THE LAND OF CONTRAST : AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



1205 



Galicia is also the Jewish stronghold 

 of the Empire and the business of the 

 entire province is in their hands, and 

 they maintain a valuable transient trade 

 to Russia and the East. The chief in- 

 dustry of the province is distilling, Ga- 

 licia supplying 45 per cent of all the 

 spirits used in the Empire. Outside this 

 the production of the province is con- 

 fined to peasant household industries, 

 as cloth and linen weaving. 



Education in Austria is compulsory, 

 and all children must attend the "Volks- 

 schulen" (schools for the people, or 

 elementary schools ) from the end of 

 their sixth year until the end of their 

 twelfth or fourteenth year, varying in 

 the different provinces. 



Although education is compulsory, it 

 is only so where schools have been es- 

 tablished, and there are as yet few 

 schools in Galicia and the Bukowina. 

 Hence in the Bukowina only about 34 

 per cent of the children are now in at- 

 tendance in the public schools, and in 

 Galicia only about 59 per cent. The 

 large mass of the people are illiterate. 



VIENNA — A MODEL MODERN CITY 



Vienna, the Imperial City, the capital 

 of Austria, had a great Burghermeister 

 in Dr. Karl Lueger, lately deceased. Un- 

 der Eueger Vienna became a city of mu- 

 nicipal ownership. She owns her own 

 electric and gas light, street railways 

 and omnibuses, ice manufacturing plant, 

 warehouses, stock yards, brewery, wine 

 cellar (the celebrated Rathaus-Keller), 

 all the pawnshops and even the under- 

 taking establishments. 



Quite in harmony with the history of 

 Vienna — really a series of sieges from 

 the earliest to modern times — were the 

 splendid fortifications she possessed. The 

 inner city was protected by a rampart, 

 fosse, and glacis, while a series of exter- 

 nal fortifications marked and defended 

 the outer boundaries. 



In i860 the last of the inner fortifi- 

 cations was pulled down to make way 

 for a great civic improvement, and on 

 the site of the glacis was laid the beau- 

 tiful Ring - strasse, or boulevard, two 

 miles in circumference and 150 feet in 

 width, the chief and distinctive glory of 



the modern city, what with its wonder- 

 ful shade trees and the massing of the 

 splendid public buildings along its 

 course. The Ring-strasse, as its name 

 implies, is a real ring or circle, though 

 knocked out of true in a number of 

 places until it is more of an octagon, 

 and yet you can return to your starting 

 point if you keep to the Ring. A sys- 

 tem of street cars operates entirely 

 around it, known as the "Ring Rund.'^ 

 The Ring is variously named in its dif- 

 ferent sections, as Operaring, as it 

 passes the Opera ; Karthnerring, where 

 the great business street, Karthnerstrasse, 

 crosses it; Burgring, by the Hofburg or 

 town palaces of the Emperor, and Fran- 

 zensring, Schottenring, etc. 



Vienna is popularly misunderstood to 

 be on "the beautiful blue Danube" 

 River, but that mighty stream in its 

 long course to the Black Sea really en- 

 circles the city some miles from its 

 center. A canal winds through the 

 heart of the city and connects with the 

 Danube below the Prater, Vienna's 

 great playground. 



The Danube is the second largest 

 river in Europe, being exceeded only by 

 the Volga of Russia. Below Vienna its 

 winding course of more than 1,200 miles 

 to the Black Sea traverses a region 

 richer in ethnological interest than any 

 other in Europe, or perhaps in the 

 world, and holding many commanding 

 scenic beauties, as yet but little known. 



EIFE IN BUDAPEST 



The greatest city of the Danube — 

 Vienna being in strict justice excluded 

 from consideration — is Budapest, which 

 is fairly cut in two by the broad expanse 

 of the river. Formerly two cities, Buda 

 on the right-hand side struggles up a 

 picturesque mountain, and here on a high 

 terrace is the magnificent palace of the 

 King of Hungary, Avith a wonderful out- 

 look over the river. Pest, on opposite 

 side of the river, is the modern city and 

 commercially important. Its location is 

 upon a flat, so characteristic of the rich 

 Danubian plains. 



The population of the combined cities 

 is about three-fourths of a million, and 

 here is the center of all Hungarian ac- 



