SEVENTH DAY. 111 
were working at the skins under the supervision of Hodek 
junior, while the already finished specimens were drying in the 
sun. The blood of the slain birds, moreover, and the feathers, 
bones, and dirt of the whole menagerie gave our floating 
home anything but a clean appearance. 
At length the wished-for hour arrived, and we left the 
steamer and got into the carts which Count Chotek had 
ordered to the bank. Great was the astonishment of the 
natives when they suddenly saw the costume of a Styrian 
sportsman—the chamois leather and the bare knees—so totally 
unknown in these districts; for on learning that the slopes 
of the Fruska-Gora were pretty steep and difficult, I had 
changed my ordinary shooting-suit for the attire of an Alpine 
hunter, undoubtedly the most comfortable dress that exists. 
Count Chotek and Bombelles drove in the first vehicle, 
followed by my brother-in-law and myself, the two Savants, 
and lastly by the Count’s Land-Steward—a capital sportsman — 
and some other members of the Count’s shooting staff. The 
light carts were all drawn by pony-like home-bred_ horses, 
whose extraordinary qualities we learnt to thoroughly admire 
and appreciate during the next few hours, and still more so 
in the following days. 
At first. the way wound through several streets of this 
tolerably extensive village, which lies upon a steep slope, 
down which the water runs and reduces the streets to the pri- 
mitive condition of a swamp. Here we progressed but slowly 
and roughly; so how would it be when we got into the 
interior of the country occupied our thoughts at the beginning 
of this expedition. 
Hardly were we out of the village when the road passed 
between vine-clad hills and stony slopes. No civilized town- 
bred horse could have surmounted the ascents which the Sla- 
vonian ponies were playfully pulling us up. In a quarter of 
an hour we had reached the crest of this bare chain of heights, 
