From Heltau I went on to Michaelsburg, an extremely curious place.  In the centre of a lovely valley rises a conical rock of gneiss, protruding to the height of 200 feet or more.  This is crowned by the ruins of a Romanesque church.  There are, I believe, only two other specimens of this kind of architecture in the country.  The time of the building of Michaelsburg is stated to be between 1173 and 1223.  Before the use of artillery this fortified church on the rock must have been really impregnable.  Inside the walls I found a quantity of large round stones—­the shot and shell of those days; these stones were capable of making considerable havoc amongst a besieging party I should say.  The custom was in the old time that no young man should be allowed to take unto himself a wife till he had carried one such stone from the bed of the river where they are found, to the summit of the rock within the church walls.  As these stones weigh between two and three hundredweight, and the ascent is very steep, it was a test of strength.  The villagers were anxious to prevent the weaklings from marrying lest they should spoil the hardy race.

The view from the village itself is very pretty, home-like, and with a more familiar look about the vegetation than I had seen elsewhere.  There were orchards of cherry-trees, and hedges, as in our west country, festooned with wild hops and dog-roses.  Every girl I met was busily engaged plaiting straw as she walked.  This straw is for hats of a particular kind for which the place is famed.  Besides this industry, the people are great bee-keepers, and make a good trade by selling the honey.  The produce of the hives in the Southern Carpathians is the very poetry of honey; it is perfectly delicious, not surpassed by that of Hymettus or Hybla, so famed in ancient story.  This “mountain honey” sometimes reaches the London market, but, unfortunately, not with any regularity.  It is most difficult to make these people practical in their trade dealings; and as for time, they must have come into the world before it was talked about.

I made a short excursion into the Rothen Thurm Pass, the principal road across the Southern Carpathians, if we except the Tomoescher Pass from Kronstadt, which, owing to local circumstances, has become more important.  The Rothen Thurm or Red Tower Pass is extremely picturesque.  It is traversed by the Aluta, which though rising in the Szeklerland in the north-east, finds its way through the Carpathian range, flowing at length into the Lower Danube.  The red tower stands at the narrowest part of the defile, an important position of defence; and not far from this spot signal victory was gained by the Christians over the infidels.  In the year 1493 the Turks made one of their frequent raids into Transylvania.  They had succeeded in collecting a vast amount of booty, including many fair young maidens and tender youths, and were returning in long cavalcade through the Red Tower Pass.  Here, however,