According to M. Keleti's tables,
fifty-three per cent of the males and sixty-two per cent of the females
in Hungary generally are still illiterates. This excludes from the
calculation children under six years of age. On comparing notes, other
countries do not come out so very much better. It is calculated that 30
per cent of French conscripts are unable to read; moreover, in _our_
"returns" of marriages in England in 1845, a percentage of forty-one
signed the register with _marks_. In 1874 the number of illiterates was
reduced to twenty-one per cent.
I elicited a good many interesting facts from my Wallack guide, several
that were confirmatory of the terrible ignorance existing amongst the
priesthood of the Greek Church. The popes do not commend themselves to
the good opinion of the male part of the community, whatever hold they
may have on the superstition of the women. I cannot see myself how
things are to be mended till the position and education of the
priesthood are improved. It is said that, in the old days before '48,
when the peasants had to render forced labour to the lord of the land,
the Transylvanian nobles would have the village pope up to the castle,
and keep him there for a fortnight in a state of intoxication, thus
preventing his giving out the saints' days at the altar on Sunday. This
was done that their own harvest-work should proceed without the
inconvenience of suspending operations at a critical time on _fete_
days, the people themselves being too ignorant to consult the calendar!
The Magyar nobles are improved, and do not play these pranks now; but
very little progress, I imagine, has been made on the side of the
priests.
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