Hungarian Sketches in Peace and War Part 23

"But you must eat it before me."

"Huhu! I will take it to Joska bacsi!"

"Joska bacsi doesn't want it. Joska bacsi has sent to say that you are to eat it yourself."

"Really! did he say that?" asked the old woman; and then, with a deep sigh, she began to swallow the bannock. She did not bite it, not having wherewithal, but pushed the pieces into her mouth and swallowed them, heaving a deep sigh at every mouthful; and, when she thought n.o.body was observing her, she hastily concealed the remainder in her ap.r.o.n, and looked round in great glee at having succeeded so cleverly.

"What will she do with the piece she has hidden?" I asked Mistress Kata.

"She keeps it, poor fool, for Joska bacsi!"

On hearing Joska bacsi mentioned, the old woman looked eagerly up, and asked, "What does Joska bacsi say?"

"He says you must count how many poppy-seeds[32] there are in that plate," said one of the maids, laughing.

[Footnote 32: Poppy-seeds are much used in Hungary, in bread, puddings, cakes, &c.,--a favourite ingredient worked up into crust for different pastries.]

The old woman rose without a word, and, approaching the plate, began eagerly counting the seeds grain by grain.

"Why do you trifle with her?" said I, pitying the poor, witless creature; while Mistress Kata came forward and took hold of her arm.

"Leave it alone, good Marcsa; Erzsi is telling a story--that was not what Joska bacsi said."

But the poor idiot would not leave off counting till Kata said, pointing to me, and making a sign that I should acquiesce, "Look here, Marcsa; this gentleman has just come from Joska bacsi, and he has brought a message from him that you should go home and remain quiet, and not wander so much about the Theiss--did he not, sir?"

I of course a.s.sented, on which the idiot shuffled joyfully up to me, and, taking my hand, looked long into my face with her fearful, vacant eyes, and then said coaxingly, "Huhu! I do think he is almost as beautiful a lad as my own Joska bacsi!"

This was very flattering, though I would have been better pleased had this hapless creature not gazed upon me thus, with her fixed and witless eyes, and hastily taking a piece of silver out of my pocket, I offered it to her.

Idiots are always fond of money, and as soon as I had put the coin into her hand, she immediately wished everybody good-night, and set off in great haste.

"Well, there's something more for Joska bacsi," said Mistress Kata, laughing.

"How--how?" I eagerly asked, my curiosity being much excited.

"She will throw it into the Theiss where the water is deepest.

Whatever she gets that she can give to Joska bacsi, all goes into the Theiss!"

"And who is this Joska bacsi?"

"n.o.body at all: dear heart! such a creature never existed on earth. It is only a fancy, such as all idiots have."

"And was she always mad?"

At these words an old peasant, who had been sitting in the chimney-corner, and silently observing us, exclaimed, "No, sir, that she was not."

"Well, I have never seen her otherwise, since I remember anything,"

said Mistress Kata.

"You are not yet thirty years old, Mistress, and this happened long before your birth."

"Do you know something about her, then?" I asked, turning with interest to the old man.

"He know, indeed!" said Mistress Kata scornfully; "he just likes to tell stories, when he can find a fool who will listen to him. But don't be taken in, young gentleman, take my word for it."

I paid no attention, however, to Mistress Kata's warning, and questioned the old man further: "Perhaps it was love that drove this poor woman mad?"

"Love, indeed!--what nonsense!" cried Mistress Kata; "as if a peasant would go mad for love! Bless your soul! only great folks can do that--peasants have something else to do."

"And were you not yourself madly in love with me, eh?" interrupted her husband, putting his arm round her waist.

"Get along!" cried his wife, striking his hand and blus.h.i.+ng to the eyes; "I'd like to know for what?"

The old peasant meanwhile pulled my cloak, and whispered, "I don't like speaking here, sir, for they only laugh at me; but if you would like to hear, come this evening. I will be standing in the porch, and there I can tell you. It is a sad story enough, and may interest you to hear it."

Mistress Kata reverted frequently to the subject, exclaiming ever and anon, as the bread baked, and she took each loaf out of the oven and turned up its s.h.i.+ning crust, "Well, that is an idea!--go mad for love of you, forsooth, as if you were worth going mad for!"

I did not forget my evening tryst, and found the old man in the porch.

I greeted him with "Adjon Isten,"[33] and placed myself beside him on the bench.

[Footnote 33: _Adjon Isten_, G.o.d give--an abbreviation for, G.o.d give good day, &c.]

The old man returned my salutation, and, emptying his pipe, began striking fire with a flint. "Permit me, sir, to light my pipe again; for I cannot now think much unless I see the smoke before me;" then, drawing his cap far over his brow, he began his tale:--

"n.o.body remembers anything about it now, for full sixty years have pa.s.sed since it happened; I was myself a barefooted boy, and it is only a wonder that I have not forgotten it too. That poor idiot whom you saw there, that wrinkled old creature, was then a beautiful young girl, and that Joska bacsi of whom she always speaks was--my own brother! There was not a handsomer pair among all the peasants than those two; I have seen many a rising generation since, but never any like them! Our parents were mutually sponsors. Marcsa's mother held my brother and me at our baptism, and my mother held Marcsa. We played together, we went to school together, and to the Lord's Table on Easter Sunday. Hej! that was a good priest who christened and catechized us; he has been long since preaching in heaven; and the worthy chanter who instructed us too, is up striking time among the angels!

"The lad and the young girl had been so attached from their childhood, that they never dreamed they could live otherwise than together. Our mother always called Marcsa her little daughter-in-law; and when she and my brother were each nineteen years old, their parents decided that if G.o.d pleased to preserve us all till the next Carnival, they should be married. My brother often entreated them not to wait till the Carnival, 'for who knows,' he said, 'what may happen before then?'

and with reason did his heart misgive him, poor fellow! for at the vintage Marcsa's father and ours went to the cellars to make the wine, and the deadly air[34] struck them--we found them both dead!

[Footnote 34: The wine-cellars, which every peasant possesses, are not in their cottages, but out in their vineyards; it frequently happens that there is a malaria in the vaults, which is certain death to any who remain in them above a certain time.]

"The mourning was very great in both houses--the two fathers cut off at one stroke; but in Marcsa's house the distress was still greater than in ours, for the old man, having been sacristan, had been intrusted with certain sums, of which two hundred florins were missing after his death. Where he had put them, or what had become of them, was never known, for death had struck him too suddenly. The reverend gentlemen who examined the accounts had so much consideration for the poor widow, that they did not bring the affair to light, and even promised to wait a whole year, during which time the family must endeavour to make up the sum, as after that period it could no longer be kept secret.

"Our mother was much distressed when she heard of this affair, and there was no more said of the carnival wedding: she was a poor but an honest woman, and how could she allow her son to marry the daughter of a man in whose hands the public money had been lost, and whose goods would probably be sold at the end of a year to repay the scandalous debt? The young lovers cried and lamented loudly, but it was all in vain; my mother said if the sum should be restored within a year she would receive the girl, but never otherwise. She prohibited my brother from holding personal intercourse with Marcsa during that entire period; and in order that he might keep his word the more easily, she bound him apprentice to a Theiss miller, and then--the water parted them.

"Meanwhile, Marcsa's mother very soon died of grief and care, and the girl was left alone. But love wrought wonders in her; and when the poor girl had not a creature in the world to help her, she came over to our mother and said: 'You will not allow your son to marry me unless my father's debt be replaced--good, I have still a whole year, and I will work day and night; I will endure hunger, fatigue--everything, but I will earn the money.'

"And then she began to put her promise into execution.

"Oh, sir! you do not know what a great sum two hundred florins is for a poor peasant, who has to earn it all by hard and honest labour, the work of his hands and the sweat of his brow, and to collect it penny by penny.

"From this day forward, the good girl was scarcely ever seen away from her work. All through the winter, she sat for ever at her wheel, spinning a yarn like silk, which she wove herself; there was no linen like hers in the village, as I have heard the old folks say. She looked after the poultry in the morning, and carried the fowls and eggs herself to market. There was a little bit of a garden behind the house, where she kept flowers and vegetables; and earned more by it than many who had four times as much ground. In summer she joined the reapers, and all that she got for her work she turned into money--fruit, or poultry, or little sucking pigs. Throughout that blessed year, sir, n.o.body ever saw smoke arise from her chimney: a bit of dry bread was all her daily sustenance; and yet the Lord took such good care of her, that not only her beauty did not diminish, but she looked as healthy and as rosy as if she were living on milk and b.u.t.ter. Love kept the spirit in her, poor girl!

"My brother was not allowed to go to her, but I was the messenger between them. Often, in the fine summer evenings, when I was down at the mill with my brother, he would take his flute and play those beautiful melodies, which none could do better than he; and the girls on the other side, who were filling their pitchers in the stream, or standing with their white feet in the water, was.h.i.+ng linen, would hear the air, and join in the chorus. But my brother only heard one voice, and that was the sweetest and the saddest I ever listened to, and brought tears into the eyes of every one who heard it: you could have recognised her voice among a thousand.

"Sometimes his master gave my brother leave of absence for an hour or two, and those were happy days for Joska: he would send me to bid Marcsa come down in the evening toward the Willow Island. This was a little sandbank covered with willow-trees, about three or four fathoms from the sh.o.r.e. Hither would my brother also come in his little boat, while his true-love sat opposite to him upon the sh.o.r.e, and there would they converse till morning across the stream--thus satisfying their own hearts, and obeying my mother's orders. They met, and yet were separated.

"On this footing things remained until the vintage. Marcsa was considered not only the prettiest, but the best girl in the village.

The new wine was not yet clear, when one morning the good girl came into my mother's, and counted out two hundred florins on the large oak table--all in good huszasok,[35] not one small piece was wanting--and begged my mother to take them with her to the reverend gentlemen, who gave a sealed receipt for the amount. None but ourselves ever knew that it was all our pretty Marcsa's hard earnings.