ians in high office, who retains his
old Turkish costume, and has a frame that reminds one of the Farnese
Hercules. Then what a medley of languages; Servian, German, Russian,
Turkish, and French, all in full buzz!

We proceeded to the dining-room, where the _cuisine_ was in every
respect in the German manner. When the dessert appeared, the prince
rose with a creaming glass of champagne in his hand, and proposed the
health of the sultan, acknowledged by the pasha; and then, after a
short pause, the health of Czar Nicolay Paulovitch, acknowledged by
Baron Lieven; then came the health of other crowned heads. Baron
Lieven now rose and proposed the health of the Prince. The Pasha and
the Princess were toasted in turn; and then M. Wastchenko, the Russian
consul general rose, and in animated terms, drank to the prosperity of
Servia. The entertainment, which commenced at one o'clock, was
prolonged to an advanced period of the afternoon, and closed with
coffee, liqueurs, and chibouques in the drawing-room; the princess and
the ladies having previously withdrawn to the private apartments.

My time during the rest of the year was taken up with political,
statistical, and historical inquiries, the results of which will be
found condensed at the termination of the narrative part of this work.

CHAPTER VII.

Return to Servia.--The Danube.--Semlin.--Wucics and
Petronievitch.--Cathedral Solemnity.--Subscription Ball.

After an absence of six months in England, I returned to the Danube.
Vienna and Pesth offered no attractions in the month of August, and I
felt impatient to put in execution my long cherished project of
travelling through the most romantic woodlands of Servia. Suppose me
then at the first streak of dawn, in the beginning of August, 1844,
hurrying after the large wheelbarrow which carries the luggage of the
temporary guests of the Queen of England at Pesth to the steamer lying
just below the long bridge of boats that connects the quiet sombre
bureaucratic Ofen with the noisy, bustling, movement-loving new city,
which has sprung up as it were by enchantment on the opposite side of
the water. I step on board--the signal is given for starting--the
lofty and crimson-peaked Bloxberg--the vine-clad hill that produces
the fiery Ofener wine, and the long and graceful quay, form, as it
were, a fine peristrephic panorama, as the vessel wheels round, and,
prow downwards, commences her voyage for the vast and curious East