The Village Notary: A Romance of Hungarian Life

The Village Notary: A Romance of Hungarian Life

When Joseph, Baron Etvs, wrote his "Village Notary," and when he dedicated that work to me, neither he nor I could anticipate the sudden and unexpected downfall of the political and social institutions which he attempted to portray. It is true that my friend did not, in the present work, make an exclusive use of his poetical faculties. The dregs of opposition were fermenting in his mind, and his ostensible object, to give a sketch of life in a Hungarian province, was mixed up with the desire to make his story act as a lever upon the vis inerti of our political condition. In those days, the liberal party in Hungary was divided into three factions. Our great reformer, the Count Szchenyi, was worn out by his long and seemingly resultless struggles against the policy of the Court of Vienna. He made a surrender of the leading ideas of his political life. He had ever since 1829 been the champion of equal taxation and of legal equality. He had advocated[Pg iv] the abolition of feudal burdens on the land. But he lived to consider these objects of his former aspirations as matters of secondary import. He became a practical man, and directed his energies to the steam-navigation on the Danube, to the damming and dyking of the river Theiss, to railroads, &c.; and for the furtherance of these plans the Count Szchenyi, though still faithful to his principles, had drawn close to the conservative party, and become reconciled to the government at Vienna. He did not, indeed, deprive himself of the pleasure of recounting numberless anecdotes and sketches from life, all of which tended to prove the incapability and the malevolence of that government; but his voice was silent in the debates of the Parliament, and the whole of his energies were devoted to the execution of practical improvements. "Make money, and enrich the country!" such was the advice he gave to us, his younger friends; and he added,"An empty sack will topple over; but if you fill it, it will stand by its own weight." ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 34819
Author: Eötvös, József
Release Date: Jan 2, 2011
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Translator: Wenckstern, Otto von, 1819-1869