fiume, budapest, and the immigrant
it was a cold, cloudy, windy, rainy day when the little coasting vessel that was to take us across the adriatic drew out from the gray and misty harbour of the ancient city of ancona and started in the direction of fiume, the single point at which the kingdom of hungary touches the sea. i had read of the hardships of the early immigrants, and i heard once an old coloured man, who had been carried to america as a slave, tell of the long journey of himself and some fifty others, all crowded together in a little sailing vessel. it was not, however, until this trip of a few hours on the adriatic in a dirty, ill-smelling little vessel that i began to understand, although i had crossed the ocean several times, how uncomfortable a sea voyage might be.
fortunately the journey was not a long one, and after the vessel found itself in the shelter of one of the beautiful green islands which are stationed like sentinels along the dalmatian coast, it was possible to go on deck and enjoy the view of the rugged and broken coast line.
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it was indeed a splendid sight, in the clear light of the late afternoon, to watch the great blue-gray clouds roll up over the green and glistening masses of the islands, which lifted themselves on every side out of the surrounding sea.
what i had heard and read of the dalmatian coast had led me to look for the signs of an ancient civilization, not unlike that which i had left in italy. what impressed me at first sight about fiume, however, was the brand-new and modern character of everything in view. i do not mean that the city had any of the loose-jointed and straggling newness of some of our western american towns. it had rather the newness and completeness of one of those modern german cities, which seem to have been planned and erected out of hand, at the command of some higher authority. in that part of germany which i visited i noticed that nothing was allowed to grow up naturally, in the comfortable and haphazard disorder that one finds in some parts of america. this is particularly true of the cities. everything is tagged and labelled, and ordered with military precision. even the rose-bushes in the gardens seem to show the effect of military discipline. trimmed and pruned, they stand up straight, in long and regular rows, as if they were continually presenting arms.
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the impression which i got of modern hungary at fiume was confirmed by what i saw a few days later at budapest, the capital. there was the same air of newness and novelty, as if the city had been erected overnight, and the people had not yet grown used to it.
a little further acquaintance with the cities of fiume and budapest made it plain, however, in each case, that the new city which filled the eye of the stranger had been, as a matter of fact, built over, or, rather, added to, a more ancient one.
in fiume, for example, somewhat hidden away behind the new buildings which line the broad avenue of the modern magyar city, there is still preserved the outlines of the ancient italian town, with its narrow, winding streets, crowded with all the quaint and vivid life, the petty traffic, and the varied human sights and sounds with which i had become familiar during my journey through italy.
so in budapest, across the river from the modern hungarian, or, rather, magyar city of pest, there is the ancient german city of buda, with its castle and palace, which dates back into the middle ages.
what is still more interesting is that in these two modern cities of fiume and pest, in which one sees and feels the impress of a strong and
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masterful people, one meets everywhere, in the midst of this feverish and artificial modern life, evidences of the habit and manners which belong to an older and simpler age.
for example, it struck me as curious that in a city which is so well provided with the latest type of electric street cars one should see peasant women trudging in from the country with heavy loads of vegetables on their backs; and, in a city where the government is seeking to provide modern houses for the labouring classes, with all the conveniences that invention can supply, one should see these same peasant women peacefully sleeping on the pavement or under the wagons in the public square, just as they have been so long accustomed to sleep, during the harvest times, in the open fields.
in the same way, in another connection, it seemed strange to read in the report of the minister of agriculture that an agricultural school at debreczen, which had been carried on in connection with an agricultural college at the same place, had been closed because "the pupils of this school, being in daily contact with the first-year pupils of the college, boarding at the pallag, attempted to imitate their ways, wanted more than was necessary for their future social position, and at the same time they aimed at a position they were not able to maintain."
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all this suggests and illustrates the rapidity with which changes are going on in hungary and the haste with which the leaders in the government and in social life are moving to catch up with and, if possible, get ahead of the procession of progress in the rest of europe.
the trouble seems to be that in hungary progress has begun at the top, with the government, instead of at the bottom, with the people. the government, apparently, desires and hopes to give the masses of the people an education that will increase their usefulness, without at the same time increasing their wants and stimulating their desire to rise. its efforts to improve the condition of the masses are further confused by a determination to suppress the other nationalities and preserve the domination of the magyar race. in short, i think i might sum up the situation by saying that hungary is trying the doubtful experiment of attempting to increase the efficiency of the people without giving them freedom.
the result is that while the government is closing up the schools because, as the minister of agriculture says, "an important political and social principle is endangered" when students begin to hope and dream of a higher and better situation in life than that in which they were born, the masses of the people are
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emigrating to america in order to better their condition.
at fiume i had an opportunity to study at close range what i may call the process of this emigration. i had, in other words, an opportunity to see something, not merely of the manner in which the stream of emigration, flowing out from the little inland villages, is collected and cared for at fiume until it pours into and is carried away in the ships, but also to get a more definite idea of the motives and social forces that are working together to bring about this vast migration of the rural populations of southeastern europe.
in no country in europe, not even in italy, has emigration been so carefully studied, and in no country has more been done to direct and control emigration than in hungary. at the same time i think it is safe to say that nowhere else has emigration brought so many changes in the political and social life of the people. at one time, indeed, it seemed as if hungary proposed to make emigration a state monopoly. this was when the government, in granting to the cunard steamship company a monopoly of the emigrant business at fiume, made a contract to furnish that line at least 30,000 emigrants a year. at that time there were between one hundred and two hundred thousand
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emigrants leaving hungary every year, most of whom were making the journey to america by way of the german lines at hamburg and bremen.
it is said that the hungarian government, in order to turn the tide of emigration in the direction of fiume and swell the traffic at that port, directed that all steamship tickets should be sold by government agents, who refused permission to emigrants to leave the country by other than the fiume route.
since then, however, hungary has, i understand, modified its contract with the cunard company in such a manner that it does not appear as if the government had actually gone into the business of exporting its own citizens, and, instead of attempting to direct emigration through fiume by something amounting almost to force, it has rather sought to invite traffic by creating at this post model accommodations for emigrants.
as a matter of fact the government has, as a rule, attempted to discourage emigration rather than increase it. where that was not possible it has still tried to maintain its hold upon its citizens in america; to keep alive their interest in their native land and make the emigration, as far as possible, a temporary absence, in order that the state should not suffer a permanent
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loss of its labouring population, and in order, apparently, that the stream of gold which had poured into the country as a result of this emigration might not cease.
the actual amount of money which is brought back by returning emigrants, or those living temporarily in america, cannot be definitely determined. for example, not less than 47,000 emigrants returned to hungary in 1907. it is estimated, if i remember rightly, that each returned emigrant brought home at least $200, while the average immigrant, not permanently settled in america, sends back every year about $120, which is probably more money than he could earn at home. in the years 1900 to 1906, inclusive, there was sent to hungary by money orders alone, $22,917,566. in the year 1903 an official investigation shows that, in addition to the money which went from america in other ways, $17,000,000 was sent to hungary through banks.
one result of this influx of money from america has been that the peasant has been able to gratify his passion to obtain for himself a little strip of land or increase the size of the farm he already possesses. in fact, in certain places mentioned by miss balch in her book, "our slavic fellow citizen," the demand for land has been so great that it has
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increased in value between 500 and 600 per cent.[1]
in one year, 1903, according to miss balch, 4,317 emigrants from one county in croatia sent home $560,860, which is an average of not quite $130 per immigrant. with this money 4,116 homes were bettered, by paying debts, buying more land, or making improvements.
these facts give, however, but a small indication of the influence which immigration has had, directly and indirectly, upon the conditions of life among the masses of the people in hungary and other portions of southeastern europe. for one thing, in arousing the hopes, ambitions, and discontent of the so-called "inferior" peoples, it has added fuel to the racial conflicts of the kingdom.
the slovak or the croatian who comes to america does not at once lose his interest in the political and social struggles of his native land. on the contrary, in america, where he has opportunity to read newspapers printed in his own language, and to freely discuss racial policies in the societies and clubs which have been formed by the different nationalities in many parts of the united states, the average slovak or croatian in america is likely to take a more intelligent interest in the struggle for national
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existence of his own people than he took at home.
in the case of members of some of the minor nationalities it has happened that, owing to the persistence with which the hungarian government had discouraged their efforts to teach their own languages, it is not until they have reached america that they have had opportunity to read their mother-tongue.
some indication of the interest which the different immigrant peoples take in the struggles of the members of their own race, in their native land, is given by the work which several of these nationalist societies are doing in america. the national slavonic society organizes political meetings, raises funds for slovak political prisoners in hungary, and scatters slovak literature for the purpose of arousing sympathy and interest in the slovak cause.
in his book, "racial problems in hungary," seton-watson, who has made a special study of the condition of the slovaks, says:
"the returned slovak emigrants who have saved money in the united states are steadily acquiring small holdings in hungary, and helping to propagate ideas of freedom and nationality among their neighbours.... they speedily learn to profit by the free institutions of their adopted country, and to-day the 400,000 slovaks of america possess a national culture and organization which present a striking contrast to the cramped development of their kinsmen in hungary. there
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are more slovak newspapers in america than in hungary; but the magyars seek to redress the balance by refusing to deliver these american journals through the hungarian post-office. everywhere among the emigrants, leagues, societies, and clubs flourish undisturbed; ... these societies do all in their power to awaken slovak sentiment, and contribute materially to the support of the slovak press in hungary."[2]
seton-watson adds that "the independence and confidence of the returned emigrants are in striking contrast with the pessimism and passivity of the elder generation." it is for this reason, perhaps, that the magyars, who represent the "superior race" in hungary, say that "america has spoiled the slovak emigrant."
in travelling across hungary from fiume to budapest, and thence to cracow, poland, i passed successively through regions and districts inhabited by many different racial types, but i think i gained a more vivid notion of the strange mixture of races which make up the population of the dual monarchy from what i saw in fiume than in any other part of the country. in budapest, which is the great melting pot of the races in hungary, there is much the same uniformity in the dress and manners of the different races that one meets in any other large and cosmopolitan city. fiume, on the contrary, has a much larger number of people who seem to be still in touch
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with the customs and life of their native villages, and have not yet learned to be ashamed to wear the quaint and picturesque costumes of the regions to which they belong.
among the most striking costumes which i remember to have seen were those of the montenegrin traders, with their red caps, embroidered vests, and the red sashes around their waists, which made them look like brigands. after these, perhaps the most picturesque costumes which i saw were worn by a troop of dalmatian girls, the most striking feature of whose costume was the white woollen leggings, tied at the knee with ribbons. one figure in particular that i recall was that of a little woman striding through the streets of fiume, driving a little train of beautiful cream-coloured oxen.
all these distinctions of costume emphasized each other by contrast, and as they each signified differences in traditions, prejudices, and purposes of the people to whom they belonged, they gave one a sort of picture of the clash of races in this strange and interesting country.
even among those races which are no longer divided by costume and habits, racial distinctions seem to be more clearly drawn than at budapest. for example, to a large extent the business of the city seems to be
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monopolized by germans and jews. the government officials are magyars, but the bulk of the population are italians and croatians. as a matter of fact there are three distinct cities, which commonly go under the name of fiume. there is the modern city, with its opera house, its handsome official buildings, which is magyar; the elder city, with its narrow, gossiping streets and roman triumphal arch, which is italian, and, finally, just across the canal, or "fiume," which seems to have given the name to the city, is a handsome new croatian town which is officially distinct from the rest of the city, having its own mayor and town officials.
fiume itself has an exceptional position in the kingdom of hungary. it is what was known in the middle ages as a "free city," with a governor and representatives in the hungarian parliament. the mayor, i understand, however, is an italian, who has married a croatian wife. this alliance of two races in one family seems to have a certain advantage in the rather tumultuous politics of the city, for i was told that when the croatians, as sometimes happens, go to the mayor's house in procession, with their grievances, the mayor's wife has been able to help her husband by addressing her own people in their native language.
the most interesting thing i saw in fiume,
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however, was the immense emigration building, which has accommodations, as i remember, for something like 3,000 emigrants. here are the offices of the hungarian emigration officials, and in this same building are received and cared for, until the next succeeding sailing, the accumulations of the stream of emigration which flows steadily out at this port from every part of the kingdom.
here the emigrants, after they have been medically examined, given a bath and their clothes disinfected, are detained until the time of embarkation. in company with united states consul slocum, from whom i received much valuable information, i visited the emigration building and spent a large part of one day looking into the arrangements and talking, through an interpreter, with emigrants from different parts of the country who were waiting there to embark.
under his guidance i inspected the barracks, furnished with rows upon rows of double-decked iron beds, observed the machinery for disinfecting the clothing of emigrants, visited the kitchen, tasted the soup, and finally saw all the different nationalities march in together to dinner, the women in one row and the men in another. the majority of them were of magyar nationality; good, wholesome, sturdy, and
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thrifty people they seemed. they were from the country districts. some of them were persons of property, who were going to america to earn enough money to pay off mortgages with which their lands were burdened. very many of them had relatives, a brother, a sister, or a husband already in america, and they seemed to be very well informed about conditions in the new country where they were going.
the two most interesting figures that i noticed among the intended emigrants were a tall, pallid, and barefooted girl, with rather delicate and animated features, and a man in a linen blouse which hung down to his knees, his feet and legs incased in a kind of moccason, surmounted with leggings, bound with leather thongs. the girl was a ruthenian, who was going to meet relatives in america. the man, whom i noticed looking, with what seemed to me rather envious interest and curiosity, at a pair of american shoes on sale at one of the booths in the big common hall, was a roumanian.
two of the emigrants with whom i talked had been in america before. one of these, who understood a little english, seemed to be a leader among the others. when i asked him the reason why he was going back to america
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he spoke quite frankly and disparagingly about conditions in the old country.
he said it was not so much the wages that led people to emigrate, though they were small enough. but the worst of it was that there were long intervals when it was not possible to get any work. besides that, the taxes were high.
"and then," he added, shrugging his shoulders and throwing out his arm with a gesture of impatience, "it is too tight here."
i suspect that this expresses the feeling of a good many emigrants who, returning to their native country, have emigrated a second time. they have found things in the old country "too tight" for comfort. there is still room in america for people to spread out, and grow and find out for themselves what they are capable of. as long as people find things "too tight" they will move on. the plant stretches always toward the light.
among the emigrants with whom i had an opportunity to talk was a group of roumanians who had come up from transylvania, or siebenbürgen, as they called it. they were a dark, silent sort of people, who hung very closely together and looked at us out of the corners of their eyes. when i sought to talk with them they seemed indisposed to answer my questions,
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and finally one of them told the interpreter that they had been instructed not to talk with any one until they reached america.
considering the elaborate regulations which their government has imposed upon people seeking to leave hungary, and the still more elaborate regulations which our government has imposed upon people seeking to enter the united states, this did not particularly surprise me.
since these people were roumanians, or wallachs, from siebenbürgen, they may have had other reasons for not telling why they were leaving the country. the roumanians, although they proudly claim descent from the roman conquerors of this part of the world, are, nevertheless, classed among the "inferior," as they are, in fact, among the most ignorant, races in hungary. as they have been particularly persistent in advertising their wrongs to the rest of europe, and have been frequently punished for it, they may, perhaps, have learned that silence is golden, particularly in the presence of magyar officials.
when in vienna i was seeking for information that would help me to understand the racial situation in the dual monarchy, i found that one of the most learned and brilliant writers on that subject was a roumanian who,
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while he was a student in a roumanian academy in 1892, had been arrested with other students and condemned to four years' imprisonment for writing and circulating a pamphlet in which were enumerated "acts of violence" committed against the other races of hungary by the "superior" magyars.
the superiority of the dominant race seems, as a matter of fact, to be the foundation stone of the political policy of the present government in hungary. in the last analysis it seems to be the major premise, so to speak, of every argument which i happen to have heard or read in justification of the policy which the government has pursued in reference to the other races of the monarchy. in fact, the "superiority of the magyar" race is responsible for most that is good and evil in the history of hungary for the past seventy years. it seems, for example, to have been the chief source of inspiration for the heroic struggle against austria which began in 1848 and ended with the independence of hungary in 1867. it seems, also, to have been the goad which has spurred on the impatient leaders of modern hungary in their hurry to overtake and surpass the progress of civilization in the rest of europe.
unfortunately the ambition and success of
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the magyars in their effort to gain their political independence and preserve their peculiar racial type from being lost and swallowed up by the other and "inferior" peoples by whom it is surrounded have encouraged every other nationality in a similar desire and determination.
"if it is good for the magyars to preserve their language, customs, and racial traditions," say the other races, in effect, "why is it not just as important for us that we preserve ours?"
the reply of the magyars is, in effect: "you have no language, no history, no tradition worth keeping. in short, you are an inferior race."
naturally the argument does not end there. the other nationalities reply by founding national schools and colleges to study and preserve their peculiar language, traditions, and customs, while these nationalities who have previously had no history proceed to make some. thus the doctrine of superiority of the magyar race, which has been so valuable in stimulating the magyars to heroic efforts in behalf of their own race, seems to have been just as valuable in stinging into life the racial pride and loyalty of the other races. and thus, on the whole, in spite of its incidental cruelties, the conflict of the races in hungary, like the struggle of the white and black races in the south, seems to have done less harm than good.
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at least this is true so far as it concerns the races which are down and are struggling up, because oppression, which frequently stimulates the individual or the race which suffers from it, invariably injures most the individual or the race which inflicts it.
most of the "acts of violence" of which the subordinate nations complain are committed in the name of what is known as the "magyar state idea," which seems to be little more, however, than the idea that the magyars must dominate, although they represent but 51 per cent. of the population in hungary proper and 45 per cent. of the total population, including that of the annexed territory, croatia-slavonia.
so far is the magyar race identified with the government in hungary that it is punished as a kind of treason to say anything against the magyars. most of the persons who are persecuted for political crimes in hungary seem to be charged either with panslavism, which is usually little more than a desire of the slavs to preserve their own national existence, or with "incitement against the magyar nationality."
on the part of the magyars it does not seem to be any crime to speak disrespectfully, or even contemptuously, of the other races. i have observed that those writers who have
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sought to defend the "magyar state idea" refer quite frankly to the roumanians and the slovaks as "inferior races," who are not competent to govern themselves.
there is, likewise, a saying among the magyars to the effect that "a slovak is not a human being," a notion that seems to spring up quite naturally in the mind of any race which has accustomed itself to the slavery and oppression of another race.
it is, however, all the more curious that such a saying should gain currency in hungary in view of the fact that kossuth, the great national hero of hungary, was himself a slovak.
one hears strange stories in hungary of the methods which the dominant race has employed to hold the other races in subjection. for example, in the matter of elections, bribery, intimidation, and all the other familiar methods for exploiting the vote of ignorant and simple-minded people are carried on in a manner and to an extent which recalls the days of reconstruction in the southern states.
in order to maintain the superior race in power, newspapers are suppressed, schools are closed and the moneys for their support, which have been collected for educational purposes, are confiscated by the government.
as an illustration of the lengths to which
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hungary has gone in order to maintain magyar domination, it is said that when the catholic clergy, seeing the ravages which drink had made among slovaks, attempted to organize temperance societies among them, the government suppressed these organizations on the ground that they tended to foster the sentiment of panslavism and so were in opposition to the "magyar state idea." it is known, however, that the chief complaints against these societies were from liquor dealers.
apparently it is just as easy in hungary as in america for selfish persons to take advantage of racial prejudice and sentiment in order to use it for their own ends. in fact, all that i saw and learned in regard to the relation of the races in hungary served to show me that racial hatred works in much the same way, whether it exists among people of the same colour but different speech, or among people of different colour and the same speech.
if there are some points in which the relations of the races in hungary and the united states are similar, there are others in which they differ. while hungary is seeking to solve its racial problem by holding down the weaker races and people, america is seeking to accomplish the same result by lifting them up. in hungary every effort seems to be made to
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compel the so-called "inferior race" to give up their separate language, to forget their national history, traditions, and civilization—everything, in fact, which might inspire them, as a people, with a desire or a proper ambition to win for themselves a position of respect and consideration in the civilized world.
in america, on the contrary, each race and nationality is encouraged to cultivate and take pride in everything that is distinctive or peculiar, either in its traditions, racial traits, or disposition. i think i am safe in saying that there is no country in the world where so many different races of such different colours, habits, and traditions live together in such peace and harmony as is true in the united states. one reason for this is that there is no other country where "the man farthest down" has more opportunity or greater freedom than in the united states.
footnotes:
[1] charities publication committee, 1910.
[2] quoted by miss balch in "our slavic fellow citizens," p. 116.
