Tisza River

“ Austria 366 km,
Croatia 329 km, Romania 443 km, Yugoslavia 151 km, Slovakia 677 km,
Slovenia 102 km, Ukraine 103 km
Coastline: 0 km (landlocked)
Maritime claims: none (landlocked)
Climate: temperate; cold, cloudy, humid winters; warm summers
Terrain: mostly flat to rolling plains; hills and low mountains on the
Slovakian border
Elevation extremes: lowest point: Tisza River 78 m highest point:
Kekes 1,014 m
Natural resources: bauxite, coal, natural gas, fertile soils, arable land
Land use: arable land: 52% other: 45% (1998 est.) permanent crops: 3%
Irrigated land: 2,100 sq km (1998 est.) ”

“ There is hardly a tree, and the sky-line, unbroken in its tremendous semicircle, sweeps on ever infinitely. It is difficult to give any idea of the Alföld, unless the characteristics of the people who dwell in it are taken into account as throwing light upon it. This great plain, once an inland sea, contained at one time a gigantic marsh of 100,000 acres, and the rivers Theiss (or Tisza) and Danube overflowed their banks occasionally, making it impossible for any one to live near them in safety. ”

“ The Theiss is clear and swift in its course through the mountains, but in the plain it becomes slow, somewhat muddy and very tortuous. Its basin covers an area of 56,600 sq. m., and comprises the whole eastern part of Hungary, and the greater part of Transylvania, and collects all the rivers descending from the Carpathians westward.
The Theiss is navigable for rafts almost everywhere, but for steamers only from Szolnok downwards, a distance of about 200 m., where the breadth of the river is 450 to 759 ft. The depth of the Theiss at low-water mark is 7 ft. at Tokay, 20 ft. at Szeged and 11 ft. ”

“ Grand and lonely as it is, though villages and hamlets are passed at no infrequent intervals, more especially on the Hungarian side, it no longer suggests “primæval wilderness”—far less so, indeed, than some of the low-lying stretches between Budapest and Zimony (Semlin) . Passing between these rocky walls the river has narrowed considerably, and the swift current hastens to the cataracts and rapids which have been considerably modified by the gigantic engineering undertaking of improving the channel for shipping. ”

“ Opposition to the Tisza régime arose from two sources principally, i.e., the Kossuth party of Independence, which clung still to the principles of 1848, and the National party, led by the brilliant orator Count Albert Apponyi, distinguishable from the Independence group, on the one hand, by its provisional acquiescence in (p. 502) the Ausgleich and from the Liberals, on the other, by its still more enthusiastic advocacy of Magyarization. At Vienna, Tisza was regarded as indispensable; but growing discontent in Hungary undermined his position and March 13, 1890, he retired from office. ”

“ But this opposition was not specially Tisza's, for whichever of the Hungarian politicians might have been at the head of the Cabinet he would have adopted the same standpoint.
I sent at that time a confidential messenger to Tisza enjoining him to explain the situation and begging him in my name to make the concession. Tisza treated the messenger with great reserve, and wrote me a letter stating once for all that the voluntary cession of Hungarian territory was out of the question; "whoever attempts to seize even one square metre of Hungarian soil will be shot." ”

“ Tisza was a man whose brave and manly character, stern and resolute nature, fearlessness and integrity raised him high above the average man. He was a thorough man, with brilliant qualities and great faults; a man whose like is rare in Europe, in spite of those faults. Great bodies cast long shadows ”

“ A relative scarcity in running waters prevails in the whole region between the Danube and the Drave. The greatest proportionate deficiency, however, is observable in the arenaceous region between the Danube and Theiss, where for the most part only periodical floods occur. But in the north and east of the kingdom rivers are numerous. Owing to its orographical configuration the river system of Hungary presents several characteristic features. ”

“ To begin with, the Magyar-central standpoint was not a speciality of Tisza's; all Magyar politicians upheld it. Secondly, Tisza had one great point in his favour: he had no wish to prolong the war for the purpose of conquest; he wished for a rectification of the Roumanian frontier and nothing beyond that. If it had come to peace negotiations, he would have supported me in taking as a basis the status quo ante. His support—and that was the third reason—was of great value, for he was a man who knew how to fight. He had become hard and old on the battlefield of parliamentary controversy. ”

“ The streets and squares are now darker than ever. A new order has been published that shops are to be closed at five, and so the shop-windows are dark after that hour. I passed in front of a Kinematograph, where big coloured posters near the entrance “featured” Tisza’s death. An actor was made up as Tisza, and an actress represented Countess Tisza: Denise Almássy too was impersonated. The manager had had the reel staged on the authentic spot of the murder. ”

“ Near the next stopping place, Apátin, is a relic of the Roman occupation of the Hungarian plain, in the [Pg 231] form of an embankment extending from near the Danube to the Tisza (Theiss) . This “Römerschanze,” about twelve feet high and twenty broad, served to enclose an extensive tract which, with the Danube on the west and south, and the Tisza on the east, must have been a fairly impregnable position in the olden times. ”

“ In daytime, one could hardly imagine a more pleasant journey than on board a barge which leisurely floats down, without any of the noises of a steamer—one or two strokes being occasionally given with its immense stern rudder to keep it in the main current. For the lover of nature, the lower part of the Shílka and the upper part of the Amúr, where one sees a most beautiful, wide, and swift river flowing amidst mountains rising in steep wooded cliffs a couple of thousand feet above the water, offers one of the most delightful scenes in the world. ”

“ It is fed by numerous streams and springs, and discharges its superfluous waters through the Sió, the Kapos River, and the Kapos Canal into the Danube. The southern bank is low, while the northern is bounded by vine-clad hills. The lake abounds in fish. ”

“ It is easy to see that a good year of inundation extends the borders of the so-called lake to within the Naizar; and there are well-defined beds of dry canals intersecting the country, which prove the existence former y of an extensive water-system no longer prevailing. The main canal of Seistan, confounded by some writers with the parent river, bears the waters of the Helmund westward into the heart of the country. ”

“ We draw near to a small projecting height, behind which the road runs to Kangan and Leh. Side branches debouch into the canal, but we make for a lake called Anchar; its water is greyish blue, and comes from the Sind, or Send as they here pronounce the name of the river.
After a while eddies and sandbanks show that we are in the river. The sun has set; the summer evening is quiet and peaceful, only the gnats buzz over the water.
Though the rowers work steadily, putting forth all their strength, we make slow progress, for the current is strong 33 against us. ”

“ Like Count Berchtold, he had received the education and training of a Hungarian aristocrat. He is an autocrat of the old school, whose strong will has never been broken by opposition. Possessed of great strength of character, but educated in an atmosphere of unreality, he had no grasp of what was really happening in Europe. Tisza always prided himself on his loyalty to the Emperor. When the sovereign told him to reduce the rebellious Hungarian Parliament to order, he did not hesitate to order the soldiers to drag out offending members. ”

“ The Magyars, the real Hungarian ruling race, are most skilful politicians. Their elections often are corrupt and all the tricks of the politician are in use in Hungary.
In many families political talent seems hereditary. Tisza, the Premier of Hungary for the period [212] for some time before the war, was the son of Tisza, who was Premier of Hungary about the year 1875. Kossuth, son of the great Kossuth, has been active in politics. ”

“ With this exception the valley is quite uninhabited, but the numerous turf huts of all ages and in all stages of decay met with along the banks, show that parties of Finns occasionally visit the river to fish it, while others further away nearer the fjeld are evidently the remains of Fjeld Lapp encampments, as the remains of Reindeer and Wolves and the shed antlers on the fjeld testify. From the south side of the lake a tolerably well-marked foot-track leads across the fjeld to Polmak, on the Tana; this is used by parties of Finns with pack-horses, who come to net the lake. ”

“ The broad River Irtish flows placidly onward, five hundred miles to Omsk and thousands of miles to the Arctic Ocean, and it is navigated by a considerable number of steamers and sailing boats. It is a great waterway—a sort of safer sea in the heart of Asia. The wonder is that more towns have not sprung up on its shores. In the history of the world it has not yet become a typical river. It flows from the silences of the Altai mountains, through the silences of Northern Asia, the noise of man hardly ever becoming more than a whisper upon it. ”

“ After some stay, we set out with fresh boats and crews, and were five days passing the wild rapids between here and Wieng Chan. The river finds its way among low hills in a narrow, deep channel between clay-slate rocks alternating with sandstones and conglomerates with a general easterly dip. The rapids are of the whirlpool and eddy character, and extend for miles on end; the water is in places confined to a width of 150 feet, and the rushes, boilings, spinnings, and general deafening pandemonium which results is astounding; not one place is like another, nor one whirlpool like the next. ”

“ On the western side, west of the Raab, the heights drained by the river are peopled by Germans and, in spite of a complex boundary zone, a convenient line of demarcation could be drawn upon the basis of elevation. Southward the old-time utility of the Drave as the dividing line between Croat and Hungarian remains unimpaired to this day. In the east, however, around the confluence of this river with the Danube and towards the Theiss valley the swamp lands have repelled the ease-loving Hungarian as effectively as the mountains to the east and north. ”

“ Flat slabs of schist, branches, and roots have been inserted into cracks and fissures of the precipice 120 feet above the river, and on these planks, poles, and stones are laid forming a gutter a foot broad, without a scrap of railing, where one must even keep one’s tongue in one’s mouth lest one should lose one’s balance. Of course we traverse this stretch of road, called Tigu-tang, on foot, leaning inwards and supporting ourselves by the rock. We breathe freely again when we are safely over, and the great basin lies before us where, at Linga, two important valleys converge. ”

“ It descended from Ulding abruptly to the level of the Dras river, to cross at its point of junction a large tributary whose source is in the eastern slopes of Deotsu. A succession of steep ascents and descents followed for four or five miles, throughout which distance the ravine through which the river ran was narrow and precipitous and quite without villages. Further up, the valley widened a little, the mountains rose less steeply, and left narrow strips of level ground along the margin of the stream. ”

“ And here let it be asserted that Tisza was one of the best fighters and shots in the country. With a Browning, armed with seven shots, a door may well be defended against more than three men. But he did not do it. One of the soldiers expressed the wish that Tisza's wife and sister-in-law should leave the room. This they refused to do. The soldier said to Tisza that he might put away the revolver. Tisza answered: "You have weapons, too." ”

“ On the 9th of November I encamped at Kiris, and next day I passed the junction of the Indus and Shayuk. The direction of the united streams soon becomes nearly due north, and it flows for many miles through a very narrow ravine, along which the road is of a most difficult nature, partly high on the mountains, partly on platforms of alluvium, and occasionally over angular blocks of rock, which are piled in enormous heaps along the banks of the river. ”

“ Beyond this, crossing the Rúdbár canal, we entered a wide gulf or reach of level land. It is now a perfect wilderness; and in its centre, on a low mound, are the ruins of Lát Calá, of the history of which nobody could tell us anything. The surface around is strewed to redness with bits of broken pottery, bricks, and glazed ware. Farther on, our path still skirting the desert cliffs on our left, we passed the ruins of Karbásak or Garshásap, [202] and then veering towards the river on our right, crossed a bare pebbly tract down to Rúdbár, where we camped. ”

“ The river Min, flowing through the heart of the Fu-kien province, is one of the main outlets for the drainage of the mountainous region where the celebrated Bohea hills stand, and is also the channel down which the produce of one of the richest tea districts in China is conveyed for exportation. The stream, however, although a broad one, is not navigable for large vessels beyond the town of Shui-Kow, which stands on its left bank, at the foot of dangerous rapids, one hundred miles from the coast. ”