46 TRAVEL, ADVENTDKE, AXD SPORT. 



were six shots fired ; this was the signal of ' Pesth in 

 danger.' ... I heard distinctly above the murmur 

 of voices the town clocks strike twelve. Just after- 

 wards a man running at full speed broke through the 

 crowd, shouting as he went, ' The water is falling ! ' 

 Thank God ! he spoke words of truth. ... It was 

 a generally-expressed opinion that something must 

 have happened further down the river to relieve the 

 pent-up waters. Very shortly official news arrived, 

 and spread like Avildfire, that the Danube had made 

 'a way for itself right across the island of Csepel into 

 the Soroksar arm of the river. . . . The Danube, in 

 reasserting its right of way to the sea, caused a ter- 

 rible calamity to the villages on the Csepel island, 

 but thereby Hungary's capital was saved." 



After the fate of Szegedin, the warning conveyed 

 by this incident at Buda-Pesth in 1876 is surely not 

 to be disregarded. Plans of river regulations, which, 

 however beneficial they may be locally, are yet not 

 conceived on general principles, or with reference to 

 the whole river-system of the country, must be looked 

 upon with jealous suspicion. It is a question for the 

 engineers to decide whether the best relief for the 

 flooded rivers of Hungary may not be obtained by 

 deepening and generally improving the channel of 

 the Danube at the Iron Gates. In the opinion of 

 persons qualified to speak, it is the only efficacious 

 means of relieving both the Theiss and the Danube. 

 It is no new project. In the Treaty of Paris, in 



