Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. IIGleig, G. R. (George Robert)
History
Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II
Gleig, G. R. (George Robert)
Austria -- Description and travel; Bohemia (Czech Republic) -- Description and travel; Germany -- Description and travel
When the boy was gone we proceeded to question our landlady as to the
habits of his people, and we received from her an account corresponding
in all respects with that which our first informant had given us. She
added, over and above, that there was no trusting them; that they were
deceitful to a degree unparalleled among men, and that no arts or
offices of kindness ever won their forbearance. We listened to her
statements more than half disposed to credit them, yet we adhered to
our original determination, nevertheless, of joining the first gypsy
camp on which, during the course of our tour, we might stumble.
By this time it was necessary to move; and I state the fact in
consequence of a trifling incident, illustrative, I conceive, of the
extreme honesty of this simple people. We had advanced, perhaps, a
quarter of an English mile towards Arnau, a town through which our
route lay, when we heard a female voice shouting behind us, and on
turning round saw our landlady in full pursuit. I had left behind me on
the table a penknife,--of very little value, inasmuch as one of the
blades was broken,--and this good woman would not permit me to be the
loser of it. When I add, that she was in a state during which running
must have been both inconvenient and hurtful to her, the strength of
the principle which urged her to bring me my knife will be better
understood.
Arnau is an old-fashioned town, with a wide market-place, in the centre
of which stand two colossal statues, representing two warriors in
complete armour, each armed with a sword. The people told us they were
of very ancient date, and represented the two knights, by whom, in old
times, the town was founded. There is, besides, a convent of Franciscan
monks in the immediate neighbourhood, which contains eighty brothers; a
clumsy pile, evidently of modern construction, and resembling in its
exterior a manufactory, much more than a house of religious persons.
One of the brothers we met in the town, to whom the children seemed to
pay much respect. His dress was a brown coarse frock, a bare head, with
a shaven crown, bare legs, sandals for his feet, and a rosary of black
beads fastened round his middle. I asked him the way to Troutenau, and
received a very short, and somewhat unsatisfactory answer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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