Dracula (version 2)
by Bram Stoker

Publication date 2010-06-30
Usage Public DomainCreative Commons Licensepublicdomain
Topics Librivox, audio, Dracula, drama, vampire

chapter 1 of dracula this is a librivox recording all librivox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit librivox.org dracula by bram stoker chapter one read by mb jonathan harker's journal three may be left munich at 8 35 pm on first may arriving in vienna early next morning should have arrived at 6 46 but train was an hour late budapest seems a wonderful place from the glimpse which i got of it from the train and the little i could walk through the streets i feared to go very far from the station as we had arrived late and would start as near the correct time as possible the impression i had was that we were leaving the west and entering the east the most western of splendid bridges over the danube which is here of noble width and depth took us among the traditions of turkish rule we left in pretty good time and came after nightfall to klausenburg here i stopped for the night at the hotel royale i had for dinner or rather supper a chicken done up some way with red pepper which was very good but thirsty ma'am get recipe from meena i asked the waiter and he said it was called paprika hendel and that as it was a national dish i should be able to get it anywhere along the carpathians i found my smattering of german very useful here indeed i don't know how i should be able to get on without it having had some time at my disposal when in london i had visited the british museum and made search among the books and maps in the library regarding transylvania it had struck me that some foreknowledge of the country could hardly fail to have some importance in dealing with the noblemen of that country i find that the district he named is in the extreme east of the country just on the borders of three states transylvania moldavia and bukovina in the midst of the carpathian mountains one of the wildest and least known portions of europe i was not able to light on any map or work giving the exact locality of the castle dracula as there are no maps of this country as yet to compare with our own ordnance survey maps but i found that bistritz the post town named by count dracula is a fairly well-known place i shall enter here some of my notes as they may refresh my memory when i talk over my travels with mina in the population of transylvania there are four distinct nationalities saxons in the south and mixed with them the wallocks who are the descendants of the nations magyars in the west and zacchaeus in the east and north i am going among the latter who claim to be descended from attila and the huns this may be so for when the magyars conquered the country in the 11th century they found the huns settled in it i read that every known superstition in the world is gathered into the horseshoe of the carpathians as if it were the center of some sort of imaginative whirlpool if so my stay may be very interesting mem i must ask the count all about them i did not sleep well though my bed was comfortable enough for i had all sorts of queer dreams there was a dog howling all night under my window which may have had something to do with it or it may have been the paprika for i had to drink up all the water in my carafe and was still thirsty towards morning i slept and was awakened by the continuous knocking at my door so i guess i must have been sleeping soundly then i had for breakfast more paprika and a sort of porridge of maize flour which they said was mamaliga and eggplant stuffed with forced meat a very excellent dish which they call implitara ma'am get recipe for this also i had to hurry breakfast for the train started a little before eight or rather it ought to have done so for after rushing to the station at 7 30 i had to sit in the carriage for more than an hour before we began to move it seems...