The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 | Page 5

is in a foreigner, seems rather the result of an utter
abandonment to his thought, and a reliance on that to express itself,
than of an absolute command of the niceties of the grammar and
dictionary. He evidently has no fear of speaking wrong, and so, as by
inspiration, expresses himself often better even than one to whom the
language is native and familiar. Though he often uses words with a
foreign meaning, or a meaning different from that we usually give them,
he does not stop to correct himself, but goes on as if there were no
doubt that he would be perfectly apprehended.
The character of Kossuth has been very amply discussed in all the
journals both before and since his triumphal entry into New-York. The
judgment of the London Examiner is the common judgment of at least
the Saxon race, that, while the extraordinary events of 1848 and 1849,
afforded the fairest opportunities for the advent of a great man, the
people who were ready for battle against oppression, were all stricken
down on account of the incapacity of their leaders--except in one
instance. The exception was in the case of Kossuth. And he was no new
man, but had been steadily building a great fame from his youth; had
labored in the humblest as well as highest offices of patriotism; and as
a thinker, a speaker, and a writer, had been before the public eye of all
Europe for years. He was born in 1806, at Monok, in Hungary, of
parents not rich, yet possessing land, and calling themselves noble. His
native district was a Protestant one, and in the pastor of that district he
found his first teacher. On their death, while he was still young, more
devoted to books than to farming, he was sent to the provincial college,
where he remained until eighteen years of age, and earned the
reputation of being the most able and promising youth of the district. In
1826, he removed to the University of Pesth, where he came in contact
with the political influences and ideas of the time; and these, blending
with his own historic studies and youthful hopes, soon produced the
ardent, practical patriot, which the world has since seen in him.
According to the Constitution of Hungary, the Comitats or electoral
body treated those elected to sit in the Diet more as delegates than as

deputies. They gave them precise instructions, and expected the
members not only to conform to them, but to send regular accounts of
their conduct to their constituents for due sanction, and with a view to
fresh instructions. This kind of communication was rather onerous for
the Hungarian country gentleman, and hence many of the deputies
employed such young men as Kossuth to transact their political
business, and conduct their correspondence. Acting in this capacity for
many members of the Diet, Kossuth came into intimate relations with
the comitats, and acquired skill in public affairs.
He was soon himself made a member, and from the first was
distinguished in the Diet as a speaker. Here he felt, and soon pointed
out to his colleagues, how idle and powerless were their debates unless
these were known to the public in some more efficient manner than by
the private correspondence of the deputies. Influenced by his
representations, the chief members of the Diet resolved to establish a
journal for the publication of their discussions; and Kossuth was
selected as one of those who were to preside over it; but the Archduke
Palatine objected, of course, because the object was to curtail the
reports and garble them. Kossuth, however, was enabled by the more
liberal of his colleagues to publish the reports on his own account. He
then extended the journal by the insertion of leading articles; and his
counsels and criticisms on the instructions of the comitats to the
deputies, so stirred the bile and counteracted the views of the Austrian
authorities, that they interfered and suspended his newspaper by seizing
his presses. But, even this did not stop his pen, nor those of his many
amanuenses; until, at last, Metternich, exasperated by his obstinacy,
caused him to be seized and condemned to three years' imprisonment in
the citadel of Ofen. He was liberated in 1837; and during the years that
elapsed between that epoch and 1848 the history of Hungary was that
of Kossuth, who, amidst the many men of noble birth, wealth, high
character, and singular talents, who surrounded him, still held his
ground, and shone pre-eminent. In 1847 he was the acknowledged
leader of the constitutional party, and member for the Hungarian capital.
It is unnecessary to pursue this narrative. The events of 1848 and 1849
have passed too recently and vividly before us to need relation. The
part that Kossuth