Prince Zilah — Complete eBook

Jules Arsène Arnaud Claretie
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 288 pages of information about Prince Zilah — Complete.

Prince Zilah — Complete eBook

Jules Arsène Arnaud Claretie
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 288 pages of information about Prince Zilah — Complete.
beneath the walls, the Sultan himself dying before he could subjugate the Hungarian.  Often had Andras’s father, casting his son upon a horse, set out, followed by a train of cavaliers, for Mohacz, where the Mussulmans had once overwhelmed the soldiers of young King Louis, who died with his own family and every Hungarian who was able to carry arms.  Prince Zilah related to the little fellow, who listened to him with burning tears of rage, the story of the days of mourning and the terrible massacres which no Hungarian has ever forgotten.  Then he told him of the great revolts, the patriotic uprisings, the exploits of Botzkai, Bethlen Gabor, or Rakoczy, whose proud battle hymn made the blood surge through the veins of the little prince.

Once at Buda, the father had taken the son to the spot, where, in 1795, fell the heads of noble Hungarians, accused of republicanism; and he said to him, as the boy stood with uncovered head: 

“This place is called the Field of Blood.  Martinowitz was beheaded here for his faith.  Remember, that a man’s life belongs to his duty, and not to his happiness.”

And when he returned to the great sombre halls of the castle, whence in bygone days the Turks had driven out his ancestors, and whence, in their turn, throwing off the yoke of the conquerors, his ancestors had driven out the Turks, little Prince Andras found again examples before him in the giants in semi-oriental costumes, glittering in steel or draped in purple, who looked down upon him from their frames; smoke-blackened paintings wherein the eagle eyes and long moustaches of black hussars, contemporaries of Sobieski, or magnates in furred robes, with aigrettes in their caps, and curved sabres garnished with precious stones and enamel, attracted and held spellbound the silent child, while through the window floated in, sung by some shepherd, or played by wandering Tzigani, the refrain of the old patriotic ballad ‘Czaty Demeter’, the origin of which is lost in the mist of ages—­

Remember, oh, yes! remember our ancestors!  Brave, proud Magyars, when you left the land of the Scythians, brave ancestors, great forefathers, you did not suspect that your sons would be slaves!  Remember, oh, yes! remember our ancestors!

Andras did remember them, and he knew by heart their history.  He knew the heroism of Prince Zilah Sandor falling in Mohacz in 1566 beside his wife Hanska who had followed him, leaving in the cradle her son Janski, whose grandson, Zilah Janos, in 1867, at the very place where his ancestor had been struck, sabred the Turks, crying:  “Sandor and Hanska, look down upon me; your blood avenges you!”

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Project Gutenberg
Prince Zilah — Complete from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.