Where steam had not yet penetrated, and there was no choice but between posting and the saddle, he usually rode; if the roads were level, and the route unsighly, he would take the luxnrioiis rest of a "Messenger's carriage," and post through the nights and days; but, by preference, hard riding carried him over most of his ground, with pace and stay that none in the service could equal, and which had made the Arabs, when their horses swept beside his through the eastern sunlight, toss their lances aloft, and shout, "Fazzia! Fazzia!" with applause to the Giaour. He rode so now, when, having passed direct from Belgrade across the lower angle of Transylvania, and crossed the Carpathian range, he found himself fairly set towards Moldavia, with only a hundred miles or so more left between him and Jassy, which was his destination.
The Principality was in ferment; Church and civil power were in conflict and rivalry; England, France, Austria, and Russia were all disturbing themselves after the affairs of this out-of-the-way nook, conceiving that with Greece in insurrection, and Italy in a transition state, and Poland quivering afresh beneath her bonds, even Moldavia might be the match to a European conflagration, and open up the scarce-healed Eastern question; and an
