In regard to character the Walachians are sly, reserved, cunning, revengeful and indolent. With the appearance of the greatest simplicity they well know how to profit by every opportunity of overreaching their neighbours. Indolence is a failing of the men rather than of the women, who perform all the labour of the house, make clothes for the whole family, and frequently afford their husbands much assistance in agriculture: whereas the men, after performing the most indispensable operations of the field and vineyard, pass the remainder of their time in idleness. The natural indolence of the Walachians receives much encouragement from the frequent holidays of the Greek church, which they usually spend in prayer, drinking and sloth. To work on such days would be criminal. They are much addicted to drink, and the Walachian will frequently consume in wine and brandy in a few hours the produce of the labour of a week. If he is fortunate enough to find a pipe or violin, in addition to a full pitcher, he seldom ceases from revelry till he is quite intoxicated, and is carried home senseless. It rarely happens that many Walachians are assembled under such circumstances without fighting, for they are very quarrelsome when drunk. The idleness of their disposition is naturally connected with an inclination to plunder; and if the Walachians are not such professed thieves as the gipsies, they never suffer a favourable opportunity to pass, and are particularly dexterous at stealing cattle; so that many laws passed in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries are directed against them by name, and at the present time the inhabitants of the countries in which they reside take strong precautions to prevent their depredations. When they leave their homes, for fear of punishment or to avoid military service, they often retire to the forests and mountains, where, singly, or in bands, they become the terror of the country. Perfectly acquainted with every hiding-place and every by-path, they are always ready to fall upon passing travellers, or to plunder lonely houses and villages, exercising the most inhuman cruelties: and in spite of the greatest precaution on the part both of the civil and military power, it is generally long before the depredators can be secured or expelled from their haunts, especially as the inhabitants are prevented by fear of a cruel revenge from affording effective assistance. The Walachians are in the highest degree superstitious, but make no scruple of employing shocking oaths on every trifling occasion. The stupidity and avarice of the greater part of the clergy, who find a rich source of profit in the ignorance of the common people, tend to encourage the failings and depravity of their flock. The ignorance and want of cultivation in the inferior Walachian clergy exceeds all belief; and there can be no doubt that the first step towards an improvement in the morals of the people must be a reform in that order.