The Baron's Sons

A Romance of the HungarianRevolution of 1848

By
Dr. Maurus Jókai
Author of
"Midst the Wild Carpathians," "Black Diamonds,""Pretty Michal," "The Hungarian Nabob," etc.

Translated from the Fourth Hungarian Edition by
Percy Favor Bicknell
Joint Translator of "The Jesuit Relations."

Boston
L. C. Page and Company
(Incorporated) 1900

Copyright, 1900By L. C. Page and Company
(INCORPORATED)

All Rights Reserved

Colonial Press
Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.
Boston, Mass., U.S.A.

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

[Pg vii]No page of history is more crowded with thrilling interest than thatwhich records the uprising of the Hungarians, in 1848-49, in a gallantattempt to recover their constitutional rights. The events of thatstirring period, even when related by the sober pen of the annalist,read more like romance than reality; and thus they cannot fail to lendthemselves admirably to the purposes of historical fiction. More thanone of that brilliant series of novels with which the genius ofHungary's greatest story-writer has enriched the literature, not ofhis own country merely, but of the world, takes its theme from thosememorable scenes in which the author himself played no unimportantpart. Into none of these fascinating romances has the writer succeededin crowding so much of the life and colour, of the heroism andself-sacrifice, the triumph and the despair, of that nationalconvulsion, as into the pages of "The Baron's Sons" ("A Kőszívű EmberFiai," literally, "The Sons of the Stony-hearted Man"). Especiallyeffective is his description of the historic flight over theCarpathians of the two hundred and twenty hussars who, at the outbreakof the[Pg viii] Revolution, deserted the Austrian army and hastened to theircountry's aid. No chapter in all the author's writings exceeds thisone in breathless interest and in the skilful handling of detail.

The necessity of abridging the author's text, while regretted by noone more than by the translator, has, it is believed, tended tocontribute to the story an element of unity and compactness which,owing to the undue elaboration of certain minor details, seemssomewhat lacking in the original. It is with extreme hesitation anddiffidence, however, that I venture, even in self-defence, to imputethe slightest blemish to a style in which so many of the author'sadmirers can see no fault. The curtailment has necessitated, in somechapters, a certain amount of adaptation, and a slight departure fromstrict literalness of rendering; but it is hoped that the spirit ofthe original has nowhere been sacrificed.

P. F. B.

Malden, Mass., April, 1900.

CONTENTS.