The Danube

The immediate approach to Budapest by river is distinctly and remarkably impressive. Ahead on the right are seen the heights of the Gellert Hill and of the nearer one on which the royal palace stands, while as we pass under the Margaret Bridge we get a striking view of what is surely one of the most beautiful groups of Parliament buildings in the world. Coming down-stream to Vienna it is only after we have got a certain degree of intimacy with it that we begin to do justice to its fascination. Budapest captures from the outset. Nor are first impressions of delight diminished on fuller acquaintance—for the place grows on us.

And apart from all other natural and civic beauties, those portions of the city along the Danube banks by themselves offer the most varied attractions. We may sit outside an hotel in the morning and see the wonderful effect of light and shade on the splendid royal palace, rising above terraced gardens on the hill on the further side of the river, on the massy Gellert Hill (or Blocksberg) to the left, and over the many buildings at the foot of the Castle Hill, while away to the right rises the beautiful spire of St. Matthias’ church. We may wander along the quayside and inspect closely the long barges with their tiny houses, their high-perched steersman’s shelter, their little “gardens” of flowers; we may see the long roofed-in barges with high, curved, carven prows, that look like the foreparts of some ancient galleys; we may watch a throng of busy men, half naked and a rich brown with exposure, bringing up great measures of grain from the barges to be put in sacks, weighed, and loaded on wagons on the quayside; we may idly scan the incessant little paddle steamers fussing to and fro with passengers who prefer this method of crossing the river to making use of one of the various handsome bridges that span the Danube.

At sunset the view of the west side of the river against the coloured heavens takes on new beauty—comparable only in my experience with a sunset behind the Mala Strana, and Hradcany at Prague, as seen from the right bank of the Ultava. And again at night the wonderful sky-line of buildings and hills with myriad specks of light between it and the river forms another attraction. Cross the river and look down from the Castle Hill, from the bastion behind St. Matthias’ church, or other point of vantage, and the scene is newly impressive, where beyond the broad river lies the newer of the twinned towns spreading far over the plain, from which the dome and towers of St. Stephen’s cathedral, the many spires of the Parliament House, and other prominent buildings, stand out with special distinction.

A magnificent site for a great city has indeed been finely utilized at this point of the Danube, where three towns have been joined to make the kingdom’s capital. It is less than forty years ago that Buda and O-Buda on the right bank and Pest on the left were formed into a civic whole; and their names combined in one, so that we can no longer say with our old traveller, “Pest is the representative of modern reforms, modern ideas, modern architecture, as Buda, on its height, of old aristocratic stateliness and ancient times,” but we may still echo him when he says that “the two form a panoramic whole which will scarcely find its match in the world.”

The progress Budapest has made within the memory of men still middle-aged is extraordinary. Wandering about its broad streets and squares, its “Ring” streets, and promenades, we are struck again and again, not so much by the old buildings, but by the grandeur and boldness of the new. It bids fair to become a city of palaces—palaces of art and education, palaces of business and industry. Here I am not concerned with the many handsome edifices, the museums and art galleries, but rather with suggesting something of the whole, with telling something of only some of the places, details of which belong to guide-book summaries, and something of the story of the place which, after being the station of a Roman legion, came to be a residence of the kings of Hungary; then was for a century and a half in the hands of alien conquerors, and within living memory has become the residence of the king of the Hungarians, the seat of the Parliament and the Law Courts, and a commercial centre of great and ever-growing importance.

Buda (Ofen) on the right bank, is the oldest part of the great city. It was near here that the only Roman legion stationed in the province of Lower Pannonia had its headquarters; the ancient place as revealed by excavation may be visited, and a small museum of relics seen at Aquincum, a short distance to the north of O-Buda (Alt-Ofen). But of the Roman times there is little to be learnt. Hungarian history may be said to begin with the conquests of Arpád, who in battle overcame the various princes then occupying different tracts of the territory—all but Zalán, prince of the long strip of country between the Danube and the Tisza, which includes Pest.

What Arpád could not take by force he captured by a trick, for the story runs that after he had failed to defeat Zalán, he sent him rich presents of horses, camels, and slaves, asking only in return a piece of grass from his country, as he wanted to see if the grass was as green as that in Asia, and some water from the Danube, as he wished to find if it was as sweet as that from the Don. Zalán received the envoys well, accepted the rich gifts, and returned the small acknowledgments requested, only to be told that the grass and the water represented all the land along the Danube, which he accepted in return for his presents. Thus towards the close of the ninth century began the rule of the Arpád dynasty that continued to rule in Hungary for about four hundred years.

Except in paintings and sculpture we must not look for any reminders of this distant past in the Budapest of to-day. The church of St. Matthias which was begun in the mid part of the thirteenth century by King Béla IV. contains some ancient tombs, but the remaining links with the Arpáds are few.

It was this King Béla, too, who first built a royal palace at Buda, but the present simple and impressive mass of buildings—since much enlarged and restored—only dates from the reign of Maria Theresa. Here is preserved the old Hungarian regalia—the crown of St. Stephen, orb, sceptre, etc.—of the romantic adventures of which we learn something some hundreds of miles further down the Danube, as we near the Rumanian frontier. The regalia, which is preserved with special care, always guarded by soldiers, and not shown to visitors, was used when Francis Joseph, Emperor of Austria, was crowned King of Hungary in St. Matthias’ church in 1867. After the crowning he carried out on the Eskuter on the Pest bank, the ceremony of waving the sword to the four quarters, and repeating the time-honoured oath which the kings of the country had hitherto sworn at Poszony (Pressburg).

To the south of the Palace rises the great mass of St. Gellert’s Hill (Blocksberg) with the ancient citadel. Nearly four hundred feet above the Danube, from the side and summit of this hill are to be had magnificent views, not only over the city outspread below, but also far over the adjacent plain and along the noble river from which the hill abruptly rises. On the hillside overlooking the town, is a statue of the sainted bishop Gellert, who, having been the first bringer of Christianity to the land, was martyred at Buda in the year 1046.

Nearly two hundred years after the martyrdom of Gellert, King Béla IV., builder of the palace and of St. Matthias’ church, found his unhappy country overrun by devastating hordes of Tartars. He sought assistance from neighbouring states in vain, and his own nobles were with him debating what should be done when the terrible news came: “Sire, you and our country are lost. The Tartars have defeated our forces and are quickly approaching.” The king called to him one of his friends, and giving him the crown of St. Stephen and other national treasures, begged him to take them to a place of safety out of the country, and then drawing his sword said, “The fate of the nation is in the hands of God, but its honour is in mine. Those who wish to die with glory for their country, let them follow me—but those who wish to live in disgrace can remain at home!” There was ready response to the brave appeal, but it came too late.

Place after place was burnt by the advancing hordes, “and the flames of the burning towns and villages were already to be seen from Pest.” King Béla with a force of six thousand men sought, but unavailingly, to stop the invaders. The king and such of his followers as survived had to seek shelter in caves and in the mountains.

Meanwhile, Pest and other places were destroyed and the people slaughtered wherever the Tartars passed. At length domestic affairs recalled the invaders, and the Hungarian king encouraged the remnant of his people to build their towns, and return to their farms, inviting German immigrants to come and settle in the land.

Nearly twenty years later when another Tartar invasion was threatened, the brave monarch found more prompt assistance, and pushed forward to the Carpathians before the Mongolians could reach the plain. This time the Hungarians won so signal a victory that the enemy, after losing it is said upwards of fifty thousand men, fled back to the East. Looking down on the magnificent city now, it is difficult to realize that distant past, or the past of three hundred years later when the Turks, after long and heroic struggles—after the national Hungarian hero, Hunyadi Janos, had defeated them in ten pitched battles—at length overcame the Hungarians and captured Buda.

For nearly a century and a half—a period in which the country was in a state of perpetual change with rival or usurping rulers—Buda was the centre of an important pashalik; the crescent flew over the castle, and the church of St. Matthias became a mosque. A relic of the Turkish occupation is to be seen in the small octagonal Turkish chapel over the grave of a holy Mohammedan, Sheikh Gül-Baba, in Buda. When the treaty of Karlowitz was signed in 1699, it was specifically undertaken that this monument should be properly preserved, and thus it is that, more than two centuries after the last pasha was driven out of Buda, the visitor may still see there a Turkish shrine, may still visit baths reminding him of the day when there was a slave market in the town and the ruling pasha had his harem on the Margaret’s Island in mid-Danube.

The Turkish occupation was disputed again and again, and Buda was often, but unsuccessfully, besieged. It was in 1686 that that occupation came to an end, when the Duke of Lorraine, in command of an army said to have been made up of German, French, English and Spanish as well as Hungarian soldiers, stormed this formidable height and took the powerful citadel. The struggle on which so much depended—the capture of Buda meant the expulsion of the Turks from the kingdom—has been summarized thus:—

“Pressed on all sides by the Austrian force, the Turks now craved a suspension of arms, and sent an aga to wait upon Lorraine for that purpose. But the Duke coolly replied, ‘I have but one duty to perform; namely to conduct the war, now declared against the Sultan your master; I will therefore make it my business to attack your general wherever I can meet him. In the meantime, I will despatch your letter to the emperor, who will acquaint you with his pleasure.’ Surprised at this answer, the aga employed every means to shake the Duke’s resolution, and endeavoured to make interest with the officers of his staff. But the only reply was, ‘Such is the Duke’s pleasure, and his mind once made up, no power on earth can turn him aside.’

“Carrying back to the Vizier this stern and uncompromising answer, the aga re-entered the fortress of Buda. A scene of hurried preparation and fearful suspense ensued. The storm was gathering fast around the devoted fortress, and the thunder at last bursting with redoubled fury on its walls, a breach was speedily effected—the Turks fought with desperation; and retreating from bastion to bastion, poured their deadly shot into the serried ranks of the besiegers. But imitating the example of their intrepid commanders, the Christian host surmounted every danger. Before sunset they took possession of those castled heights, and hoisted the Austrian banner on the tower of the old Gothic church, which still consecrates the spot, and points to the fearful scene of massacre which followed.” The pasha in command is said to have been killed “fighting in the breach with a Roman bravery.” Thereafter it is recorded the Turks were hunted through the Alföld plain like deer.

When Lady Mary Wortley Montagu was journeying through Hungary, thirty years later than that recapture of Buda, she said that nothing could be more melancholy than “to reflect on the former flourishing state of that kingdom, and to see such a noble spot of earth almost uninhabited. Such are also the present circumstances of Buda, once the royal seat of the Hungarian kings whose palace there was reckoned one of the most beautiful buildings of the age, now wholly destroyed, no part of the town having been repaired since the last siege but the fortifications and the castle which is the present seat of the governor-general.”

Presumably, by the castle, Lady Mary meant the citadel on St. Gellert’s Hill, the key to the possession of the town. From this hill, as has been said, we get one of the most impressive views of Budapest, though the extensive vineyards, which used to clothe the neighbouring slopes and form a notable item in the prospect, have been destroyed by phylloxera. It was from this hill, says the tradition, that Etzel “hurled his offending brother into the Danube.”

Possibly it is the dim influence of that tradition, outweighing for a time that of the martyred bishop, which has given rise to another one that I find recorded only by Dr. Beattie, in whose words I chiefly give it. The sanctity of the spot, according to the authority of the people of the neighbourhood, has not protected it from being an occasional rendezvous for evil spirits! During the awful inundation of 1838, the summit of St. Gellert’s Hill was crowded with these unhallowed visitors, and such was their mirth and revelry, whilst from their commanding point they looked down on the perishing city, that peals of fiendish laughter bore testimony to the pleasure with which they viewed the destruction of our race. Afterwards, too—although we do not vouch for the truth of so weighty a charge—it appeared that various astronomical instruments belonging to the observatory had been turned to diabolical purposes; for the first visitor who made use of the glasses after the fiendish appearances, could see nor sun, nor moon, nor stars as hitherto—but in place thereof, he beheld a dance of witches, with Prince Beelzebub at their head—and what was unspeakably worse, with a near and dear earthly relative of his own, acting as chief partner to his Satanic Majesty. Frantic at the sight he shouted out, “Holy St. Gellert! Is that my own wife?” No reply—but down dropped the glass from his hand, and, happily for the sight of others, was broken in pieces! He rushed home; and there, at the hearth-side, sat his wife, rocking their baby in its cradle. But, as he very shrewdly observed, she was greatly flurried and disconcerted. He was, fortunately, a learned man, and having read that edifying author “Adolphus Scribonius de Purgatione Sagarum, etc.,” he remembered that this philosopher lays it down as an indisputable fact that witches weigh infinitely less than other persons; for, says he, “the devil is a spirit and subtle being, and penetrateth so thoroughly the bodies of his votaries, as to make them quite rare and light.” Now, this thought no sooner struck him than the experimental astronomer resolved to put the matter to the test, and seizing his wife with both arms, he threw her up almost to the ceiling, and might indeed have done so, it is said, with but three fingers, for in fact, despite her apparent bulk, she did not weigh four ounces! If ever philosopher had just cause to run mad, Herr Reisenschloss undoubtedly had. To the glory of his favourite author his experiment had been only too perfectly successful. When he looked at his wife, the sleeping baby in the cradle, and all the home surroundings, he became quite frantic, rushed out of the house, ravingly related his frightful story to a sympathizing friend, and subsequently found refuge in a public hospital. Afterwards it became a favourite maxim, says the grave historian in the neighbourhood of the hill, that husbands should never consult the stars too closely on “St. Gellert’s Eve.” It is a story which, for its proper presentation, like an earlier one recorded, calls for the genius of a Thomas Ingoldsby.

Reference at the beginning of this fearsome tale to the inundation of 1838 seems to call for fuller mention. The Pest side of the river is a plain, and in the spring of that year—the Danube having been covered with ice over three feet thick—when the break-up began the country was flooded in a disastrous fashion. At the first menace a breakwater of earth and timber six feet high was thrown up on the river-side all along the town front, but—

Meredith might, when writing his poem, have remembered the awful episode of 1838. When the ice broke, the water dashed through the improvised embankment, until within a few hours it was twenty-seven feet deep in some parts of the city. Street after street, building after building collapsed, until, when the waters went down and the damage could be estimated, it was said that a thousand lives have been lost and over two thousand houses entirely destroyed. Indeed, out of 4255 houses but 1147 were left intact.

“The day of horror, the acme of misery, was 15 March. Pest will probably never number in her annals so dark a day again—she might perhaps not be able to survive such another—the maddened river as that day dawned, rioted in ruin; and many looked upwards to the clear cold sky, and wondered whether the Almighty promise was forgotten. Thousands of men, women and children, homeless, houseless, hopeless beings, clinging to life, when they had lost nearly all that made life a blessing; parents and children, and sisters and lovers—the young helpless in their first weakness and the old trembling in their last—the strong man whose weapon was stricken from his hand by a power against which the strongest contends in vain; the philosopher who in all his abstraction had found no preparation for so hideous a death as this; the mother whose hope had withered as her babe died upon her bosom, who clung to life rather from instinct than volition; the fond, the beautiful, the delicately nurtured—all were huddled together during that fearful day, upon the narrow spaces scattered over the town and suburbs, which the water had not yet reached. And, as it wore by, every half-hour added to the devastation around them; houses and buildings which had survived the first shock, seemed to have been preserved only to add to the horrors of that day. Many of them fell and perished from roof to base; others became rent by the heavy dashings of the waters, and through the yawning apertures the wasting tide poured in and ruined all it touched; while, to add to the confusion, in some quarters of the city the heavy barges, which had been procured to remove the sufferers from their threatened houses, broke loose, and went driving onward through the streets on the crests of the foaming waters.”

Many of the nobles and other inhabitants devoted themselves to the succouring of their fellows, and a memorial of such service is to be seen on a wall in the Kossuth Lajos Ut, where there is a fine tablet in relief depicting Baron Nicholas Wesselényi engaged as boatman in rescuing sufferers from almost submerged houses.

So great was the devastation that we may well marvel over the energy and determination of the people who set about rebuilding the place. Indeed, it was said when the new Pest began to rise where the old had been ruined that, but for the terrible loss of life, the disaster was a blessing in disguise, so boldly was the new town planned, so solidly were the new buildings designed. Since then it may be hoped that the improvements of the Danube for navigation have also had the effect of greatly reducing the chance of any repetition of such a visitation. Certainly it is difficult to realize any such disaster in connexion with the far-spreading city on which we look down from any of the heights on the western side of the river.

And it is the river that inevitably draws one; the river to which this strangely fascinating city owes no small measure of its fascination. Even when we have been up and down its broad streets, and its “Rings”; have visited the fine museums; have inspected some of the many statues—Budapest bids fair to become known as a city of beautiful sculpture—have wandered about the attractive Városliget or public park, it is as though we were insensibly drawn back to the Danube; to the lovely park-like Margaret’s Island; to the fashionable promenade along the left bank, where for a time in the afternoon it is as though everybody in the place walked up and down; to the quays to watch the ever-attractive operations of lading and unlading the barges, the arrival or departure of the up and down river steamers or the busy traffic of the bridge.

Here, too, as has been suggested, are to be seen some of the finest buildings of a city remarkable for such. Notably, first of all, the beautiful Parliament House, which remains in memory as a wonderful range of spired buildings with something of the delicacy of lace-work; the substantial Renaissance Academy; and such palatial offices as the great Gresham building named after the English merchant prince. “To name them all would need” if not a thousand tongues, the small type and concision of a guide book. The handsome bridges form a notable feature of the Budapest Danube—in which respect the river here contrasts strongly with the portion of it that flows past Vienna—and the first of them to be built, the Lánczhid or suspension bridge, is worthy of note as being one of the longest of its kind in Europe, (1227 feet) and as having been constructed (1839-49) by an English engineer, William Tierney Clark. It will be recognized that this bridge was begun the very year after the terrible inundation. Its stability has been proved by its withstanding “the shocks of masses of ice, the repeated charges of an attacking army, and the tumultuous crowding of a retreating force”; it is even further said to have resisted the attempts of military engineers to destroy it by gunpowder. This, presumably, was in the War of Independence at the time when it had only just been completed at a cost of over six hundred thousand pounds.

THE PALACE, BUDAPEST

The engineer’s choice of a point for his bridge proved to be exactly the same as that selected centuries earlier, for while the workmen were engaged in digging for the foundations of the new bridge they came upon the remains of a solid stone wall, the existence of which was very puzzling until it was discovered on searching the national records that on the very same spot the erection of a bridge had been commenced in the reign of Matthias Corvinus. It, or the old bridge of boats which it superseded, was the scene of a grim tragedy at the outbreak of that war—a tragedy which made the war inevitable—for Count Lamberg having been appointed by the Emperor of Austria as Commander-in-Chief of the Hungarian troops, the Diet refused to recognize the nomination, declaring all who should obey him to be guilty of high treason, and when he arrived at Pest, while crossing the bridge he was dragged from his carriage by the infuriated populace and killed.

Unlike Clark’s bridge and the later Francis Joseph bridge which crosses to the foot of St. Gellert’s Hill, both of which are supported on two piers in the stream, the graceful Elizabeth bridge, which spans the river between them, does so in a single span from bank to bank. The Margaret’s bridge is singular in that from its centre a branch bridge connects it with the southern end of the island from which it takes its name.

Less crowded, less superficially animated than Vienna, the Hungarian capital delights some visitors far more—though in regard to animation, if we go along the Francis Joseph Quay during the promenade hour, or along the Andrassy Street in the evening, when the cafés are at their busiest, then Budapest may compare in that regard, too, with the Austrian capital. The visitor perhaps feels more at home among the Hungarians than in the social cosmopolis, and that even though some travellers have declared that in Budapest we first touch the Orient. The comparison perhaps becomes the more inevitable in that Vienna is the last great city at which we stay before Budapest, perhaps also because we have here the case of the two capitals under one crown.

There is a feeling of hospitality about Budapest which is increased and fixed by the cordial reception accorded by the people with whom we come in touch. Mr. Arthur Symons, who has, as it were, made a study of the psychology of cities declares that at Budapest “coming from Austria, you seem, since you have left Vienna, to have crossed more than a frontier. You are in another world, in which people live with a more vivid and a quite incalculable life: the East has begun.” In his brief account of Budapest he gives a suggestive summary of the impression of that river-side promenade which, as I have said, is one of the abiding memories of the fascinating city: “To the stranger Budapest hardly exists beyond the Ferencz-Josef Rampart along the river, which has at all hours an operatic air, as of something hastily got up for your pleasure, and with immense success. Well-dressed people walk to and fro upon this cheerful boulevard, with its trees, cafés and flags; little trams run smoothly along it between you and the water, with a continual, not unpleasant agitation; steamers pass on the river. At sunset every point of the abrupt hill opposite is detailed in sharp silhouette against a glowing sky, out of which the colour is about to fade; the whole uninteresting outline of the palace, seen under this illumination, becomes beautiful. Lights begin to star the two hills, the hill of the citadel and the hill of the palace, sparkling out of the darkness like glow-worms; lights come out along the bridge and strike the water like gold swords. Some charm is in the air, and a scarcely definable sense of pleasure, which makes one glad to be there. One has suddenly been released from the broad spaces, empty heights, and tiring movements of Vienna, in which, to the stranger, there is only the mechanical part of gaiety and only the pretentious part of seriousness. Here, in Budapest, it is delightful to be a stranger; it is as if a door had been thrown open, and one found oneself at home with bright strangers. Idleness becomes active; there is no need for thought, and no inclination to think beyond the passing moment.”[14]

Those closing sentences sum up, in so far as it can be summed up, much of the impression that we bear away with us from Budapest. Though, perhaps, Mr. Symons somewhat too narrowly limits the impressions to those that remain of the Danube-side promenade, along with it one’s memory dwells upon the views from the right or Buda bank; upon the broad streets; upon the beautiful horses, which in every thoroughfare remind us again and again of the equine display in our Hyde Park drive when society in the season takes its airing; upon the palatial buildings and upon the delightful Városliget (People’s Park).

Those who know anything of the heroic tragedy that makes up much of the history of Hungary, should not fail to visit the extensive and well laid out cemetery (Kerepesi Köztemetö) with its memorials of the illustrious dead. There is the handsome Kossuth Mausoleum in which was buried in 1894 the remains of one of the chief leaders of the revolution. Louis Kossuth, who died in exile at the great age of ninety-two, had refused to accept the Compromise of 1866, from which his country may be said to date its renaissance, and never returned to Hungary after the tragic failure of the War of Independence. His stern republicanism—possibly, too, his defeated ambition, for there are not wanting critics of the man memorials to whom are to be seen in every town—could allow of no compromise with the Habsburg dynasty.

Some of his fellows were more far-sighted, and among them Francis Déak, who, no less sincere in his patriotism, worked untiringly at home as a simple citizen to bring about the welfare of his country by peaceful methods, rather than by any further appeal to the arbitrament of arms. Though much blamed for his share in the Compromise, Déak may be regarded as one of the chief agents of the renaissance. When at the time of the coronation of Francis Joseph as king of Hungary, it was proposed that Déak should accept a high position, he replied with a simple dignity that “It was beyond the king’s power to give him anything but a clasp of the hand.”

The Déak Mausoleum stands not far away from that of the fellow-worker who, though with like aims, would have chosen other methods than his for their attainment. Not far from the Kossuth memorial, too, is that of Count Louis Batthány, another of the leaders of the revolution and first constitutional Prime Minister of Hungary.

It is not surprising to find when we talk to an enthusiastic Hungarian—and the spirit of the country, so far as a visitor can judge, seems worthy of the patriots just named—to hear in many words what the Bostonian put pithily when he declared that his town was the hub of the universe. On the first night of my first visit to Budapest I happened upon one of these enthusiasts. He told me (and after disclaiming any regard for mere patriotic sentiment) that Budapest is without exception the most beautiful of all the great capitals of Europe; the city with the loveliest river front; the city in which all great improvements in civic amenities had been tested. Where, he asked, was the first road-tunnel made? Where were arc-lamps first used as street illuminants? Where was the first electric underground railway run? Where was the conduit system for electric tramways first employed? And in every instance he triumphantly answered his own queries with the same syllables—in Budapest. Where, he went on, could be seen such luxurious cafés? Where such magnificent stone-built business premises? And he paused triumphantly where, though it was near midnight, great insurance offices were being built—men and women labourers busily engaged by artificial light—to point out that it was all “stone upon stone.”