As a matter of fact, if the Hungarian
peasant gave up his _session_--that is to say, the land he occupied in
hereditary use--he was free to go wheresoever he pleased, and was not
forced to serve any master. In practice the serf would not readily
relinquish the means of subsistence for himself and family, and
generally preferred the burden, odious though it was, of the _robot_, or
forced labour. This personal liberty, which the Hungarian peasant in the
worst of times has preserved, is deep-rooted in the growth of the
nation, and accounts for their characteristic love of freedom in the
present day. It was this that made the freedom-loving peasant detest the
military conscription imposed by the Austrians in 1849, an innovation
the more obnoxious because enforced with every species of official
brutality.
The poor Czigany had not been so fortunate as to preserve even the
Hungarian serf's modicum of liberty. Mr Paget mentions that forty years
ago he saw gipsies exposed for sale in the neighbouring province of
Wallachia.
There are a great many "settled gipsies" in Transylvania. Of course they
are legally free, but they attach themselves peculiarly to the Magyars,
from a profound respect they have for everything that is aristocratic;
and in Transylvania the name Magyar holds almost as a distinctive term
for class as well as race. The gipsies do not assimilate with the
thrifty Saxon, but prefer to be hangers-on at the castle of the
Hungarian noble: they call themselves by his name, and profess to hold
the same faith, be it Catholic or Protestant.
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