agreeable. As it was my first visit to a Hungarian house, I found many
things to interest me. Several of the dishes at table were novelties,
the variety consisting more in the cooking than in the materials; for
instance, we had maize dressed in a dozen different ways. It was
generally eaten as a sort of pudding at breakfast, at which meal there
was also an unfailing dish of water-melons. Of course we had _paprika
handl_ (chicken with red pepper), and _gulyas_, a sort of improved Irish
stew; and gipsy's meat, also very good, besides excellent soups and many
nameless delicacies in the way of sweets.

All Hungarian men are great smokers, but as a rule the ladies do not
smoke; there are some exceptions, but it is considered "fast" to do so.

The peasants in the Hatszeg Valley are all Wallacks, and as lazy a set
as can well be imagined; in fact, judging by their homes, they are in a
lower condition than those of the Banat. So much is laziness the normal
state with these people that I think they must regard hard work as a
sort of recreation. Their wants are so limited that there is no
inducement to work for gain. What have they to work for beyond the
necessary quantity of maize, _slivovitz_, and tobacco? Their women make
nearly all the clothes. Wages of course are high--that is the trouble
throughout the country. If the Wallack could be raised out of the moral
swamp of his present existence he might do something, but he must first
feel the need of what civilisation has to offer him.

The village of Rea, where I was staying, is about the wildest-looking
place one can well imagine in Europe. The habitations of the peasants
are made of reed and straw; the hay-ricks are mere slovenly heaps,
partially thatched; the fences are made up of odds and ends. As for
order, the whole place might have been strewn with the _débris_ of a