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Then the Duke of Perse resumed his residence in Edelweiss, opening the old palace once more to the world. His daughter, after the death of the Princess, began her extended visits to the home of her girlhood. So long as the Princess was alive she remained away from Edelweiss, reluctant to meet the friend who had banished her husband long before the wedding day in Buda Pesth.
While wandering about the mountains of Transylvania, he had been quite contented to be alone: at Pesth he had not ceased to congratulate himself on his solitude, though sometimes he found the day a little too long for his purpose in doing so; at Vienna he was glad enough to find an old Oxonian; though, even while enjoying the treat, he would occasionally say to himself that, after all, society was only a bore.
"It was started by Kolla, a Protestant clergyman of the Slavonic congregation at Pesth, who wished to establish a national literature by circulating all works written in the various Slavonic dialects.... The idea of an intellectual union of all these nations naturally led to that of a political one; and the Slavonians seeing that their numbers amounted to about one-third of the whole population of Europe, and occupied more than half its territory, began to be sensible that they might claim for themselves a position to which they had not hitherto aspired."
It was therefore most opportune when a quite unexpected invitation from the management of the National Theatre in Buda- Pesth reached me to give two concerts there, in compliance with which I went at the end of July to the Hungarian capital, and was received by the manager Radnodfay.
He was not content to devote the proceeds of a single concert to some object of charity, but even gave money, and whole tours. Besides this concert at Lyons, and various others, one might mention the concert given for the flood sufferers at Pesth, and for the poor of his native town, and the concert tour by which he made Beethoven's monument possible at Bonn.
The patriot Deak is to have a colossal monument; the quays are to be rendered more substantial against inundations than they are at present; and many massive public edifices are to be erected. The Danube is often unruly, and once nearly destroyed the city of Pesth, also doing much damage along the slopes of Buda.
His own chateau near Buda Pesth, he informed me, had only recently undergone complete restoration in every particular. A great deal of money had been required, but the expenditures had been justified by the results. Paintings like these had been restored to their original glory, and so on and so forth.
The Danube was swollen by rains, Pesth was inundated, thousands were mourning the loss of friends and relations or of all their property. During his absence in Milan Liszt learned that many of his countrymen were suffering from absolute want. His resolution was taken. The smiling heaven of Italy, the dolce far niente of Southern life, could not detain him.
"We send them prime ministers, and now and then we allow them a glimpse of some of our beauties in one of their palaces, but the latter does not happen very often," once said an Hungarian friend to me. An American who should arrive in Pesth fancying that he was about to see a specimen of the dilapidated towns of "effete and decaying Europe" would find himself vastly mistaken.
Not far from this hill is situate the handsome inn called the "Two Green Trees," where the charges are as high, if not higher, than in Vienna. Until we have passed Pesth, passengers going down the river are not allowed to remain on board through the night. March 23d. This morning we continued our journey at six o'clock.
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