Eastern or Wooded Carpathians end, the range of mountains divides and sends ramifications in two directions, to the south and to the west. These chains which enclose Transylvania, giving it the general aspect of a great natural fortress, are the most eastern offshoots of the mountain system of central Europe, and guard the approach from the east to the great Hungarian plain. They slope gently towards the interior of Transylvania, but rather abruptly towards Rumania, and while the western wall possesses several large and easy passes, the eastern and southern walls are much more difficult to cross.
The eastern wall of the Transylvania quadrilateral is composed of two parallel ranges of mountains divided by the valleys of the Maros and Aluta. The outer range is composed of the following groups: the Gyergyó Mountains (including the Kelemen range) with the highest peaks Kelemenhavas (6600 ft.) and Pietrosul (6908 ft.); the Csik Mountains with the highest peaks Nagy-Hagymas (5900 ft.) and the volcanic Büdös (3300 ft.); and the Bereczk Mountains with the highest peak Lakócza (5830 ft.). The inner range is composed of the following groups: the Görgény Mountains with the highest peak Mezöhavas (5826 ft.); the Hargitta Mountains with the highest peak Hargitta (5900 ft.); and the Barota Mountains with the highest peak Kukukhegy (5120 ft.). Near the mouths of the Maros and the Aluta are situated the celebrated Györgyö valley, one of the most beautiful in the whole Transylvania, and the famous Borszék valley with its mineral springs.
The southern wall of the Transylvanian highland is occupied by the Transylvanian Alps. They have a length of 230 m., and are the highest and wildest mountain range of the whole Transylvanian system, resembling the High Tatra in their bold and high peaks, their beautiful scenery, and their flora. The Transylvanian Alps rise to an altitude of 7200 ft. above the level of the Danubian (Rumanian) plain, and are divided into a considerable number of groups. From east to west these groups are: the Bodza Mountains with the highest peak Csukás (Ciucas, 6424 ft.); the Burzenland Mountains with the beautiful peaks of Bucsecs (8230 ft.), Königstein (7352 ft.) and Schuler (5910 ft.); the high Forgaras group, extending to the Roteturm pass, and containing Negoi (8345 ft.), the highest peak in the Transylvanian mountains, Butyan (8230 ft.) and Surul (7482 ft.). West of the Roteturm pass the Transylvanian Alps are also known under the name of the Hátszeg Mountains, and consist of the following groups: the Cibin Mountains with the highest peak Cindrel (7366 ft.); the Paringul Mountains with the highest peak Mandra (8260 ft.); the Vulkan Mountains, and the Hátszeg Mountains proper with the beautiful peak Retiezat (8125 ft.). The south-western part of the Transylvanian Alps is formed by the Cserna or Ruszka Mountains with the highest peak Verfu Petri (8140 ft.) whose offshoots, of a mean altitude of 3200–4700, known as the Banat Mountains, fill the Banat. The southern part of the Cserna Mountains, known as the Stretinye Mountains, extend to the Danube, and together with the Miroch Mountains, on the right side of the Danube, and belonging, therefore, to the Balkan system, form the famous gorge of the Iron Gate near Orsova.
The western and northern wall of the Transylvanian quadrilateral do not present the character of an uninterrupted chain of mountains, but possess many low and easy passes towards the Hungarian plain. Going from south to north the principal groups are: the Transylvanian Ore Mountains with the basaltic mass of the Detunata (3768 ft.) near Abrudbánya; the Bihar Mountains, with romantic scenery and numerous caverns, with the highest peak the Cucurbeta (6045 ft.); to the east of this group are the Aranyos Mountains with the highest peak, the Muntelui Mare (5970 ft.), to the south-west of Kolozsvár; then come the Meszes group and the Kraszna Mountains. The northern wall is formed by the Lápós Mountains with the highest peak Ciblesiu (6020 ft.), and the Rodna Mountains with the highest peaks Muncsel (5835 ft.), Pietrosu (7544 ft.) and Ineu (7484 ft.).
Inside this mountainous quadrilateral lies the Transylvanian highland or plateau, which has a mean elevation of 1000–1600 ft. It is improperly called a plateau, for it does not possess anywhere extensive plains, but is formed of a network of valleys of various sizes, ravines and cañons, united together by numerous small mountain ranges, which usually attain a height of 500–800 ft. above the altitude of the valley.
In the Transylvanian Mountains the principal passes are: the Rodna, the Borgo, the Tölgyes and the Békás. Then come the Gyimes, the Uz and Oitoz, the Bodza or Buzeu, the Tömös or Predeal pass, crossed by the railway from Brassó to Bucharest, the famous Roteturm pass (1115 ft.) through the narrow gorge of the Aluta, crossed by the railway from Nagy-Szeben to Bucharest, the Vulkan, the Teregova pass, and the Iron Gate pass, both crossed by the railway from Temesvár to Craiova. All those passes lead from Transylvania into Rumania. From Transylvania into Hungary are the Bánffy-Hunyad pass, crossed by the railway from Nagy-Várad to Kolozsvár, and the defile of the Maros crossed by the railway from Arad to Broos. In the interior of Transylvania are the Szent-Domokos pass near Csik-Szereda leading from the valley of the Aluta to that of the Maros (near their respective mouths) and the pass of Csik-Szereda over the Hargitta Mountains.
TRAP (O. Eng. treppe or traēppe, properly a step, as that on which an animal places its foot and is caught, cf. Ger. Treppe flight of stairs), a mechanical device for the snaring or catching anything, and especially wild animals. Traps for animals are of great antiquity, and no savage people has ever been discovered, whatever its culture scale, that did not possess some variety of snare. In the most primitive form of trap no mechanism need be present, e.g. a cavity into which the animal walks, as the pitfall of the Arabs and Africans or the snow-hole of the Eskimos. Dr O. T. Mason has divided traps into three classes: enclosing traps, which imprison the victim without injury; arresting traps, which seize the victim without killing it, unless it be caught by the neck or round the lungs; and killing traps, which crush, pierce or cut to death.
Enclosing traps include the pen, cage, pit and door-traps. Pen-traps are represented by the fences built in Africa into which antelopes and other animals are driven; and by fish-seines and pound-nets. Among cage-traps may be mentioned bird-cones filled with corn and smeared with bird-lime, which adhere to the bird's head, blinding it and rendering its capture easy; the fish-trap and lobster-pot; and the coop-traps, of which the turkey-trap is an example. This consists of a roofed ditch ending in a cul-de-sac into which the bird is led by a row of corn-kernels. Over the further end a kind of coop is built; the bird, instead of endeavouring to retrace its steps, always seeks to escape upward and remains cooped. Pitfalls include not only those dug in the earth, at the bottom of which knives and spears are often fixed, but also several kinds of traps for small animals. One of these consists of a box near the top of which a platform is hung, in such a way that, when the animal leaps upon it to secure the bait, it is precipitated into the bottom of the box, while the platform swings back into place. Another kind of pitfall is formed of a sort of funnel of long poles, into which birds fall upon alighting on a perfectly balanced bar, to which a dish of corn is made fast. The door-traps form a large and varied class, ranging in size from the immense cage with sliding door in which such beasts as tigers are caught, to the common box-trap for mice or squirrels, the door of which falls when the spindle upon which the bait is fixed is moved. The box-trap with a simple ratchet door, allowing the animal or bird to push under the door or wires which fall back and imprison them, is alike an enclosing and an arresting trap. There are four general classes of arresting traps, the mesh, the set-hook, the noose and the clutch. The mesh-traps include the mesh and thong toils used of old for the capture of the lion and other large game, and the gill-net in the meshes of which fish are caught by the gills. To the set-hook division are reckoned the set-lines of the angler, several kinds of trawls and the toggle or gorge attached to a line, which the animal, bird or fish swallows only to be held prisoner. The noose-trap class is a very extensive one. The simplest examples are the common slip-noose snares of twine, wire or horsehair, set for birds or small mammals either on their feeding grounds or runways, the victim being caught by the neck, body or foot as it tries to push through the noose. When the noose is used with bait it is generally attached to a stout sapling, which is bent over and kept from springing back by some device of the “figure-4” kind. This is constructed of three pieces of wood, one of the horizontal spindle on which the bait is placed, one of the upright driven into the ground, and the third the connecting cross-piece, fitted to the others so loosely that only the strain of the elastic sapling keeps the trap together. When the victim tries to secure the bait he dislodges the cross-piece and is caught by the noose, which is spread on the ground under the bait. The Patagonians take the vicuna with one variety of this snare, and, before the moose (Cervus alces) was protected by law in North America, even that animal, weighing often 1200 ℔, was caught in snares of wire and rope. There are two widely different types of clutch-traps: bird-lime and other tenacious substances, and jaw and clap-traps. The simplest form of the first is adhesive fly-paper. A common practice in Italy is to smear with bird-lime the branches in the neighbourhood of a captive owl, which results in the capture of numbers of birds, gathered to scold at their common enemy. Examples of the clap-trap are the clap-net, consisting of two nets laid flat on the ground and attached to cords in such a manner that they fly up and close when the draw-cord is pulled by a concealed trapper; and the various other spring-traps used by bird-catchers. The jaw-traps are the most important class of device for the capture of fur-bearing animals, and are the product of civilization. While rude specimens are known to have existed in the middle ages, the steel-trap as used to-day dates from the middle of the 18th century, and reached perfection in the latter half of the 19th, the “Newhouse,” named from the American inventor, having been the first trap of high grade. Steel-traps consist of two jaws, with or without teeth, which are worked by powerful single or double springs and are “sprung” when the victim steps upon the “pan,” which is
