A Hungarian Nabob

A Hungarian Nabob, by Maurus
Jókai

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Title: A Hungarian Nabob
Author: Maurus Jókai
Translator: R. Nisbet Bain
Release Date: April 3, 2007 [EBook #20978]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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HUNGARIAN NABOB ***

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WORKS OF MAURUS JÓKAI
HUNGARIAN EDITION

A HUNGARIAN NABOB
Translated from the Hungarian
By R. NISBET BAIN
NEW YORK DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
Copyright 1899 by Doubleday & McClure Co.

PREFACE.
This noble novel, now translated into English for the first time, was
written nearly fifty years ago. On its first appearance, Hungarian critics
of every school at once hailed it as a masterpiece. It has maintained its
popularity ever since; and now, despite the manifold mutations of
literary fashion, in Hungary as elsewhere, has reached the unassailable
position of a national classic.
It is no light task to attempt to transplant a classic like "Egy Magyar
Nábob." National tastes differ infinitely, and then there is the
formidable initial difficulty of contending with a strange and baffling
non-aryan language. Only those few hardy linguists who have learnt, in
the sweat of their brows, to read a meaning into that miracle of
agglutinative ingenuity, an Hungarian sentence, will be able to
appreciate the immense labour of rendering some four hundred pages
of a Magyar masterpiece of peculiarly idiomatic difficulty into fairly
readable English. But my profound admiration for the illustrious
Hungarian romancer, and my intimate conviction that, of all continental
novelists, he is most likely to appeal to healthy English taste, which has
ever preferred the humorous and romantic story to the Tendenz-Roman,
or novel with a purpose, have encouraged me to persevere to the end of
my formidable task.
I may add, in conclusion, that I have taken the liberty to cut out a good
third of the original work, and this I have done advisedly, having
always been very strongly of opinion that the technique of the original

tale suffered from an excess of episode. This embarras de richesse
would naturally be still more noticeable in a translation, and I am
particularly anxious that "A Hungarian Nabob" should attract at first
sight. Let this, therefore, be my apology to Dr. Jókai and, as I trust, my
claim upon his forgiveness.
R. NISBET BAIN. AUGUST, 1898.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. AN ODDITY, 1822 9 II. A BARGAIN FOR THE SKIN OF A
LIVING MAN 41 III. THE WHITSUN KING 58 IV. A FAMILY
CURSE 89 V. THE TEMPTER IN CHURCH 116 VI. PAID IN FULL
132 VII. THE NABOB'S BIRTHDAY 153 VIII. AN UNEXPECTED
CHANGE 186 IX. THE HUNTER IN THE SNARE 203 X. POOR
LADY! 242 XI. THE FEMALE FRIEND 260 XII. THE
HOUSE-WARMING 268 XIII. THE HUNT 274 XIV. MARTYRDOM
287 XV. THE SPY 294 XVI. LIGHT WITHOUT AND NIGHT
WITHIN 301 XVII. A DANGEROUS EXPERIMENT 315 XVIII.
UNPLEASANT DISCOVERIES 327 XIX. ZOLTÁN KÁRPÁTHY
332 XX. SECRET VISITORS 337 XXI. THE LAST WILL AND
TESTAMENT 344 XXII. LEAVE-TAKING 356

A HUNGARIAN NABOB.
CHAPTER I.
AN ODDITY, 1822.
It is nasty, dirty weather outside there on the puszta;[1] the sky is
cloudy, the earth muddy, the rain has been falling for two weeks
incessantly, as if by special command. There are inundations and
submersions everywhere; rushes are growing instead of wheat, the

stork is ploughing, the duck is fishing all over the precious sea-like
expanse. "This judgment weather began on St. Medardus' Day, and will
last now for forty days longer, but if it does last, I know not where we
are to find the Noah to save man and beast from a partial deluge."
[Footnote 1: For the meaning of this and all other Hungarian words
used in the text, see the glossary at end of book.]
This melancholy reflection was made by the noble Mr. Peter Bús,
whom a cruel fate had called to be a perpetual wrangler with guests on
the cross-roads of the famous county of Szabolcs, for he was the
innkeeper of the "Break-'em-tear-'em" csárda there. That worthy inn
owed its name, not to its ancestors, but to its own peculiar merits, for
no traveller could possibly reach that sweet haven till he had had
endless spills and been nearly torn to pieces. This was especially the
case at such times when the floodgates of Heaven were open, and it
naturally occurred to a man's mind how much better it would have been
to have had floodgates on