
| passing into Hungary, through the valley
! OF the Arva. at the western base of the
! Iatra mountains; and on this mountain
shadowed, forest-friuged, cliff hung and
| cascade-tremulOus highway | tramped
with cartmen and packmen, soldiers
and pilgrims, beggars and gypses, TO the
! Tatra mountains TO know their strange and
| unknown pessantry.
am thus explicit regarding the thor
| oughfares of GGlicia, because without this
those who travel with me can hardly know
Galician 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 a score of
countries and sharply defined peoples, is
seen. From them every variation in OUT
door daily life, aspect OF quaint husbandry.
| ceremonial between classes, and hint and
tint of popularity and color in national
fact and feeling, comes close and clear to
the traveller upon his legs. And | have
nowhere else in Europe seen such a variety
and wealth Of roadside shrines.
| should think that in the 1000 or S, 900
miles of the great stone roads of GalicIa a
| huge wooden or stone cruCltiX, or q tiny
| brick or stone shrine might be found on the
average at the distance of every half an
English mile. Most of the cruciixes are Of
wood hewn out of beech or oaken logs
Whether Of wood or stone, as if from some
great burden, every one leans, aud this
very leaning lends strangely suggestive
sadness and loneliness to the landscape.
They are most frequently in districts
nearest the Carpathlals which form the
hungarian boundary. The Ruthenian
peasants, being of Russian stock are all
Greek Catholics, and the Polish Gallcians
are, without exception. Roman Catholics.
They are equally pious, and you can never
pass crucitix or shrine without witnessing Z
group Of both in rapt devotion, many Of
whom are groveliug PROSTATE upon the
earth before the sacred reminders Of Cal
vary. AT Whissuntide one will see crowds
of these simple and piOus devotees crawling
upon all fours, while trailing huge wooden
crosses from their necls and shoulders,
around every roadside shrine in Gaiicia-
At the little inn where | tarry In Cracow,
| made the acquaintance Of youth of
twenty who had tired of Tatras peasant
life, and had come to the great city 70 seek
his fortune as a kellner or servitor.
He had led the dogs life of the city inn
long enough TO pine for, his old mountain
home with an unutterable longing. bought
his freedom of his landlord master for 81
marks, and thus secured the most devoted
guide traveller ever knew TO the shepherd
| nut MONIES OF Cne WIG aAQ dlhOSG uuLEdN'
ersed Tatra mountains.
| These comprise q western spur Of the Car
| pathan range where the latter, between
GalIcla aud Hungary, ara broken by the
| great panoramic valley Of Arva, and reap
| pear beyond. in lesser ranges such as the
| Iiptau and Neutra mountains and the Little
! Carpathian range. The entire region re-
minds one strikingly OF the wilder and
Rrahder portions of the English lake
/ h. Eao1uy ell
rears his craggy, ml5t-crowned crest
above the sh8dowy vale OF st.
John; only that the elevations are vastly
higher; the glens and valleys more dark
and Shadowy; the cascades more impressive
aud sublime; and the forests more deep,
vast end impenetrable to all save those
who know their secret ways; while the
splendid olden sturdy Umbrian peasantry
of English Westmoreland and Cumberland,
who are both shepherds and agriculturists,
have here their conReaers in purely shep-
herd peasantry, whose lives and ways have
been changeless for more than 1000 years.
We went by rail to the little village of
JOrdenow aud crossed the 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
morning set our faces toward the east and
the Tatra nights.
The glorieS of this mountain journey were
unrivaled. Wild, rugged, grand nature
unchanged from creation by the hand of
man, was mine for complete enjoyment.
This, too, was entrauoingly varied by occa-
sional simultaneous views Of a marvellous
character. Our way led mainly along the
southern or Hungarian slopes. Bnt now
and then my guide, Ludwig, who seemed to
move straight as the flight Of mountain
bird to his own eyrie, 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 grasp.
Only in GalicIa, and especially in some OF
the sheltered southern valleys beside the
Carpathians were the greens 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 by its mighty wreath of mount
aims, and, visible as far as Buda-Pesth, lay
spread before our gaze a disk of throbblng
green and bloom.
That night we came to Ludvig's people.
The reunion was touching and joyful. Be
tween 30 and 800 souls comprised this one
mountain side band. Perhaps there are
100000 folk Of the same sort in the Tatra
range. They are all shepherds, principally
goatherds, aud the number of animals they
care for must reach millions. For about
four months of the winter they retire to
such towns as Niedzwiec, Jablonka, Neu-
markt, Thurdorin, Dunajec, Mdgura,
Repisko and Kriwan-although many re-
main In their huts upon the mountains
profiting by woodcraft in trapping and
sharing animals and birds-so filling up
and overcrowding the villages that they
become winter cities.
They call themselves Podhalians. Their
language is a mixture or dialect of the
ancient Magyar and the Germauic 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 "bannock, goat milk whey,
the wild mountain fruits aud such small
game as they can secure in the mountain
forests. They neither have nor wish any
other. Unlike the Galician Hungarian
peasant, who loves and can secure good
and cheap wine, they drink no LIQUOR of
any sort whatever, and are huge in frame.
handsome in face and physique. robust and
powerful, and live to an extraordinary old
age.
The band which visited was fair ex-
ample of them all. 1t had Just come upon
the valleys with it's herds, bus its members
thirty huts. These were of tree limbs, bark
and leaves, large and comfortable, but all
oDening to the south. All the band, includ-
ing women, were dressed in the Unframed
skins of the goat, with hoods and sandals of
81 Thaxy do in