Dracula

The women looked pretty, except when you got near them, but they were
very clumsy about the waist.  They had all full white sleeves of some
kind or other, and most of them had big belts with a lot of strips of
something fluttering from them like the dresses in a ballet, but of
course there were petticoats under them.

The strangest figures we saw were the Slovaks, who were more barbarian
than the rest, with their big cow-boy hats, great baggy dirty-white
trousers, white linen shirts, and enormous heavy leather belts, nearly
a foot wide, all studded over with brass nails.  They wore high boots,
with their trousers tucked into them, and had long black hair and
heavy black moustaches.  They are very picturesque, but do not look
prepossessing.  On the stage they would be set down at once as some
old Oriental band of brigands.  They are, however, I am told, very
harmless and rather wanting in natural self-assertion.

It was on the dark side of twilight when we got to Bistritz, which is
a very interesting old place.  Being practically on the frontier--for
the Borgo Pass leads from it into Bukovina--it has had a very stormy
existence, and it certainly shows marks of it.  Fifty years ago a
series of great fires took place, which made terrible havoc on five
separate occasions.  At the very beginning of the seventeenth century
it underwent a siege of three weeks and lost 13,000 people, the
casualties of war proper being assisted by famine and disease.

Count Dracula had directed me to go to the Golden Krone Hotel, which I
found, to my great delight, to be thoroughly old-fashioned, for of
course I wanted to see all I could of the ways of the country.

I was evidently expected, for when I got near the door I faced a
cheery-looking elderly woman in the usual peasant dress--white
undergarment with a long double apron, front, and back, of coloured
stuff fitting almost too tight for modesty.  When I came close she
bowed and said, "The Herr Englishman?"

"Yes," I said, "Jonathan Harker."

She smiled, and gave some message to an elderly man in white
shirtsleeves, who had followed her to the door.

He went, but immediately returned with a letter:

"My friend.--Welcome to the Carpathians.  I am anxiously expecting
you.  Sleep well tonight.  At three tomorrow the diligence will
start for Bukovina; a place on it is kept for you.  At the Borgo
Pass my carriage will await you and will bring you to me.  I trust
that your journey from London has been a happy one, and that you
will enjoy your stay in my beautiful land.--Your friend, Dracula."


4 May--I found that my landlord had got a letter from the Count,
directing him to secure the best place on the coach for me; but on
making inquiries as to details he seemed somewhat reticent, and
pretended that he could not understand my German.

This could not be true, because up to then he had understood it
perfectly; at least, he answered my questions exactly as if he did.

He and his wife, the old lady who had received me, looked at each
other in a frightened sort of way.  He mumbled out that the money had
been sent in a letter, and that was all he knew.  When I asked him if
he knew Count Dracula, and could tell me anything of his castle, both
he and his wife crossed themselves, and, saying that they knew nothing
at all, simply refused to speak further.  It was so near the time of
starting that I had no time to ask anyone else, for it was all very
mysterious and not by any means comforting.

Just before I was leaving, the old lady came up to my room and said in
a hysterical way:  "Must you go?  Oh!  Young Herr, must you go?"  She
was in such an excited state that she seemed to have lost her grip of
what German she knew, and mixed it all up with some other language
which I did not know at all.  I was just able to follow her by asking
many questions.  When I told her that I must go at once, and that I
was engaged on important business, she asked again:

"Do you know what day it is?"  I answered that it was the fourth of
May.  She shook her head as she said again:

"Oh, yes!  I know that!  I know that, but do you know what day it is?"

On my saying that I did not understand, she went on:

"It is the eve of St. George's Day.  Do you not know that tonight,
when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will
have full sway?  Do you know where you are going, and what you are
going to?"  She was in such evident distress that I tried to comfort
her, but without effect.  Finally, she went down on her knees and
implored me not to go; at least to wait a day or two before starting.

It was all very ridiculous but I did not feel comfortable.  However,
there was business to be done, and I could allow nothing to interfere
with it.

I tried to raise her up, and said, as gravely as I could, that I
thanked her, but my duty was imperative, and that I must go.

She then rose and dried her eyes, and taking a crucifix from her neck
offered it to me.

I did not know what to do, for, as an English Churchman, I have been