belong to Count Karoly. If my driver was to be believed, the head of the house was a man of fabulous wealth; and certainly there was every indication of one of those great landed estates which we are accustomed to consider peculiar to England. But-and this is the circumstance which struck me most in the whole excursion-in order to reach Palota, we left the high road some few miles out of Pesth, and struck across fields. I am using these words literally, not metaphorically. We drove for a mile or thereabouts over one of those bleak bare fields, of which I had seen such an endless series on my journey through Hungary. There was no road: there was nothing except the mark of wheel-ruts to show us the direction we had to take. I thought at first my coachman had missed his way, then that he had taken a short cut across country. But it seemed that this was the regular route between Palota and the metropolis

-a distance possibly of eight miles. Traversing the bleak expanse of fields, we came upon a splendid private race-course, built for the use of the Karoly family; then we entered a private park, with handsome lodges; then we passed through a beautifully laid out private-garden. There were scores of labourers employed in the park, clearing the autumn leaves from the paths, and carrying the frostnipped flowers under shelter. Most undeservedly, I was supposed to be a guest going to call at the "Great House;" and everybody I met touched his hat to me with an almost obsequious respect. My conductor was anxious I should call at the mansion, declaring that strangers were always welcome; but, learning that the house was occupied, I declined visiting it. So I was taken through the great stable-yard, where English grooms were loitering about, and out into the model village of Palota, which the Count had constructed for the benefit of his labourers. The houses were comfortable and cosy-looking enough; but the stain of dirt hung about them everywhere. Standing in the midst of the village was the private chapel, which the Karolys

race. Whether architecturally it was in good taste or not, is another question. But there could be no doubt about its splendour, still less about its costliness. The chapel was ornamented with statues, ordered, for the purpose, from Tenerani of Rome, and was decked out with Florentine mosaics. "Regardless of expense" was, in fact, the epithet with which one felt inclined to describe the edifice. Everybody at Pesth spoke of Count Karoly as a model of publicspirited and energetic proprietors; and all I saw led me to suppose the praise was justified. Yet this nobleman, who had his city residence in Pesth and his country seat at Palota, and who must have spent hundreds of thousands in beautifying and improving the estate, had never taken the trouble to connect his park with the highway to Pesth by a common carriage road. The highest praise I heard given to the Count by everybody was, that he was a true Magyar; and so I believe he is, both for good and bad.

One of the subjects I felt most curious to learn about was the extent to which the Austrians had Germanized Hungary. I had seen a great deal, in SchleswigHolstein and Jutland, of the process of what is called in Teutonic treatises "Germanizirung." You may be the most zealous admirer of the Danes; but, if you are able to observe facts, you cannot doubt for one moment that the Teutonic element is gradually driving the Scandinavian out of the field, as far as the Cimbrian peninsula is concerned. No matter what Copenhagen politicians may choose to assert, the decline of the Scandinavian element as compared with the Teutonic is due to natural, not artificial causes. Somehow or other, the Germans in the Duchies were more energetic, more pushing, and more intelligent than their Danish fellow-subjects. They represented a greater nationality, a higher civilization. They worked harder; they were more adventurous in making money, more frugal in spending it, more fitted to succeed generally in the battle of life. So the result was that all business got

no

land came gradually into their possession; and Hamburgh, and not Copenhagen, became the real capital of Continental Denmark. I had expected to see a very similar process going on in Hungary. In all material aspects the civilization of Austria is infinitely higher than that of the Magyar kingdom; and the Germans settled east of the Leitha must have had, for long past, not only the positive protection of the Government, but the still greater advantage of belonging to the dominant race. Yet, notwithstanding this, there were indications that I could discover of the Magyars becoming Germanized. Everybody in Pesth spoke German; but German was obviously a foreign language. The book-stalls were filled with Hungarian books; the addresses of the candidates for election to the Diet, with which the walls of the town were then placarded, were all in Hungarian. This was the case even at Ofen, which is regarded as a German colony. And, what was even more significant, the German newspapers published in Pesth, of which there are some dozen or so, all took the part of Hungary in the AustroMagyar quarrel, and stood up, more or less openly, for the hereditary rights of the Hungarian kingdom. As far as I could learn, there was really no class of "Deutsch-gesinnte" in Pesth. I was told that the only partizans of the Austrian centralization scheme were the poor German Jews of the city, who had been villainously ill-treated beneath the old Magyar rule, and who owed their emancipation to the comparatively tolerant rule of Austria. Since the political troubles the Magyars have made it rather a point of honour to speak their own tongue in preference to German; but, even in the days when German was the common medium of conversation in the well-to-do classes, the German settlers only acquired position and standing as they identified themselves with the ruling caste. Moreover, the German immigration never got a footing in the rural districts.

Go a

few miles from Pesth, and you will not

language but his own. The fact, too, that the estates are to a great extent in the hands of large landowners, not of petty proprietors, has rendered impossible that gradual acquisition of land which proved the most powerful agency in the Germanization of Schleswig.

Such, at least, were the views on this subject expressed to me by persons I spoke to, and they appeared to be confirmed by all I saw. As to the feeling of the Hungarians with reference to Austria, I had very little means of judging. Some travelling acquaintances of mine-commercial travellers from Frankfort, who had just been making their rounds through the chief towns, and whose testimony was probably impartial enough-declared that the resolution of all classes to accept nothing less than the restoration of their lost independence was quite astonishing. About this I can say nothing. My own impression would be that the Emperor Francis Joseph was personally very popular in Hungary, but that, as the representative of Austrian unity, he could reckon on no national support whatever. This, however, is an impression derived rather from what I have read in newspapers, than from anything I actually observed. I fancy that English observers rather under estimate the difficulties of a reconciliation between Austria and Hungary. Such a reconciliation may be, and I believe is, the best thing for both kingdoms; but the past stands in the way. We, looking philosophically at the whole matter, may opine that the Kaiser is sincere; but it is difficult for a Hungarian to feel equally confident. A citizen of Pesth must be very young indeed not to remember the day when Russian troops, invited by the Emperor, were encamped as conquerors in the streets of the capital; the bloody assize which followed the repression of the rebellion cannot be forgotten yet by a people whose memory is singularly retentive; the great Blocksberg fortress hangs over the town as a perpetual menace in case the

pleasure of the Government; the very children can recollect the stern rule of the Austrian centralists, when the attempt was made to crush out by force the nationality of Hungary. And, with the knowledge of these things fresh in their minds, it is not odd if the Hungarians distrust the tardy offers of friendship which Francis Joseph has at last been constrained to make. Passion and resentment ought to have no place in politics; but, as long as the world lasts, men will be governed much more by sentiment than by passionless reasoning.

Let me conclude by telling one story, showing how history is made. While in Pesth I asked a man, who had been a private in the national army in '48,

something about Kossuth. Immedi ately he burst into a description of the doings and triumphs of the great popular hero, told me that he did not believe any man in the world had ever been loved by a nation as Kossuth was, and concluded by saying that, after he had been conquered, the great Powers of Europe had exiled him to an island, where he was treated with regal honours, though not allowed to leave his island prison. I timidly suggested that perhaps my informant was thinking of the Great Napoleon; but the suggestion was so ill-received that I withdrew it at once, and forbore to mention that, the last time I had seen the Ex-Dictator, he was dining at a table d'hôte in an Italian hotel, as little heeded as the writer of these lines.

CHAPTER XL.

PREVIOUS to the matters chronicled in the preceding chapter, Mr. Garnet had received a note, of which the following is a copy :

"SIR,-My friend, Major Blazeater, late of the Hon. East India Company's 59th Regiment of Native Infantry, has kindly consented to see you, on my behalf, to request a reference to any gentleman whom you may be pleased to name, for the purpose of concerting measures for affording me that satisfaction which, as a man and a gentleman, I am entitled to expect for your cowardly and most ruffianly violence, on the 28th ultimo. I beg you to accept my sincere apologies for the delay which has occurred, and my assurance that it has been the result of circumstances entirely beyond my own control.

"I have the honour to be,

Sir,

"Your most obedient Servant, "RUFUS HUTTON. Geopharmacy Lodge, Nov. 1st, 1859."

The circumstances beyond the fiery little doctor's control were that he could not find any one who would undertake to carry his message. When Bull Garnet read this letter-handed to him, with three great bows of the Chinese pattern, by the pompous Major Blazeater-his face flushed to a deep amethyst tinge, which subsided to the colour of cork. Then he rolled his great eyes, and placed one strong finger across the deep channels of his forehead, and said, “Let me think, sir !"

"Hurrah," said the Major to himself, 66 now we shall have something to redeem the honour of the age. It is a disgrace for a fellow to live in a country where he can never get satisfaction, although he gets plenty of insult.”

"Major Blazeater, you will make allowances for me," resumed Mr. Garnet; “but I have never had much opportunity of becoming acquainted with the laws-the code, perhaps, I should saywhich govern the honcurable practice of duelling at the present day."

"No matter, my dear sir; no matter

no

land came gradually into their possession; and Hamburgh, and not Copenhagen, became the real capital of Continental Denmark. I had expected to see a very similar process going on in Hungary. In all material aspects the civilization of Austria is infinitely higher than that of the Magyar kingdom; and the Germans settled east of the Leitha must have had, for long past, not only the positive protection of the Government, but the still greater advantage of belonging to the dominant race. Yet, notwithstanding this, there were indications that I could discover of the Magyars becoming Germanized. Everybody in Pesth spoke German; but German was obviously a foreign language. The book-stalls were filled with Hungarian books; the addresses of the candidates for election to the Diet, with which the walls of the town were then placarded, were all in Hungarian. This was the case even at Ofen, which is regarded as a German colony. And, what was even more significant, the German newspapers published in Pesth, of which there are some dozen or so, all took the part of Hungary in the AustroMagyar quarrel, and stood up, more or less openly, for the hereditary rights of the Hungarian kingdom. As far as I could learn, there was really no class of "Deutsch-gesinnte" in Pesth. I was told that the only partizans of the Austrian centralization scheme were the poor German Jews of the city, who had been villainously ill-treated beneath the old Magyar rule, and who owed their emancipation to the comparatively tolerant rule of Austria. Since the political troubles the Magyars have made it rather a point of honour to speak their own tongue in preference to German; but, even in the days when German was the common medium of conversation in the well-to-do classes, the German settlers only acquired position and standing as they identified themselves with the ruling caste. Moreover, the German immigration never got a footing in the rural districts. Go a few miles from Pesth, and you will not

The fact, too,

language but his own. that the estates are to a great extent in the hands of large landowners, not of petty proprietors, has rendered impossible that gradual acquisition of land which proved the most powerful agency in the Germanization of Schleswig.

I

Such, at least, were the views on this subject expressed to me by persons spoke to, and they appeared to be confirmed by all I saw. As to the feeling of the Hungarians with reference to Austria, I had very little means of judging. Some travelling acquaintances of mine-commercial travellers from Frankfort, who had just been making their rounds through the chief towns, and whose testimony was probably impartial enough-declared that the resolution of all classes to accept nothing less than the restoration of their lost independence was quite astonishing. About this I can say nothing. My own impression would be that the Emperor Francis Joseph was personally very popular in Hungary, but that, as the representative of Austrian unity, he could reckon on no national support whatever. This, however, is an impression derived rather from what I have read in newspapers, than from anything I actually observed. I fancy that English observers rather under estimate the difficulties of a reconciliation between Austria and Hungary. Such a reconciliation may be, and I believe is, the best thing for both kingdoms; but the past stands in the way. We, looking philosophically at the whole matter, may opine that the Kaiser is sincere; but it is difficult for a Hungarian to feel equally confident. A citizen of Pesth must be very young indeed not to remember the day when Russian troops, invited by the Emperor, were encamped as conquerors in the streets of the capital; the bloody assize which followed the repression of the rebellion cannot be forgotten yet by a people whose memory is singularly retentive; the great Blocksberg fortress hangs over the town as a perpetual menace in case the

pleasure of the Government; the very children can recollect the stern rule of the Austrian centralists, when the attempt was made to crush out by force the nationality of Hungary. And, with the knowledge of these things fresh in their minds, it is not odd if the Hungarians distrust the tardy offers of friendship which Francis Joseph has at last been constrained to make. Passion and resentment ought to have no place in politics; but, as long as the world lasts, men will be governed much more by sentiment than by passionless reasoning.

Let me conclude by telling one story, showing how history is made. While in Pesth I asked a man, who had been a private in the national army in '48,

ately he burst into a description of the doings and triumphs of the great popular hero, told me that he did not believe any man in the world had ever been loved by a nation as Kossuth was, and concluded by saying that, after he had been conquered, the great Powers of Europe had exiled him to an island, where he was treated with regal honours, though not allowed to leave his island prison. I timidly suggested that perhaps my informant was thinking of the Great Napoleon; but the suggestion was so ill-received that I withdrew it at once, and forbore to mention that, the last time I had seen the Ex-Dictator, he was dining at a table d'hôte in an Italian hotel, as little heeded as the writer of these lines.

CHAPTER XL.

PREVIOUS to the matters chronicled in the preceding chapter, Mr. Garnet had received a note, of which the following is a copy:

"SIR,-My friend, Major Blazeater, late of the Hon. East India Company's 59th Regiment of Native Infantry, has kindly consented to see you, on my behalf, to request a reference to any gentleman whom you may be pleased to name, for the purpose of concerting measures for affording me that satisfaction which, as a man and a gentleman, I am entitled to expect for your cowardly and most ruffianly violence, on the 28th ultimo. I beg you to accept my sincere apologies for the delay which has occurred, and my assurance that it has been the result of circumstances entirely beyond my own control.

"I have the honour to be,

Sir,

"Your most obedient Servant, "RUFUS HUTTON. "Geopharmacy Lodge, Nov. 1st, 1859."

The circumstances beyond the fiery little doctor's control were that he could not find any one who would undertake to carry his message. When Bull Garnet read this letter-handed to him, with three great bows of the Chinese pattern, by the pompous Major Blazeater-his face flushed to a deep amethyst tinge, which subsided to the colour of cork. Then he rolled his great eyes, and placed one strong finger across the deep channels of his forehead, and said, "Let me think, sir!”

"Hurrah," said the Major to himself, "now we shall have something to redeem the honour of the age. It is a disgrace for a fellow to live in a country where he can never get satisfaction, although he gets plenty of insult."

"Major Blazeater, you will make allowances for me," resumed Mr. Garnet; "but I have never had much opportunity of becoming acquainted with the laws-the code, perhaps, I should saywhich govern the honcurable practice of duelling at the present day."

No matter, my dear sir; no matter