PATON ' S HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS 01' THE ADRIATIC. *
Arras his long sojourn among the modern Syrians, and his exploration of Servia, Mr. Paton seems to have found himself at Vienna in 1846 ; when the late Sir Robert Gordon, our Ambassador, advised him to under- take a work which should give a general view of the material resources of the Austrian Empire. With this object, Mr. Paton visited the Austrian ports of the Adriatic in 1846-7 ; but the dynastic revolutions of the early part of last year seemed to render statistical and commercial matters un- attractive at present. To some extent, therefore, Mr. Paton has deviated from his original purpose. The first and a part of the second volume is an account of a tour in Dalmatia, including visits to its seaports and some of its highlands with occasional excursions in the interior. The re- mainder consists of an excursion through Croatia and to the frontier of Bosnia, with a disquisition on the past policy and future prospects of Austria. Mr. Paton also called at the ports of Fiume, Trieste, and Ve- nice, on his return, and gives a statistical and general notice of each place. It is unfortunate for the freshness of the book that Mr. Paton's Dal- matian tour was almost a counterpart of Sir Gardner Wilkinson's ex- cept that Mr. Paton did not penetrate Herzgovina at all, and was Wilkinson's, back from Montenegro by bad weather. It so happens, too, that the method of treatment is very similar. Each writer handles the history of the country and of the principal towns, gives a description of the anti- quities, and such sketches of the people and their landscapes as fell in his way. In point of historical or antiquarian elaboration, and perhaps of knowledge, there is little room for comparison between Mr. Paton and Sir Gardner : of the two, we think Sir Gardner had the better oppor- tunities for observing the people. As Mr. Paton sojourned longer in the towns, with the view of pursuing his commercial inquiries and picking up information, his sketches of city life and the urban Dalmatians are the fullest.
The tour in Croatia, containing some passing notices of Jellachich and the notables who are figuring in the Austrian civil wars, together with Mr. Paton's ideas of the rights and wrongs of the Hungarian question, has more interest than the Dalmatian journey. The attraction of the book, however, is not proportioned to its subjects. Mr. Paton's style has a sort of forced lightness, but it wants vigour and vitality. His taste is not inclined to the deep or the solid, but rests satisfied with the ex- ternals of things. When the character of an incident or a scene is in- herent and obvious, Mr. Paton can present it; but he is hardly able to discover the interest which everywhere lurks in nature, when there are skill and genius to develop it. His political disquisition is not much better than his description. He wants grasp and depth : his dis- cussions are like poor state papers, without that weight which a state paper however inferior carries with it from the position of the writer.
Mr. Paton is an admirer of great Ministers—a panegyrist both of Pal- merston and Metternich : his views are Austrian, such as Austria ex- presses in the late Constitution—which contains, by the by, his sugges- tion for the freedom of internal trade. For the Hungarians and their character he expresses regard ; but he opposes both the justice and the policy of their attempt at enforcing the Hungarian language upon the Selave tribes.
" As regards the interior of Hungary, the eighteenth century was for the most Wt pacific, and a gradual infiltration of German civilization took place; the Latin language being used as that of the Diet and public business, while German was the language of society. A rich national literature of the previous century kept the Illyrian language in full bloom; but the Magyar had fallen into such voluntary desuetude, that, without a literature, it necessarily ceased to be the lan- guage of the nobility; and up to the year 1825 its cultivation was a matter of niers antiquarian curiosity. At length, forth starts Count Secheniy to arouse the Hungarians from their slumbers. No one doubts his excellent intentions: steam on the Danube, roads, and bridges, are all the noblest monuments of his patriot- ism; but his idea of making Magyars of all the nations of Hungary, nearly a thou- sand years after they settled on the Danube, was the most unhappy project that ever entered into the brain of a statesman.
" From 1825 to the present time, the Sleeve of Hungary have resisted, as one man, the realization of this most unjust and impolitic project, of compelling them to abandon their mother-tongue for an almost forgotten Asiatic dialect. • • * " The Illyrian to a man regarded it as a gross infringement of their rights. " The mode in which the propaganda of Magyarisrn has been carried on forms
curious episode in the history of Hungary. The literature being still of dwarf- ish growth, hot-house expedients were resorted to, and premiums were proposed for tragedies and comedies: but the Illyrian Pasquins said that Thalia and Mel- pomene are not at the beck of presidents, vice-presidents, secretaries, and trea- surers. These prize-productions have as little of the natural vigour of the Illyrian literature of the seventeenth century as the Academy pictures of the eighteenth century have of the spontaneous genius of the previous ages.' Such harmless methods might raise a smile, but would never have provoked civil war. In the Wallachian county of Arad, which adjoins the Banat, and where only a seventh Part of the population is Magyar, they resolved not only that all political and ju- ridical business should be transacted in Magyar, but that no pastors and school- masters should be allowed but Efagyars ; that no boy could be an apprentice, no apprentice become a journeyman, no journeyman become a master, unless be un- derstood Magyar."
*Highlands and Islands of the Adriatic; including Dalmatia, Croatia, and the South- ern Provinces of the Austrian Empire. By A. A. Paton, Author of "Servia, the Young-
est Member of the European Family "; and " The Modern Syrians. Published by Chapman and Hall.
Of the Austrian bureaucracy Mr. Paton speaks better than any one else, at least in its treatment of the peasantry ; and as the country (op-. posed to the town) has stood fast to the government in the late convul- sions, it is probable there is some truth in his explanation.
"The rural bureaucratic system, which Joseph substituted for feudal*, worked as follows up to the presentlear 1848.
"The aristocracy and the landed pmprietors were unable to avail themselves. of their social superiority, as in some other more liberal countries, to follow their own inclinations in differences with the peasantry. It was to the functionaries 4f the circle that the peasant bad recourse to counterbalance the disadvantages
salting from the inferiority of his position to that of the proprietor lit the doidat scale; and it was in the equitable arbitration of the differences between'these two' classes that we are to find the grand secret of the immense power which the de- funct bureaucratic government wielded. There was not one law for the rich and another for the poor, as in many more liberal countries; or if a doubt existed at all, it was always the peasant and never the landlord that had the benefit of it. "In France, before the first Revolution, the aristocracy abused their position; and, the middle classes joining with an exasperated peasantry, the whole machine was reversed. In Austria, the aristocrat might be as exclusive as he pleased in his saloon ; but it is only as a member of the bureaucracy, and following its in- stincts, that be could pretend to political influence. This bureaucratic govern- ment was therefore in a position to view both peasants and landlords with perfect indifference. The latter often complained that they bad not amore efficient control of the peasantry; but, in reality, the bureaucracy by their impartiality rendered the greatest service to the aristocracy, by preventing that class of evils which pro- duced the first French Revolution. In a hundred rural male inhabitants of a great European monarchy, one may be considered as belonging to the aristocracy, or superior class, nine to the middle class, but the other ninety or nine-tenths of the whole form the people. The French Revolution of July, and the Eng- lish Reform Bill, produced a slight extension of previously existing oligarchies; but the great masa of the people and the lower part of the middle class re- mained, as regards political privileges, precisely in the same position as before: hence Chartism and Socialism. In Austria, the condition of the ninety forming the people was the first consideration of the bureaucrat; it was through him that the poor man fought his battle with the rich one. Hence the defunct rural go- vernment was a sort of joint-stock company, of which the peasantry were part- ners and the bureaucracy directors: hence the stability and solidity of the Aus- trian institutions during the French revolutionary wars, during national bank- ruptcy, and even during the confusions and disruptions of 1830 and 1831; power- fully aided and abetted, as they undoubtedly were, by the consummate skill with which in these stormy times Prince Metternich managed her diplomatic relations; some questions of course excepted—those of Cracow and Servia in particular. From the moment that the other states of Italy were revolutionized the Austrian, empire was certainly thrown off its balance: nevertheless, even the shock of events in Paris was resisted; not a province of the empire rose for weeks after the Fe bmary Revolution; but from the moment that the Archduke Louis put his veto on the resolutions of the Austrian Estates, then the machine fell to pieces."
These passages will give an idea of the more solid parts of the book ; examples of the descriptive style must be sought in the volumes. Had the gloss not been taken off by the previous appearance of Sir Gardner Wil- kinson's "Dalmatia," the Highlands and Islands of the Adriatic would of course have possessed more interest; but the real matter of the work is disproportioned to its bulk. A series of sketches and essays in a sin- gle volume would have been a more fitting medium of presenting what Mr. Paton has to tell. Some of that is really valuable, especially in the commercial information. Here is an account of the
MANUFACTURE OF MARASCHINO.
The principal manufactory in Zara [the capital of Dalmatia] is that of ma- raschino, the liqueur made from the masses or black cherry, which is grown mostly in the neighbourhood of Almissa, between Spirit° and Macarsca. Bor- deaux is not more famous for its wines than Zara for its liqueurs; and in the ma- nufacture of them they surpass all other places. I visited these distilleries one day, and found them to have nearly all the same appearance: a low ground-floor, opening on a little back-garden; large coppers of the liqueur closely covered, so as to exclude air; the shelves filled with vanous-ooloured rosolj; the Portogallo, or orange, clear as amber; and the delioioas Garofalo, or clove, the prince of li- queurs. Spanish wax was boiling in a pot over a brazier, and the corked bottles, being reversed, are dipped in it and sealed with the name of the firm. The fruit is picked and skinned in June and July. Drioli and some of the houses pre- tend to have secrets for mixing the proportions, which are transmitted to the women of the family from generation to generation; but, in truth, it is like the secret of the protean Jean Maria Farina of Cologne, the true secret being the possession of adequate capital and a current sale. The best maraschino is that of Drioli, Luxardo, and Kreglianovich. The maraschino of the first of these is reckoned by the native Dalmatians as the best of all; but it is dear. Luxardo makes good maraschino, and has a large sale; the maraschino of Kreglianovich is very good in quality and moderate in price, but not strong enough for the English and Russian taste; for while the Sicilians prefer weak and sweet maraschino, a more powerful liqueur is requisite for the English, Dutch, and Russian. There are altogether about a dozen distilleries in the town; and several of the proprietors have made handsome fortunes.
Previous page
