The active commerce subsisting between Austria and Turkey, brings a great number of Turks into the former empire. All or nearly all of them are merchants. The advantages which they enjoy gradually induce them to settle in the country; but they are not yet sufficiently numerous to have mosques. These Turks therefore are content to practise their religion within their own houses; and when they do meet, it is not so much to worship God as to smoke and chat together. The coffee-houses of the Prater, and of Leopoldstadt, at Vienna, are commonly full of these foreigners, who carelessly seated on handsome divans, surrounded by sherbet and other liquors, and smoking long cigars, exhibit a picture of oriental manners amidst a European population. The stranger is equally struck by the splendour of their dress, the fashion of which is so different from that of the close garments of Europe. CHAPTER IV. CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE OF AUSTRIA IN GENERAL. The south of Germany would be the most fortunate country in Europe, if the government to which it is subject had not shown in many circumstances a weakness that but ill accords with the wisdom of its views. Temperate in its climate, fertile from the nature of its soil, and happy in its institutions, it remains invariably in a monotonous state of well-being, which is prejudicial to the activity of the mind alone, not to the happiness of the citizens. The inhabitants of this peaceful and fertile country have but one wish, that is, to live to-morrow as they lived yesterday. This tranquillity which in Austria pervades all classes of society is surely preferable to that agitation and thirst of wealth which torment almost all ranks in other countries. Thus industry, ease and domestic enjoyments are more highly valued in Austria than elsewhere: there every thing is done rather out of duty than for fame; and no man looks for the reward of his actions in the empty popularity which merely flatters pride and vanity, without ever gratifying the heart. A nation which has no other motive than a love of its duties must be essentially a generous and an upright nation. What nation displays, on the whole, more integrity and generosity than the Austrians? They carry the love of their sovereigns to the highest pitch, and that because they regard this love as the most sacred of duties. Let their rulers be ever so unfortunate, their attachment is but the stronger, and the greatest sacrifices seem to cost them nothing. The Germans in general, and the Austrians in particular, possess a sincerity and a probity that are proof against every thing. These valuable qualities originate as much in the excellence of their institutions as of their hearts. Their tranquil and peaceful disposition as well as their domestic habits, encourage in them a love of order and union from which they never deviate.