Those interested in fiscal matters will find in Ada Kaleh a perfect example of a free trade community. There are no customs duties at all--not even on tobacco--and the Turks have the privilege of selling their tobacco, coffee, etc., in the enclosed bazaar on the quay at Orsova. It is the purchasers who have the privilege of paying the customs on that which they have bought at the bazaar before leaving the enclosure. This is a sufficiently clear object-lesson to those who refuse to recognize that duties are paid by the consumer. Indeed, those who visit Ada Kaleh and ferry across to the bank that they may walk back to Orsova, find a tiny customs house and officers waiting to claim duties on such souvenirs as they may have purchased in the island; a fez, a pair of slippers, a Turkish coffee cup--all are put in the scales, weighed, and after reference to authorities, are shown to be dutiable, though a quarter of an hour’s formalities show that the sum total is but a few pence. IV THE LOWER DANUBE CHAPTER XII THE IRON GATE TO RUSTZUK “Broken by masses of submerged rock The seething waters foam between the hills In far extending tumult.” The Lower Danube begins, officially, at the romantic rock of Babakáj, but in an account such as this, it seems more fitting to make the division some miles further down, where Hungary is divided from Rumania by the little tributary, the Bachna. Not only does the river here flow along another kingdom, but here is also one of the most famous parts of the great river--the celebrated “Iron Gate” which finds mention even in school geography books--mention, but, so far as I can recall, little description. In the manner of one who has acquired a fresh piece of information, since visiting this place--perhaps, by name, one of the best-known natural features of Europe--I have put to many people the question, “What do you understand by the Iron Gate of the Danube?” The answers have mostly been that it was, of course, a narrow chasm, a gorge, a defile, with lofty precipitous rocks on either side. Of those to whom I have put the question only one could give an accurate reply--and he had been there!