borhood being seized and, nolens volens, forced to follow their pious example. Much waste of gunpowder crowns the whole, and the river is left to its fate, and to its grateful duty of poisoning the city till the return of its annual festival. It is extraordinary that nothing should hitherto have been done towards supplying with wholesome water a town where typhus and diphtheria ride rampant, and where fevers are as common as blackberries in autumn, and thus remedying the evil to a certain extent. The amount of water imbibed by many persons in the twenty-four hours is almost fabulous; from twelve to twenty glasses being a not exaggerated average. We have counted five large tumblerfuls of muddy liquid poured down a single throat in the brief space of fifteen minutes! The men smoke almost incessantly, and the hot Turkish tobacco dries and scorches the mouth so unpleasantly that the victim is compelled to moisten his lips again and again.

The favorite refreshment of the Roumans is 'the dulchatza, a species of preserve made from fruit or roses. This is served in a small saucer, and, followed by a glass of good iced water, is very agreeable on a warm day, though never out of fashion, even in the depth of winter. Many a man who has been two or three hours exposed to the icy winds in a little sledging expedition through the town and on the Chaussée will enter a café and order this simple fare, when an Englishman or a Frenchman would need his two or three glasses of hot grog to restore circulation. This excessive temperance may, indeed, be carried too far; yet it is to be regretted that strangers do not dispense with some of their old habits when settling in the East.

Wines, like sherry and port, and strong spirits, are most prejudicial to the health, and should be strictly avoided. Light wines, on the other hand, and wholesome beer may be taken with impunity, though people should be careful in ascertaining that they are pure beverages. Indeed, a proper use of wine is beneficial, even in the East, whatever may be said to the contrary by those whose experience has run rather in the direction of the intemperate few.

Bucharest possesses, likewise, a fine edifice on the grand boulevard, dedicated

to its university, its museum, and one of its parliamentary chambers. The university is in a rising condition, notwithstanding that the great boyards still prefer to send their sons abroad, to Paris, Vienna, Dresden, Geneva, and it is, perhaps, only natural that they should lay some stress on their receiving the same training that they themselves have undergone, and that they should properly appreciate the value of a superior civilisation. Still, everything is now improving, both at Bucharest and in the other towns of Roumania, and it is highly probable that the university will prove itself, ere many years have sped by, thoroughly competent to satisfy every ambitious desire. There can be no doubt but that much good would accrue from the union of the young men of all the better classes of society in the pursuit of knowledge, and that much would thereby be gained towards cementing the growing feelings of good-will and patriotism by which they are animated.

It may not be out of place here to mention the generally thriving condition of education at Bucharest. The town abounds in large and well-managed schools for the youth of all ranks. There are French and German schools for young ladies, where many languages are studied and practised with a zeal too seidom to be found in this more favored land. Almost every respectable Rouman living at Bucharest can make himself understood both in French and German. Amongst the upper orders of society these languages are thoroughly learned, and Italian and English are frequently added to the course. Indeed, nearly every one belonging to the patrician class knows something of our tongue; and there are men who read the Times daily, and whose acquaintance with our best authors would put not a few of our fellow-countrymen to shame. Thirty years ago modern Greek was exclusively spoken at court and in society. Now French has superseded it, and is cultivated by people of education, who speak and write it more correctly than their own Rouman. But all who have any leisure (and who has not in this Oriental city?) are great readers, and display much energy in the acquirement of languages. Young men even, employed during the day, will devote three evenings.

masters.

The Rouman is a branch of the Romance family, comprising the French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese languages. The groundwork is exclusively Latin, as that of the English is Saxon, but, like our own tongue, it has been enriched with many words derived from foreign sources. Numerous words of Slavonic, Turkish, and Greek origin may be found, not to mention others derived or adapted from the French. It is much to be lamented that, through the constant usage of French, and a certain affectation common to those young men educated at Paris, a great inclination for French words and expressions has by degrees crept into their speech, and so much has this increased of late that these on many occasions actually supersede the original ones, without any advantage to the sentence, and, necessarily, have a tendency to weaken the national tongue. A Wal lachian, even of the lowest class, will generally say, Bon soir, monsieur, instead of the phrase which should be more familiar to him. And it is amusing to listen sometimes to the painful efforts of two youths, not over-well educated, striving to sustain a conversation in the fashionable language, of which they comprehend but little, when they, unhappy victims of la mode, would be far more comfortable on their native ground.

The Rouman language is by no means inharmonious. It reminds the stranger of the Italian bereft of some of its sweetness. The peasantry speak it in its greatest purity, and have preserved original words and phrases, which have long ago died out in the more peopled districts, to which foreigners have had more ready access. These poor unpolished men pay great attention to grammar, and rarely offend the ear by mistakes in concord or gender. Indeed, they can hold their own in this respect with any peasantry in Europe, and, if the tongue is ever to be studied and revived, and used as an organ of literature, it will be to them that the author must turn if he would acquire correctness and vigor of style.

Singularly blessed as Bucharest is in the matter of education, it is also rich in charitable and religious endowments. It possesses several large hospitals splen

There are a number of Greek churches at Bucharest. To each church a yard is attached, in which are a few graves, and on the skirts of which the priests' dwellings are located. These consist of low cottages adjoining one another, and occupied by the priests, their wives and families. According to the Greek rule, every man who takes priests' orders must be married, but, should his wife die before him, he is not permitted to wed a second. If a priest lose his wife, he may hope to console himself with a bishopric, the bishops being chosen from among the widower priests. If a man prefer celibacy and would enter the service of the Church, he must become a monk; there is no means of his being received into the priesthood if he remains a bachelor.

The priests here lead peaceful regular lives, and, like the curates in our own country, almost invariably have large families. Still, though their ménage is remarkable for no ostentation, they are always comfortably off, and have wherewith to procure for their children a decent position in the world. There are, unhappily, many ignorant men amongst them, for they belong, almost without exception, to the plebeian order; and it is to be regretted that this is the case, as their influence on the aristocracy must necessarily be very limited. Several of them are attached to each church. Their duties are the reverse of onerous, and much of their time is spent in sitting about their churchyards, with their hands crossed over their long sticks, engaged in conversation with some lounger like themselves.

The churches are usually small. They are not divided into aisles or chancels, and are not pewed. On entering the western door one advances into a lofty hall, if it may be so termed. The altar

man.

The services are not particularly impressive. They are chanted in a droning lazy voice by the priests, in the same style as those of the Jews and Mohammedans. No instrumental music is allowed, and the voices of the choristers strike harshly, and often with something of dissonance, on the ear. The reliques of the saints—and their name is legionare scrupulously guarded in the churches, and the worship of many appears to be confined to their adoration and to that of the pictures and grand crucifix. For, where superstition is concerned, this Church is not one whit behind, but rather far in advance of, her sister of Rome. Both priests and people are more ignorant, more fanatical than the mass of the Roman Catholics. Amongst the uneducated folk there are many who can enumerate all the saints in the calendar, and garnish their list with many a legend and anecdote; yet, where it is a simple question of Bible knowledge, they inevitably show themselves to be almost totally unacquainted with the same. Saint Demetrius is the grand saint, and his bones are promenaded through highways and byways, escorted by a host of priests, and by a goodly company of the faithful, whenever that fickle element, rain, shows itself too. coy or too lavish of its

sweets.

There are two Roman Catholic churches at Bucharest, and a convent, founded, curiously enough, by some English ladies, and called to this day Le Couvent des Dames Anglaises. The services in this city are more gorgeous than those in our own country, probably in deference to Oriental taste. The German Protestants have a Lutheran church, which the Princess of Roumania frequents; and near it stands a Calvinist church, for the benefit of the Hungarian population. Two large Jewish synagogues may also be seen, one with the

The Roman Catholics at Bucharest naturally adhere to the New Style of reckoning time; but the German Protestants have adopted the Old Style, thus observing feast and fast on precisely the same days as the Greeks. They probably dread the double loss which they would sustain were they to close their shops on both sets of days.

It is curious to notice how trades hang together here. Men of the same trade will occupy twenty shops standing side by side, and the little community are always on the best of terms with one another. There are two reasons for this state of things. A trade or calling is generally followed by men of the same nation, often of the same city. These naturally take an interest in each other, and join company for their mutual welfare and in order to protect themselves from the attacks of strangers.

Then there is no possible ground for jealousy. Business prospers everywhere throughout the length and breadth of the Principalities; there is room for all and to spare. No man underbids his neighbor. Goods are dear, labor is expensive. Orders pour in, and the purchase is always paid for in ready money. This is the tradesman's paradise.

Whose is yonder chariot with the coronet blazoned on its brilliantly varnished panels; coachman and groom decked out in gilded liveries? These nodding plumes, these prancing steeds-whose are they? This handsome dame, this charming pair of vestals decked out in the last glories fresh from Paris-whose hearth do they light up with their beaming smiles? These are the family, these the studs, these the menials of that grocer whose shop-door is embellished with a signboard portrait of that famous Emperor Trajan, the star of whose memory will never pale so long as signboards survive. It is pleasant to note how this pretty custom has been retained. This shop flourishes beneath the sign of the White Cat; over this the Yellow Bear presides; yon glowing Angel guards this chemist's threshold.

Bucharest contains at the present day more than two hundred thousand inhabitants, a great proportion of whom are

strangers. There are, of course, Jews in plenty, as we all know-good Jews, bad Jews, indifferent and uninteresting Jews. There are] German Jews, Polish Jews, Wallachian Jews, Spanish Jews. Most of the German tradesmen are Jews, and the majority of the Bucharest tradespeople are undoubtedly German. The Jews are the bankers of the country, the artisans, and were, till recently, almost the sole tobacco and spirit vendors. The Jews are rather an oppressed class in this country. Persecutions on a small scale have sometimes arisen, though their execution has been limited to a few amateurs, and has not spread to the mass of the soldiery or people; and nothing of the kind has occurred of late, spite of the terrific reports which penetrated to our own Imperial Parliament, reports of men and boys falling beneath the avenging sword, of women and girls shamefully misused. It was even stated that men, in hundreds, were saving themselves from certain death by swimming across the Danube to the opposite shore—an assertion too absurd to need refutation, there being probably, in the whole country, no Jew capable of performing such a feat. The real truth is this. The Rouman, so long trampled beneath the heel of the conqueror, has, not unnaturally, inherited a wholesome dislike and suspicion of strangers. Now, as the mass of the foreigners in Roumania are of Jewish origin, these of course come in for the lion's share of his enmity and mistrust. And here we declare, most emphatically and unequivocally, that religion has very little to do with this state of things.

If an English colony, no smaller than the present Jewish one, were planted in the country, a like spirit of dissatisfaction would be soon afloat. It is true that this same spirit is invariably more in the ascendant at the season of the great Passover festival. This we admit at once. But the simple reason is this. The deadly foes of the Jews delight in reviving that bugbear of the Middle Ages, the false report that Christian blood is drunk on that occasion. And it is not by the priests that the train is laid, not by the representatives of religion and piety, but rather by men connected with the extreme patriotic or republican party, by men whose minds would be uninflu

enced by considerations, in their opinion, so puerile. The fact that the Jews remain a separate people, and do not intermarry or form any connection with the native population, may of course prevent an increase of cordiality, and conduce more or less to the maintenance of their unpopularity. But the Roumans are jealous of forming alliances as well with other foreigners, and of admitting them to free social intercourse with themselves.

An attack was made some time ago on the Prussian colonists at Bucharest, who were banqueting under the auspices of their consul in one of the great public halls of the city. The windows were smashed in and a free fight ensued. Other examples might be enumerated.

It would not be fair to judge the people too severely for this lack of good feeling towards foreigners. As time runs on,' they will gradually forget the sufferings they have undergone, and study to discriminate between friend and foe. Let them learn hard incessant toil, and they will soon be in a position to dispense with any colonists whose presence in the land may be distasteful to them. Let the arts be cultivated, an improved system of agriculture introduced, let stern denial be diligently practised, and this fertile region, now rich in its sons, and blessed with a second freedom even more real and more sacred than the first, will respond tenfold to the hopes of its well-wishers-and it has many-and bear abundant fruit, not only for its own gain and profit, but for the regeneration of the nations by which it is surrounded.

There are also many Greeks in the country-descendants of those who came over with the Phanariote princes; or later settlers-merchants, bankers, and men of business. A great proportion of the Rouman aristocracy have Greek blood in their veins. The names of Cantacuzene, Palæologue, Ypsilanti, and Ghica are too celebrated to render any further remark necessary. As has before been noticed, Greek was till lately the fashionable language. It was the Russian officers who, during their occupation of the country, taught the natives to prefer French.

The French are the most popular of all the colonists. France is the land which, of all others, the Rouman most

admires. And this is the case, more or less, everywhere throughout the East. The Frenchman is always liked, whilst the German is usually detested in equal proportion.

During the late war many Rouman officers offered their services to the French government, and concerts and amateur theatricals were got up at the theatre for the raising of subscriptions on behalf of the prisoners and wounded. Roumania loves to call herself the younger sister of France.

The Roumans have done wisely in substituting French for Greek as an additional language. It enables them to converse and make themselves known in print to the peoples of civilised Europe. They are now great travellers, and visit the German baths and other places of fashionable resort every year, thereby learning and noting much, and interesting foreigners in themselves and their land.

The Armenians have a quarter in Bucharest, with a church where the services are performed according to their ritual. There are also a few Russians in the city, who drive the cabs, which, by the way, are excellent, drawn by two horses, and to be had at the rate of two francs an hour. The cabs are open, and therefore somewhat inconvenient in bad weather, but, during the winter, they are replaced by sledges.

The Bulgarians work at the paving of the streets, as the gipsies, male and female, at housebuilding. The tzigans, or gipsies, are an interesting class in Eastern Europe. They were, till recently, enslaved; but their condition has greatly improved of late years. To their number belong the laoutari, or musicians, who may be found in every town and large village throughout the land. These men, though unable to read a note of music, can play by ear the most difficult and complicated morceaux. Their instruments are the fiddle, violin, panpipe, and a species of zither or guitar. They play in companies of from six to ten musicians, and display extraordinary skill and ability in the manipulation of their instruments. Their music is of the wildest nature, and must be heard again and again ere it can make any agreeable impression on the listener. But they do not confine themselves to their own com

positions. They will reproduce the finest operatic music. Their children begin to learn as soon as they can hold a fiddle, and thus is retained an excellence of style and execution peculiar to these people.

The tzigan is still despised by the Wallachian, though he is often comfortably off, when he has settled down respectably. Still many of the tzigans are migratory, and live about the town in miniature camps with their children and pigs, and many line the great roads.

are

Bucharest teems with cafés. There are cafés for men of all nationalities, classes, and conditions. These well provided with chess and backgammon boards, newspapers, card and billiard tables-the cannon game is exclusively played here—and some boast dining and supper rooms to boot. The men are very fond of lounging in the cafés, and are clever at all games of skill. They are great politicians, too, and will argue for hours upon the merits of governments, and the uses and abuses of this or that monopoly.

There are now three monopolies in the hands of the authorities-to wit, that of tobacco, of spirituous liquors, and of funerals. The price of tobacco is now excessive, and the monopoly is not popular with any class of the inhabitants, who pay very highly for an inferior article. Smuggling is of course carried on to a certain extent all along the Danube and over the Carpathians.

The monopoly of spirits was especially directed against the Jews, into whose hands the trade had chiefly fallen. By it ten thousand families were said to have been deprived of the means of subsistence.

The funeral monopoly ought to be profitable, as even the poorer folk pride themselves much on their taste in such matters. One can scarcely move out of doors of an afternoon without meeting several processions escorting the dead to their long homes. This is the funeral of a girl who died two days ago in all the bloom of youth and beauty. Two gensd'armes, in full uniform and well mounted, clear a way for the long line. Ten of the girl's companions, attired in white muslin and wearing white wreaths, plod wearily along through mud and through mire. mire. Cold they are, and splashed from