the AustJ'O- Hungarian Empire. 307 



fore introduce my reader to Hungary by asking him to accom- 

 pany me, by means of the railway from Vienna to Presburg, 

 across the river March ; at that instant he will be in Hungary, 

 and twenty minutes more will find him at Presburg. 



A pleasant but steep walk leads to the top of a high hill, on 

 which stands the castle of Presburg, dismantled in 1848 and never 

 since restoi^ed. It was from the summit of this eminence that 1 

 obtained my first view of the plains of Upper Hungary, stretching 

 to the east and north and south, and shut in by the Carpathians. 

 It is a magnificent view over flat country, extending as far as the 

 eye can reach without interruption eastwards, but bounded west- 

 ward and fringed on the north and south by the smaller Car- 

 pathians. 



From another point — the summit of Bebersburg, an old strong- 

 hold of the Palffy family — situated high up in the Carpathians 

 north of Bosing — a magnificent view over the plains of Upper 

 Hungary is obtained. From the top of a round tower of this 

 castle I gazed over the smooth plains southwards and eastwards, 

 and I shall not easily forget the grand effect of that limitless 

 expanse. Below the fearful precipice of that old castle wall 

 was a beautiful forest glade, with its cottages and its saw-mills, 

 happil}^ placed on a mountain stream. Here, then, was the 

 introduction to my labours, and descending from the old castle 

 we drove for hours far out into that flat expanse of plain, and 

 it was dark long before our destination was reached. 



I have driven forty and fifty miles a day for ten days together 

 over this plain of Upper Hungary, suri'ounded bv a horizon 

 which met the earth on all sides round, and uninterrupted by 

 a hill. 



Still more extensive and wilder is the great Alfold or plain of 

 Lower Hungary. The whole expanse of the Alfold forms a long 

 rectangle, bounded on the north, north-east, and east bv the 

 Carpathian mountains, on the west by the outliers of the Alps, 

 and on the south by the rivers Drave and Danube. The river 

 Theiss almost divides it in the middle from north to south. 

 The mean width of this plain is 140 iniles, and the mean length 

 280 miles, while the entire area comprises 37,400 square miles. 



These two plains comprise the whole of the Hungarian 

 Tiejland, or deep land. The soil throughout is black and rich, 

 and is for the most part underlain by water-worn gravel. It is 

 apparently an alluvial deposit, formed by the rivers Danube, 

 Theiss, Drave, and their tributaries. In both plains the natural 

 fertility of the soil is frequently injured by the efflorescence 

 of soda-salts upon its surface, and this is especially observable 

 in Lower Hungary, where immense tracts of flat land are thus 

 rendered unproductive, forming the plains of natron between 



X 2 



