154 
Continental Farming. 
properly drained and well farmed the produce from it would 
be enormous ; at present tlie bulk of it is grazed by large herds 
of cattle, sheep, pigs, and horses, which are attended by herds- 
men, who keep them progressing regularly over these immense 
marshes. 
What a glorious sight it would be to see all this plain drained 
and cultivated as it ought to be ! thus insuring an abundant reward 
to the industry and perseverance required to bring about such 
reclamation and improvement, causing health and wealth to pre- 
vail where now nothing but sickness, decay, and poverty exists. 
Tlie Hungaiian peasantry are a fine, strong, active, well-made 
race of men ; they have just been emancipated from serfdom by 
the present Emperor of Austria ; and being now in the transi- 
tion state, will no doubt soon raise themselves in the moral scale 
as far as the circumstances of their country will permit : they 
are in a shocking state of poverty, working barefooted and legged, 
with only coarse canvas shirts and trousers (if they are worthy 
of the name) ; they are just a wide petticoat cut up the middle, 
and each side sewed up to form legs ; the waistband is the same 
as that of a petticoat ; their coats are sheepskins, with the woolly 
side out, dyed black. It is evident that these people feel acutely 
the degraded position they have risen from. 
From Szolnok I started for Tokay by steamboat up the river 
Tessis ; the distance as the bird flies is under 150 miles English, 
but by this circuitous, muddy river it is above 400 miles. Both 
its banks are but little above the water, and for 10 miles on the 
west side and nearly 50 on the east side more than two-thirds of 
the land are laid under water for several months after the thawing 
of the snow on the Carpathians and the breaking up of the ice 
in the lowland morasses and streams. When these floods subside 
a pestilential vapour rises up, spreading fever and ague among 
the towns and villages throughout these low lands, thus weakening 
and thinning the population of the country. 
The steamboat was English built, the engine by Penn and Co. 
of Greenwich, and the technical terms used were all in the 
English language : we were two day* and two nights in getting 
up to Tokay. Many of the towns we nearly sailed round, at a dis- 
tance of some miles from them. The land frequently in these sort 
of peninsulas, or links, is the highest above flood watermark. 
Not much of this country is cultivated except about the towns 
and villages, which are few and far between. In the low country 
the system of farming is very rude indeed, but the land is rich 
and fertile where it is sufficiently above watermark, and the crops 
consequently good, and in many cases abundant. The great wealth 
of this country consists in large herds of cattle, horses, pigs, and 
flocks of sheep. Wliere the land is high and dry the cattle are 
grazed in herds of the same age and sex : if these cattle were 
