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It is the property of Mr. Lester Wallack, and is devoted to the legitimate drama. It has the best company in the city, and the two Wallacks are to be seen here alone. THE OLYMPIC was built for Laura Keene, but has now passed into other hands. It is a well arranged, pleasant hall, and for the last year has been famous as the headquarters of that eccentric individual called "Humpty Dumpty."
Lester Wallack's father, James Wallack, was one of the guests, and with a kind of shyness, which was unexpected but very agreeable in a veteran actor, he pleaded earnestly that he could not sing and knew no story.
On arriving at Varhely, or Gradischtie, as it is called in Wallack language, I found that it was worth while to stay the night, for the sake of having the afternoon to examine the Roman remains scattered about the neighbourhood. The Wallack villages I had passed through were very miserable-looking places: they are generally in the south of Transylvania.
Two miles farther on we came upon fourteen carts of gipsies, as wild a crew as one could meet all the world over. Some of the men struck me as handsome, but with a single exception the women were terribly unkempt-looking creatures. It was fully six o'clock before we reached Oravicza; the drive of twenty-five miles had taken eight hours instead of four, as the Wallack had profanely promised.
We further regaled ourselves with a good meal at the village on the Hungarian side of the Danube, after crossing again in the "dug-out." The pope of the village entered into conversation with us, and finding I was a stranger he ordered a Wallack dance for our amusement.
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.
The field where it is held is right opposite Hotel "No. 1," and the whole place was crowded with country-folks in quaint costumes spruce, gaily-dressed people mixed up with Wallack cattle-drivers and other picturesque rascals, such as gipsies and Jews, and here and there a Turk, and, more ragged than all, a sprinkling of refugee Bulgarians.
It was not in one place, or from one person, but from every one with whom I spoke on the subject, that I heard frightful stories of Wallack atrocities. In one instance a noble family in all, thirteen persons, including a new-born infant were slaughtered under circumstances of horrible barbarity within the walls of their castle. The name I think was Bardi; it is matter of history.
We found them trembling from head to foot, but we could not discover the cause of their fright. I fired off my revolver twice; the Wallack in the meantime had lighted a bundle of resinous fir branches as a torch. He had carefully arranged it before he slept; it is a capital thing, as it gives a good light on an emergency.
I now asked the Wallack in German if he could drive me to Oravicza, for I saw he had made up his mind to drive me somewhere. To my relief I found he could speak German, at all events a few words. He replied he could drive the "high and nobly born Excellency" there in four hours. The time was one thing, but the charge was quite another affair.
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