become galley-slaves. When we read them, we seem to hear the unhappy captives singing plaintively of their sufferings, to the tune of some hymn they had loved in happier days. The world-famed Rákóczy March did not receive its present form until the year 1806, yet even in its original shape it is a powerful creation, and expresses strikingly the two contending feelings of the time, a fierce love of fighting and a profound melancholy.
When Francis Rákóczy went into exile, never to return, he left his family, his dreams of freedom and glory, his crown, and his immense wealth behind him, and became a horneless wanderer. There were still some, however, who dung faithfully to him in the days of his exile; among them was a young nobleman, twenty-one years of age, Count Kelemen Mikes (1690–1762).
He accompanied Rákóczy in all his wanderings. First they went to Poland, then to England, and at length to France, where another exiled prince, James II. of England, had been hospitably received in the hope that so me diplomatic advantages might follow. At the French Court Mikes became acquainted with French literature, and translated several books, chiefly religious works.
The Hungarian exiles did not stay long at Versailles. They went to Turkey, and finally took up their abode at Rodosto, on the coast of the Sca of Marmora. Here Mikes dwelt until his dying day, spending thirty years in exile. On peaceful evenings the exiles watched the sun as it sank into the blue waves of the Marble Sea. In the morning they saw it rise above the minarets, never, alas, to herald the day of their freedom.
Years rolled by, and Rákóczy died. He was soon followed by his faithful general, Bercsényi, and one by
