50. – RUSSIAN NORTH-SEA PILOT.
The Vogouls form only a very insignificant population dwelling east of the Oural, and have undergone such mixture with the Turks and Mongolians as to have adopted to a great extent their characteristics.
The Ostiaks who dwell upon the banks of the Obi appear to have preserved in much greater perfection the characteristics of the Finns. They are a people devoted to hunting and fishing, with red hair, very uncivilized, and partly idolatrous.
Madame Eva Felinska, during an exile in Siberia, inspected, as far as possible, the Ostiak huts. These habitations were so foul, and gave forth such putrid miasmas, that, notwithstanding her curiosity, this lady was unable to remain in them more than a minute.
The Ostiaks cover their skins with a layer of rancid fat, over which they wear a reindeer skin. They eat uncooked fish or game, this being their ordinary food. But from time to time they go with large buckets of bark to Berezer, where they collect, and devour as delicacies, the refuse of the kitchens. Fig. 51 represents an Ostiak hut.
The Finns of Eastern Russia comprise the Baskirs, the Teptiars, and the Metscheriaks of the Southern Oural: three small peoples who speak Turkish dialects mingled with Finnish words, and who exist in very much the same way. The Baskirs are the most numerous; they are engaged in rearing horses and bees. Like the Cossacks they furnish bodies of cavalry to the Russian army.
The Finns of the Volga comprise the Tchouvachians, Tcheremissians and Moadueinites, who likewise speak dialects interspersed with Turkish words: a short time since they turned their attention to husbandry.
Certain populations scattered through the governments of Perm, Vologda, Orenburg, and Viatka, are the remains of a people of some consideration, formerly independent, civilized, and commercial, whom the Russians subdued, and to a large extent absorbed: these are the Permians.
The Finns of the Baltic, or Finns properly so called, have been long under the rule of Teutonic nations, and have generally preserved the characteristics of the family we have described above. Among them are distinguished the Livonians, Esthonians, Ischorians, Kyrials, Ymes or Finlanders, and Quaines, who are respectively the remains of the ancient inhabitants of Livonia, Esthonia, Ingria, Finland, and Carelia, where they are now mixed with the Slavonians and Teutons. During the last century the Quaines pushed forward to the extremity of Norwegian Lapland, of which they at present form the principal population.
51. – OSTIAK HUT.
Bulgarians, Servians, and Bosniaks or inhabitants of Flavinia. – In order to describe these, we need do no more than refer to the general facts which have been stated above with reference to the Southern Slavonians. We will merely borrow a few descriptions and illustrations from the work of M. George Perrot, a French writer, “Voyage chez les Slaves du Sud,” published in 1870, and well known on account of the excellent history it contains of his travels in Asia Minor.
52. – ISIGANE OF VOAKOVAR.
M. George Perrot travelled through Slavonia, Croatia, Bosnia, and the strip of territory recently cleared to serve as a frontier to the Mussulman possessions, and which bears the name of Military Confines.
53. – SLAVONIAN PEASANT.
M. George Perrot first of all gives us some types of the inhabitants of Slavonia, which we shall reproduce here. Figure 54 represents a peasant from the neighbourhood of Essek, a town of Slavonia.
54. – A PEASANT OF ESSEK.
While halting at the borough of Vouka, situated a few leagues from Essek, M. George Perrot thus describes the peasants of these parts.
“The majority of the men around us have hair which is blond or of different shades of chestnut. Although much burnt by the sun, they are not generally so dark as the Magyars. Many of the women, who are tall and slender, are really beautiful. Their eyes especially, which are bright and sparkling, and sometimes blue, though more frequently of a dark grey, are charming. The lower portion of their face is less agreeable; the chin is usually prominent, and the lips are rather thick.
“Their costume recalls that met with in the East. The men wear a slouch hat of black felt with the edges turned up, a linen shirt, and full trousers down to the ankle; this in hot weather, when they are in working order, forms the whole dress. One or two loungers, who joined us, were more completely dressed than this.
“They wore large boots of thick leather, and over the shirt a waistcoat of blue cloth, adorned in front, with white metal buttons, and behind, with embroidery in yellow or white. On another occasion, when we were on the boat, we saw some men who, in addition to this, wore, over the waistcoat, a short cape or half-cloak, which did not fall lower than the waist, and of which, as a rule, the sleeves were allowed to hang loose. In winter, they add to these, warm robes of sheepskin or large mantles, which put me in mind of the rough overcoats worn by our waggoners.
“As to the women, they make me think of the Albanians of Attica. This fine September afternoon, they are wearing a long chemise, embroidered with eyelet holes and coloured patterns; this chemise, which leaves the neck very open, would reach to the ground, but in order to permit of freer movement in the fields or at home, it is hitched up, and supported by a coloured girdle, wound two or three times round the body; being thus held up, the chemise forms elegant and symmetrical folds, falling in front as low as the ankle, while behind, it extends to about half way down the calf of the leg. Over the head is thrown, in various fashions, a kerchief, which is usually white, but which on festive occasions is embroidered with silver and gold; the ends of this fall down the back, or over the bosom, as may suit the taste of the wearer. When the best dress is donned, a cloth apron, the colour and pattern of which bear a resemblance to the carpets which I have met with in Servia and Bosnia, hangs down to the knees; over the chemise is worn a species of waistcoat without sleeves, and ornamented with gold or silver embroidery. In winter, they guard against the cold by wearing over all a thick overcoat of sheepskin. All the garments worn by the women are worked by their own hands and busy fingers, during the long winter evenings.”
55. – HERDSMEN OF THE MILITARY CONFINES.
M. George Perrot remained for rather a long period in the provinces now called the Military Confines or Frontiers, and he describes the miserable state in which the Slavonian peasantry exist there, where they are obliged to live side by side with wild hordes of Mussulman soldiers or pandours.
Figure 55 shows peasants of these districts returning from pasture.
56. – WOMAN OF THE MILITARY CONFINES.
Figure 56 is given by the author as a type of the Slavonian women who inhabit the Military frontiers.
Let us quote a few more of this traveller’s impressions.
“What struck me in all the villages of the Confines through which I passed, were the guard stations, before which loitered, or slept beside their guns, suspended on the wall, five or six Gränzer. In summer, they wear merely their trousers and shirt of coarse white cloth, and sometimes a sort of brown jacket with red facings, which they also wear for field work. In winter they are seen enveloped in their large hooded cloaks of red cloth; and, thus equipped and armed, guard their flocks on the moors. The state furnishes them, for exercise and service, with guns similar to those used by regiments of the line; but when not on duty, many of them prefer long guns of Albanian manufacture or shape, with swallow-tailed stocks. These guns are transmitted from father to son for several generations. Besides these, they wear in their girdles, one or two pistols, and a kind of dagger with a bone handle inlaid with coral or glass. In this guise they have rather the appearance of Bosniak bachibozouks, than of civilized subjects of His Majesty Francis Joseph, constitutional Emperor of Austria, and King of Hungary. Their uniform, consisting of a blue trouser fitting close to the leg, and a vest of black or white wool, is only produced on field days, or in war.
“But what is it that these sentinels are guarding? This is just what I have never been able to understand. No enemy, from Belgrade to Sissek, was threatening; and these villages are exposed to no more disorder than those of the neighbouring provinces, where they dispense with all this armed exhibition. This, therefore, is another of the useless and erroneous consequences of the military régime: here are hands taken day after day from their labour in the fields, and with no greater advantage than that of acquiring the habits of idleness and drunkenness, usually contracted during the period of barrack-room inactivity.”
In Fig. 57 we represent one of the military stations of the Confines, with the guards belonging to it, called Gränzers.
57. – GRÄNZERS AND THEIR GUARD-HOUSE.
“All those who have lived for some time among the Gränzers, have been struck with their indolent apathy, their careless and continued idleness. For whose sake should they exhaust themselves with work? Under the rules of their community, their wives and children are almost beyond want. As regards themselves, to-morrow they may be torn from their orchards and fields, to encounter death in Italy, or on some other frontier; would it not be madness to expose themselves to privation and fatigue in view of a future upon which they have no means of reckoning? Besides this, does their property, which they can neither render as valuable as they wish, nor sell or bequeath as they may think proper, belong to them sufficiently to give them any pleasure or profit in its improvement? They have maxims which accurately indicate their character; ‘Go late to the field and return early, so as to avoid the dew; – if God does not aid, what is the use of working?’ Being accustomed to rely only, as they say, ‘Upon God and the Emperor,’ they refuse to recognize the advantages to be gained from any modern invention, better tools, or more advanced methods of cultivation. ‘Thus I found it, and thus I will leave it,’ is a saying of which they often make use in speaking of their patrimonial domain.
58. – TSIGANE PRISONER.
“The only thing which, in spite of all the shackles which enchain and benumb their limbs, would have been able to arouse their minds and impart to them some desire for progress, is instruction. But ignorance is profound in the Military Confines; the regimental schools that exist are very insufficient both in number and quality; in certain districts, especially in Southern Croatia, the villages are so distant from one another, that the children, who do not dwell in the borough where the school is, are unable, without difficulty, to go there at any time. Besides, why should the government do much as regards instruction? It is clear, that, if the people of the Confines were better taught, they would be less resigned to their hard lot. If it rested entirely with the government, the schoolmaster would be entirely banished from these parts.
“Upon the banks of the Danube and of the Save, where the Confines abut upon the river, which is continually traversed by packet-boats, travellers, and merchandize, the people of the frontiers have nevertheless daily communication with the inhabitants of the neighbouring provinces, and even with strangers. This contact somewhat opens their minds and suggests new ideas; but it is chiefly in Southern Croatia, in the districts called Banal and Karlstadt, that the characteristic features of the Gränzer are most frequent and striking. There commences, south-east of Karlstadt, what is termed the dry-frontier; this is no longer a water-course such as the Danube or Save, but a line purely conventional, forming the boundary between Austria and Turkey.
“Surprises and hand to hand combats were recently matters of frequent occurrence upon this frontier, which is more difficult to define and to preserve; at the commencement of this century, certain forts, and other places, such as Zettin, which the Turks assaulted in 1809 and 1813, were still the subject of dispute. Here, moreover, the Frontier territory is no longer from fifteen to twenty kilometres, but from five to six myriametres broad; the people subject to the military régime, here, therefore, form a more homogeneous and compact mass. Cases of armed brigandage, and assassinations, which were very common in the whole of this country, are now becoming rarer; but theft is the crime which requires most frequent punishment. The ancestors of the Gränzers lived chiefly by plunder, and such habits are not removed in a day.”
M. Perrot made a journey in Bosnia, down the course of the river Save. He stopped in a borough of this province, of which he speaks thus: —
“After a visit to the Bosniak priest, we wandered about the town, where we made several small purchases with a view to smuggling. I replenished my pouch with a Bosnian tobacco which is by no means so good as that of Macedonia. I purchased a rug such as are worked also by the women of Slavonia and the Military Confines: this is not, like the tissues of Persia and Anatolia, thick and soft, but a rather thin and dry quality of cloth.”
Here, also, in designs and in combination of colour, are found the same innate taste, and the same boldness which is met with usually in oriental workmanship. The Slavonian women, in Austria as in Turkey, would be no unworthy rivals of the Turcoman women, who, in the neighbourhood of Smyrna, and from the high meadow-lands of the Taurus down to the low deserts of Persia, execute, beneath their black tents of goat or camel hair, those marvellous pieces of needlework, for which, at the present time, we pay so high a price.
The inferiority of the products of this domestic industry in Turkey in Europe, is attributable to the fact, that, here the women being within comparatively easy distance of large markets, filled with European wares, are enabled to procure there wools suited to their wants, already dyed by industrial processes: but it will be understood that the colours thus obtained, which are produced with a view to cheapness and variety, are far from possessing the fresh and durable tints of those colours, few in number, always the same, and almost all obtained from the animal and vegetable worlds, the secret of which has been handed down in the bazaars of the East, and under the tents of the nomadic tribes, from the time when Nineveh, Babylon, Susa, Tyre, and Sidon, were at the height of their prosperity.
“Our purchases at an end, we returned along the banks of the Save, and, while the ferry was attempting to pass a herd of bullocks, which had just been purchased in Bosnia, I amused myself by noting the picturesque mixture of costumes and types which the bank, on which were most of the market people, offered.
59. – BOSNIAK PEASANT.
“Here was a jobbing blacksmith, who had set up his shop in the open air, hammering and putting in order the pots which were brought to him; or sharpening with his hammer, the points of long iron clamps, used to connect the rafters of houses. His arrangements were most primitive. Two vertical posts supported a horizontal piece, upon which worked the lever, by means of which the bellows were set in motion. In front of the orifice by which the air escaped, a small anvil was fixed in the ground. Around the proprietor, seated on the ground, a number of tools were scattered. The long shirt and puffed out trousers of the blacksmith appeared white by comparison with his skin, although he had probably worn them for some weeks; his chest and arms were bronze coloured.
60. – BOSNIAK PEASANT WOMAN.
61. – BOSNIAK MERCHANT.
“A little further on, the most motley groups attracted and retained my notice. Here were Mussulmans, Bosniaks, Pandours guarding the market, their attitudes and costumes carrying me right away to the East, and recalling very old recollections. One of them wore a white turban, which displayed a mass of plaited hair falling down his neck; he stood erect, his hand supporting the butt end of his gun, which rested on his shoulder. A tapestried mantle, adorned with long flocks of wool, which is peculiar to the frontiers of the two countries, was thrown over his shoulders. At his side was another Bosniak, who leant against a wall, clad in a long cloak of red wool; his feet were shod with sandals of tanned leather. Here a rich landowner of the neighbourhood, whose name I really forget, was causing his servants to remove the cattle he had not succeeded in selling: there peasants were remounting their horses, whose gay and picturesque harness I much admired.”
62. – WOMEN OF PESTH.
Figures 59 and 60 represent, according to M. Perrot, a Bosniak peasant man and woman, and figure 61, a Bosniak merchant.
The Magyars are the natives of Hungary. The chief population of this country is composed of a people who came from Asia under the name of Magyars, and who were, it would seem, a tribe of the Huns. Hungary is believed to have been populated by some of the savage companions of Attila, the terrible king of the Huns, known as the “Scourge of God.”
63. – HUNGARIANS.
The Magyars are distinct from other people in their language and costumes.
They are of medium height, with black hair. Their character is warlike, and their state of civilization is superior to that of the other branches of the Slavonian family.
In his “Causeries Géographiques,” (from Paris to Bucharest,) M. Duruy has imparted to us his impressions on a journey to Pesth in 1861. The population appeared to him superb.
64. – A HUNGARIAN GENTLEMAN.
The women were remarkable through their brightness and decided attractions. In dress, they do not differ much from the men. A chemise gathered in at the neck, with full sleeves richly embroidered, and slightly tightened at the wrists, which are covered with lace ruffles; a jacket body, either red, black, or green, embroidered at the back with fringes and silver buttons, sets off a slender and supple form. A light, very ample, but often rather short petticoat; a silken or velvet scarf thrown over one shoulder à la hussarde; the national high brimmed hat surmounted by a plume of feathers as head-dress; well turned feet and ankles, in embroidered shoes, or sometimes in little spurred boots of red morocco, form the Hungarian costume, represented in figs. 63, 64 and 65.
65. – HUNGARIANS.
The markets which are held on the quays, have also peculiar features. You see there, says M. Duruy, groups which call to mind the savage hordes of Attila. M. Duruy almost believed he saw one of the companions of the “Scourge of God.” This was apparently a kind of peasant, flat-nosed, round-eyed, with large projecting cheekbones, and hanging mustachios. He was dark, and dressed in a vest of sheepskin, and breeches of coarse cloth, supported at the waist by a scarf falling over his heavily-shod and spurred boots. A large hat, with the edges turned up, covered his head, and beneath it hung two long plaits of hair. The Magyar language is energetic, full of similes, and filled with guttural aspirations which seem derived from the Arabic, while certain soft and caressing intonations remind us of the Italian idiom. National feeling is brisk in the towns and throughout the country. In the latter, it is kept alive by Bohemian songs, and by stories told by the heads of families during the long winter evenings.
About the other races composing the Slavonian family, namely, the Croats, the Tchecks, the Lithuanians, and the Poles, we have nothing particular to remark.
In general, what we have said at the commencement of this chapter, applies to them with but little modification.
The Greek Family
The Greek family comprises the Greeks and the Albanians. These races derive their origin from the ancient tribes known under the name of Pelasgians. The ancient Greeks founded many colonies on the shores of the Mediterranean.
In the fourth century before Christ, led by Alexander, they subdued part of Asia, and carried their victorious arms into Egypt. But these conquests were ephemeral. The Greek empire was in its turn subjugated by other races, of whom the principal were the Romans, the Slavonians, and the Scythians.
In the present day the Greeks compose but a scanty population, concentrated in the Morea, or scattered in the neighbouring districts. The majority of the people of this race who inhabit the Asiatic continent have adopted even the language of their neighbours, and are merely reputed Greeks because they profess the Greek form of the Christian religion.
The ancient Greeks, civilized by intercourse with Egyptian colonists, already afforded an example of advanced culture, at a time when the other European and Asiatic nations were still immersed in barbarism.
In spite of the misfortunes of a social decay destined to terminate in many centuries of subjection, the Greeks have preserved up to our own day the physical characteristics of their ancestors. Everyone knows that the most beautiful development of the brow, the finest shape of the human head, is that we find traced in the sculpture of ancient Greece. It had been supposed that the magnificent heads with the noble outlines, admired in the statues of the Greeks, were not the exact reproduction of nature, and that some features had been exaggerated in the direction of ideal beauty. But, in our own day, the skulls of ancient Greeks have been found whose proportions and whose general outlines demonstrate, that, among the artists of ancient Greece, sculpture did not surpass nature, but restricted its inspiration to types who actually lived.
The Apollo Belvidere can therefore be considered as a model, but slightly idealized by art, of the general physiognomy of the ancient Greeks. In his “Travels in the Morea,” M. Pouqueville gives a description of the physiognomy of the present Greeks, which enables us to judge of the surprising persistence of the most beautiful types, even in the midst of a social condition so deeply modified.
“The inhabitants of the Morea,” says M. Pouqueville, “are generally tall and well made. Their eyes are full of fire, their mouth is admirably well formed and full of the most beautiful teeth. The women of Sparta are fair, slender, and dignified in carriage. The women of Taygetus have the gait of Pallas.. The Messenian girl is conspicuous for her plumpness; she has regular features, large eyes, and long black hair; the damsel of Arcadia, hidden under her coarse woollen garments, scarcely allows the regularity of her figure to be perceived..”
Here, besides, are the characteristics displayed in their sculpture, and which, according to what we have said, may really be considered those of the Greek type.
A high forehead, rather a wide distance between the eyes, with the slightest possible depression at the top of the nose; this last straight or slightly aquiline; large eyes, opening widely and surmounted by a scarcely arched eyebrow; a short upper lip, a small or medium sized mouth delicately cut; and a prominent and well rounded chin.
Fig. 66 represents the Greeks of Athens; fig. 67 a Greek family and the interior of a house at Athens.
66. – GREEKS OF ATHENS.
To give an idea of modern Greek manners and types, we will borrow a few lines from an interesting work by M. Prout, “Journey to Athens,” published in “Le Tour du Monde” in 1862. Let us first listen to this traveller speaking to us of the inhabitants of Greece: —
“If Fallmeseyer is to be believed, there are no more Greeks in Greece, only Slavonians; it is beyond doubt that the inhabitants of Thrace and of Macedonia cannot boast so immaculate an origin as the mountaineers of Olympus or of Magnus; but it is equally certain that from Cape Malea to the Black Sea, and from Smyrna to Corfu, there are ten million individuals who speak Greek, mixed up with a population speaking Slavonic, and that in the plains of Athens, we easily distinguish the Albanian with the narrow temples and the prominent nose, from the Greek with the wide forehead and the high cheek-bones, although their dress is exactly the same. To converse for an hour with the latter is sufficient to satisfy all doubt as to the authenticity of his origin.
“His qualities of mind have remained the same as in the days of Homer: he has still the same aptitude for thorough and rapid comprehension, the same facility of graceful and metaphorical expression. These qualities give to the Greeks so great a superiority over the other races of the East, that they are liked by none of them. The Turks reproach them with being suspicious and dissimulating, because they have opposed craft to force; the Levantines accuse them of dishonesty in commercial transactions, because they themselves have taken lessons of them, and have often surpassed their instructors.
“There is no greater bond of sympathy between them and the other nations on the shores of the Mediterranean. Serious and deliberate in disposition, the tone of their mind is foreign alike to raillery and to the rapidity of dramatic intensity. Their grief pursues a peaceful and elegiac course; it is with them a latent sorrow, and not a sharp crisis leading to the ecstasies of madness. Whilst Cupid’s weapons, in Naples or in Venice for instance, inflict terrible wounds, the arrows of the Athenian god neither keep his victims from repose nor from the pursuit of business. The Greeks have preserved their tragic intonation, and are the true children of that wild Orestes who died at more than eighty years of age from the effects of an accident. In their minds, action always takes its course with deliberation and gravity, not without a certain amount of colouring, but never widely straying from reality; interrogating and holding council with itself, and taking time for reflection before making its decision.
67. – A GREEK HOUSEHOLD.
“It is astonishing to meet with these analytical and foreseeing tendencies, even among the most ignorant. Above all nations they best understand the art of listening, and whilst saying a great deal are the smallest talkers in the world.
“Everybody is familiar with the Greek dress: the short pelisse, the skirt, which goes by the name of fystan, the small fez with its tufted tassel falling on the nape of the neck of the wearer, and the embroidered gaiter fitting tight to the leg. The sailors, instead of the fystan, wear a very wide pair of trousers, and stockings instead of gaiters. In winter the talagani, a long close-fitting cloak of lambskin, is added to the rest of the dress. The Greeks, generally speaking, tall slender men of regular features, wear this national costume in a very dashing manner. Young Greece carries its dandyism a little to extremes by over pinching its waist, and exaggerating the width of its skirts. During the winter of 1858 it was the fashion to wear the entire beard. I trust that this fancy, which gave them the appearance of sappers in petticoats, has disappeared; the finely trimmed mustachios, revealing the lips, are better suited to their delicately chiselled features as well as to their refined and fanciful style of dress. But alas! Athens every day sees the pure gold of its ancient costume bartered for the dross of modern broadcloth fresh from the shelves of the tailor’s shop. Athens now boasts seventy tailors and fifty shoemakers who make in the French style, whilst only six of the former, and three of the latter still work in the spirit of their national traditions. There are sixty-two shops for the sale of female attire, but only three or four ladies are to be seen still faithful to their national dress (I except the maids of honour to the Queen, who wear it by order), and even in their case one half has disappeared. The corsage cut down upon the neck and the taktikios (cap) of Smyrna still remain; but the long narrow skirt has allowed itself to become swollen by the insinuating arts of conspiring crinoline. The style of dress in the islands is more commonplace, but the great quantity of garments worn one over the other remind one of the childish simplicity of the outlines of our own peasant women. I much prefer, in spite of its stiffness, the long Albanian robe worn by the women of the interior.
“It is particularly at Agora that specimens of all the peasantry of the neighbourhood may be seen walking about in their picturesque costumes.
“This Agora is not the ancient Agora of Ceramica; it is a market-place, composed of worm-eaten sheds roofed in with ragged cloths, in which are exhibited produce of all sorts, from the bursting figs of Asia Minor to the patent preparations of Parisian perfumers.
“On each side of this market-place stands a spectre of antiquity, the tower of the Winds, or clepsydrum of Andronicus, an octagonal monument engraved with passably mediocre figures, and the portico of Minerva Archigetis. Archæologists after noticing the first, hasten across the spacious vestibule to visit the second, but those, who are indifferent alike to the criticisms of Martius and of Leake, prefer to pause on the threshold of the market, particularly in the early morning when the peasantry,
‘Seated in their chariots of Homeric pattern,
Like the ancient Isis on the basso-relievos of Egina,’
pour in from the highways from Thebes and Marathon. I have said that the men were distinguished for regular symmetry of countenance; but the peasant women are simply ugly. Of middle height, robust, and sunburnt, they have no feminine attributes, in the meaning we give to the word. In commercial circles and among the Phanariots, who come principally from Asia, where the race has remained pure, there are, on the contrary, many really beautiful women to be seen. Oriental languor gives them a charm unknown in our country; but they walk badly, and are wanting in that elegance of style which French women possess in such a high degree.