Midst the Wild Carpathians Part 25

This mode of defence pleased the Tartars. The Aga exchanged glances with his subalterns, as much as to say--"This is the very man we want!" and addressed him again in a more friendly tone.

"Dost thou indeed collect the taxes? Look now! my master, Ali Pasha of Grosswardein, has sent me hither to notify to the people a fresh imposition. Allah hath clearly brought us together. Thou wilt act discreetly then by proclaiming the new tax at once. It is no more than thy duty."

"I'll do so gladly," replied Clement, who made as if he were going.

"Stay, my son," said the Aga, beckoning to him. "Thou dost not even know yet the amount of the new tax. 'Tis a mere trifle, and only imposed by way of showing that we are the masters here. 'Tis only a farthing per head. That's not much, I'm sure."

"Nothing at all!" a.s.sented Clement, eager to be off.

"Not so fast! not so fast!" remonstrated the Aga. "I shall not be best pleased if thou dost disobey my orders; but as I know that thou dost not regard it as perjury to break promises made to us, I'll tell off one of my brave fellows here to accompany thee from village to village, and take care that thou dost duly proclaim the new tax whithersoever thou goest."

"It is well, gracious sir," said Clement meekly, with the mental reservation of ridding himself of the brave fellow at the very next village.

"Mount your horse, Zulfikar," cried the Aga to one of his servants.

The person addressed was an evil-looking fellow with a malignant squint.

Although just as dirty as the others, it was clear from his physiognomy that he was not made of the same stuff, and if we condescended to bestow any thought at all upon such low people, it might even occur to us that we had seen him somewhere else before.

"As for thee," said the Aga to Clement, who was anxious to be off at any price, "take off thy boots as soon as thou gettest home, and if ever I meet thee with them on again, thou shalt receive from me five hundred strokes on the soles of thy feet, which thou wilt have cause to recollect even on thy wedding-day."

Clement the Clerk said "Yes" to everything, rejoiced that he had got off at last, and trotted off towards Abrudbanya. His Tartar escort rode faithfully by his side.

From time to time the Patrol-officer cast a sidelong glance at his companion, only quickly to avert his eyes again, for as the Tartar squinted horribly, Clement could never exactly make out which way he was looking. Clement was thinking all the while how easily he would give the Tartar the slip, smiled to himself at the thought, winked with both eyes, and nodded his head with a self-satisfied air.

"Mr. Patrol-officer, don't fancy you will circ.u.mvent me as you go your rounds!" exclaimed the Tartar suddenly, in the purest Hungarian, as if he could read Clement's thought from his face.

Clement was so aghast that he almost fell from his horse. How the deuce could the fellow snap up his very thoughts, and speak Hungarian despite his Tartardom?

"Don't bother your head about me any more," continued the Turk calmly.

"I am an Hungarian renegade who was once in the service of Emerich Bala.s.sa. I had a hand in the capture and poisoning of Corsar Beg, and when the Hungarians began to persecute me on that account, I turned Turk. If the Prophet befriend me, I may yet rise to be Kapudan Pasha.

Pray don't imagine you can bamboozle a wily old fox like me."

Clement, completely disconcerted, could only scratch his head, proceeded with his escort from village to village, and after accomplis.h.i.+ng his regular official business, proclaimed the fresh imposition of a farthing per head, which the people everywhere received most favourably, in many cases even paying it down at once to his Tartar comrade.

But no one knew anything about the panther. Indeed, but for the respect inspired by his gallooned green boots, the Patrol-officer would have been laughed out of countenance.

Only one little Wallachian village up in the mountains, called Marisel, was yet to be visited, and beyond that place began the domains of Baron Banfi, where the jurisdiction of the Patrol-officer terminated.

Thither also the renegade followed him.

CHAPTER II.

SANGE MOARTE.[29]

The Patrol-officer and his companion had already been travelling for half the day across the Batrina moor on their way to Marisel. Clement kept on asking every living soul he met where the village was, and always received the same answer--"Further on!"

[Footnote 29: _Sange moarte._ Dead blood (Roumanian).]

From time to time they met a Wallachian peasant reviling the team of sluggish oxen spanned to his huge wagon, and vainly endeavouring to make them quicken their pace; then there were ponds to be waded, where half-naked gipsy bands, in picturesque rags, were was.h.i.+ng gold-dust out of the sand, and stared at the Tartar as if he were a wild beast; here and there, in the mossy hollow of a wayside tree, stood an icon, the pale, weather-worn gilding of which being all that remained of its once gorgeous colouring; in the worm-eaten niche stood the _pomana_,[30] a pitcher of pure spring water which the traditional piety of the young Wallachian maidens had placed there for the refreshment of thirsty travellers.

[Footnote 30: _Pomana_, or _pomena_. An alms, a voluntary free succour. The etymology is obscure. Some opine that it is a corruption of _per_ and _ma.n.u.s_.]

The road now went up hill and down dale; for the greater part of the way they had to lead their horses. All around stood the ever-changing wilderness; lofty, perpendicular beeches, terebinthine oaks, with an occasional dark-green pine. At last they reached a point where the road divided. One branch of it ran right down into the valley, the other wound obliquely up to the summit of a bald bleak hill, from which a projecting rock hung down so precipitately that it seemed ready to fall every moment.

"Well, whither shall we turn now?" asked Clement, hesitating. "I have never come so far as this before."

"Let us follow the road," returned Zulfikar; "none but a fool would risk his neck up that steep cliff."

Clement looked about him in great perplexity, and suddenly perceived a man sitting on the rock which so precipitately overhung the path. It was a young Wallach with a pale face and long, flowing curls; his sheep-skin jacket was open at the breast, his cap lay beside him on the ground.

There he sat in a reverie, on the very edge of the lofty rock, with his feet dangling in empty s.p.a.ce, his stony countenance resting on his hands, and his eyes staring gla.s.sily into the remote distance.

"Hi! you up there! _ungye mera ista via?_"[31] cried Clement, in a jargon which was half Latin and half Wallachian.

[Footnote 31: _Ungye mera ista via?_ "Whither goes this road?" The first two words are Roumanian.]

The Wallach did not appear to hear the question; he remained in just the same position, blankly staring and immovable.

"He is either deaf or dead," said Zulfikar, after they had both bawled themselves hoa.r.s.e at him in vain. "The best thing we can do is to follow the beaten track," and off they set at a trot. The Wallach did not so much as look after them.

Evening was drawing nigh, and the road to Marisel seemed absolutely endless. It went out of one valley into another, without pa.s.sing a single human habitation, and the huge boulders and fierce mountain torrents, which they came upon at frequent intervals, made it almost impa.s.sable. At last they perceived, somewhere in the wood, a fire burning, and a monotonous chant struck upon their ears. On approaching nearer, they saw an immense pyre, made of the trunks of trees, burning in a forest glade, and shaded by oaks, the foliage of which was singed red by the long tongues of flame which flickered up to their very summits.

Not far from the pyre, a band of Wallachs were dancing with savage gesticulations, striking the ground at the same time with their ma.s.sive clubs. Their twirling feet seemed to be writing mystic characters in the soil, and all the while they brandished their arms and howled forth metrical curses as if they were exorcising some evil spirit.

Around the men twined a wreath of young girls, holding one another by the hand, and twirling in a contrary direction. These young and charming forms, with their black, plaited tresses interwoven with pearls and ribbons; their flowered petticoats, cambric smocks, and broad, striped ap.r.o.ns; their tinkling gold spangles, or strings of silver coins about their round necks and their tiny, high-heeled shoes, formed a pleasant contrast to the wild, ferocious figures of the men, with their high sheepskin hats perched upon their s.h.a.ggy, unkempt hair, their sunburnt, naked necks, greasy _kodurons_,[32] broad bra.s.s buckles, and large ox-hide sandals.

[Footnote 32: _Koduron._ A rough, fur jacket.]

Both dance and song were peculiar. The girls, all hand in hand, flew round the men, singing a plaintive, dreamy sort of dirge, while the men stamped fiercely on the ground and uttered an intermittent wail. The fire blazing beside them cast a red glare, intermingled with dark flitting shadows, on the wild group. Some distance behind, on the stump of a tree, sat an old bagpiper with his pipes under his arm. The tortured goatskin's monotonous discord blended with the savage harmony of the song.

When the pyre had nearly burnt itself out, the dancers suddenly dispersed, dragged forward a female effigy stuffed with straw and clothed in rags, placed it on two poles, and with loud cries of "Marcze Zare! Marcze Zare!"[33] held it over the fire; then, exclaiming in chorus--"Burn to ashes, accursed Wednesday-evening witch!" they threw it into the glowing embers. The girls then danced round the fire with cries of joy till the witch was burned, when the men, with a wild yell, rushed among the embers and trod them out.

[Footnote 33: _Marcze Zare_ = Wednesday witch, hags possessing peculiar power on Wednesday evenings, according to the Wallachs.]

"Who are ye, and what are you doing here?" cried Clement the Clerk to the Wallachs, who hitherto had not taken the slightest notice of him.

"We are they of Marisel who have burned Marcze Zare," answered the peasants unanimously, with the grave faces of men who had just done something uncommonly wise.

"Well, be quick about it, and then come back to the village, for I am here by command of the Prince, my master, to put the usual questions to you."

"And I," put in Zulfikar, "am here by command of the mighty Ali Pasha of Grosswardein to levy a new tax."

The Wallachs watched the Patrol-officer till he was quite out of sight without uttering a word; but they shook their fists after him and exclaimed--"May Marcze Zare take him!"

Then, with the bagpiper in front, they formed into a long procession and marched, loudly singing, down towards the distant village.