Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family - or, A Residence in Belgrade and Travels in the Highlands and Woodlands of the Interior, during the years 1843 and 1844. by Andrew Archibald Paton
page 39 of 230 (16%)
page 39 of 230 (16%)
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the Servian quarter, which runs along the Save. The sloping bank was
paved with stones; and above was a large edifice with an arcade, one end of which served as the custom-house, the other as the Austrian consulate. The population was diversified. Shabby old Turks were selling fruit; and boatmen, both Moslem and Christian--the former with turbans, the latter with short fez's--were waiting for a fare. To the left was a Turkish guard-house, at a gate leading to the esplanade, with as smart a row of burnished muskets as one could expect. All within this gate is under the jurisdiction of the Turkish Pasha of the fortress; all without the gate in question, is under the government of the Servian Prefect of Belgrade. We now turned into a curious old street, built quite in the Turkish fashion, and composed of rafters knocked carelessly together, and looking as if the first strong gust of wind would send them smack over the water into Hungary without the formality of a quarantine; but many of the shops were smartly garnished with clothes, haberdashery, and trinkets, mostly from Bohemia and Moravia; and in some I saw large blocks of rock-salt. Notwithstanding the rigmarole construction of the quarter on the water's edge, (save and except at the custom-house,) it is the most busy quarter in the town: here are the places of business of the principal merchants in the place. This class is generally of the Tsinsar nation, as the descendants of the Roman colonists in Macedonia are called; their language is a corrupt Latin, and resembles the Wallachian dialect very closely. |
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