part of the people; and as soon as the coronation (1174) was accomplished all open opposition ceased, and peace once more returned to the long distracted land. Still, however, Géza and his party carried on intrigues, which might in the end cause some trouble; and Béla, to prevent this, placed Géza under some restraint. With the aid of the Queen, however, Géza escaped into Austria, and thence into Bohemia; but, instead of meeting with any support in his rebellion against his brother, he was given up to Béla and imprisoned more closely than before. At the same time the Queen-mother was banished to Greece.

In 1180, Manuel, for so many years the determined foe of Hungary, died; and Béla, feeling himself absolved from his oath, re-annexed Sirmia, Dalmatia, and Croatia, without a battle. Jadra, embracing the opportunity of once more putting herself under Hungarian protection, involved him however in a war with Venice, which lasted, with varying fortune, for eight years.

Béla, having lost his Greek wife in 1184, soon after became a suitor for the hand of Marguérite, daughter of Louis VII. and widow of Prince Henry Plantagenet. The negotiations lasted so long, that Marguérite did not reach Hungary till 1186; and in the meanwhile, to provide against any possible difficulties arising from his second marriage, Béla, having caused his eldest son Imre to be crowned as his successor, made him, for the present, regent of Dalmatia and Croatia; at the same time conferring the dignity of Prince of Galicia (Halics) upon his second son András. It must be confessed that Béla had not come by his authority over Galicia in a very honourable manner. Boleslaus IV. of Poland having married the heiress of Galicia, gave the province to their daughter Judith, on her marriage with László, son of Béla the Blind of Hungary. László died, leaving her with one son; and she then married a Russian noble, by whom she had two sons, Wladimir and Roman. Galicia of right belonged to the son of László, but he was poisoned, as was supposed, by his stepbrothers, and Wladimir seized on the crown, only to be, in his turn, deprived of it by Roman. Wladimir fled to Béla, asking his assistance; but the Hungarian King, knowing the share he had had in the murder of Instislaus, gave him a prison instead of a crown, and settled the dispute by placing Prince András on the throne, where, however, he did not long remain, as Wladimir contrived to escape from prison, and, with the help of Poland, again obtained possession of Galicia. Henceforward, though governed by independent princes, Galicia acknowledged the sovereignty of Hungary, and Béla and his successors added 'King of Galicia' to their other titles. This was the beginning of those claims upon Galicia, which, from time to time advanced by the Kings of Hungary, were finally made to serve as a pretext for Austria's share in the partition of Poland—a shadowy and baseless pretext enough, yet more substantial than any that could be alleged by either Russia or Prussia.

The war with Venice had lasted nearly eight years, when, in 1187, all Europe was disturbed by news of the terrible defeat sustained by the

Crusaders near Tiberias, at the hands of Saladin. Admonished by Gregory VIII., the Princes of Europe made peace with one another, and resolved to unite in one grand effort to recover the Holy Places. Hungary and Venice followed their example, and concluded a truce for two years, that the latter might be free to devote all her strength to the Crusade.

Barbarossa, who had taken the cross, in spite of his now advancing years, sent messengers to Béla's court to arrange for the passage of his army through Hungary, the construction of roads and bridges, and the price of provisions. Béla had the success of the Crusade deeply at heart, and did all in his power to promote it. Storehouses were erected on the road by which the army was to pass; and the price* of 'four well-fed oxen' was fixed at one silver mark, which was also to be the cost of feed for a hundred horses.

The Emperor reached Presburg at Whitsuntide, with an army consisting of fifty thousand paid soldiers and many more volunteers. Here he halted and reviewed his men, weeding out the bad, and punishing with severity all who had sinned against military discipline. He then proceeded to Grán, (the ecclesiastical metropolis of Hungary,) where he was received by the King and an escort of a thousand knights, who conducted him to the palace. His stay here was celebrated by brilliant festivities, and by the betrothal of his son Friedrich, Duke of Suabia, to Béla's daughter Constantia. One person, at least, had reason to rejoice at his coming, and this was Prince Géza, who, at the intercession of Barbarossa and Marguérite of France, was released from the prison in which he had languished for fifteen years, and permitted to join the Crusade, whence neither he nor his few followers ever returned. After four more days spent at Buda in hunting in the well-stocked woods, the Emperor and his train went on their way, accompanied to the frontiers by the King; who, on parting with his guest, presented him with wagons full of provisions, and four camels laden with costly gifts, receiving from him, in return, all the transport ships which had conveyed the crusaders from Regensburg to Presburg. Queen Marguérite also presented the Emperor with a tent of purple or crimson fitted up in gorgeous and costly style. A small force of Hungarian knights accompanied the Emperor into Servia as guides, but they were recalled by the King before they had crossed the Greek frontier, either because the latter foresaw the war which shortly ensued between the Greeks and Crusaders, and did not wish to be mixed up in it, † or because the truce with Venice was drawing to a close, and hostilities seemed likely to be renewed. In truth, Venice did make another attack upon Jadra in the spring of 1190, but her fleet found the garrison so strong and determined that it was obliged to sail away without having accomplished anything. Meanwhile the

*Fessler.

†The Emperor, Isaac Angelus, was betrothed to Béla's daughter Margaret.

Bulgarians, Wallachians, and Kumans, seeing the distracted state of the Byzantine Empire, and the impotence of the poor feeble Emperor Isaac, threw off their allegiance. He appealed for assistance to Béla; but, before the promised Hungarian force had started, news came that he had been deposed, blinded, and confined in a convent. (1195.) The great Emperor of the West had died four years before him; his son, Friedrich of Suabia, whose betrothal had been celebrated with such splendour at Grán, had died of pestilence before Ptolemais; bitter quarrels had arisen between the other princes; Leopold of Austria, and Philippe Auguste of France, had returned home; and a three years truce, concluded with Saladin by Richard Coeur de Lion, was the only fruit of the great Crusade for which half Europe had made such enormous sacrifices and exertions. Yet all this failure did not hinder Béla from determining to embark in the same cause; on the contrary, the call seemed to him only the more urgent, and he began making preparations; but, as if there were a fate against any Hungarian king's taking part in a crusade, before they were completed Béla died. On his death-bed, he enjoined his younger son András to fulfil his vow, and bequeathed to him all the arms and treasure he had collected for the prosecution of the Holy War.

Béla had made wise use of the knowledge he had acquired in Constantinople, though Hungarian chronicles tell us little more than that he cleared the land of thieves and robbers, made the laws against them more stringent, and introduced some very salutary legal reforms. He established a court of Chancery, caused law-suits to be committed to writing, appointed persons to write the chronicles of the country, and for these reasons is sometimes called the Hungarian Justinian. But besides this, he greatly increased the material prosperity of the country, reconciled the various parties in the state, re-established the order which during the long wars had been so often in abeyance; recovered the provinces which had been torn from Hungary, and moreover, left a well filled treasury behind him. In this reign László I. was canonized.

A glance at the history of the last fifty years, shows us that Hungary at this time laboured under two great drawbacks to her advancement; one, and perhaps the most important, being that the order of succession was not clearly established. Any prince of the royal house of Arpád might ascend the throne, whether he were brother, eldest son, or youngest son of the late king, though a feeling seems to have prevailed and gained ground, that the eldest son was the rightful heir. What yet further increased the perplexity was the habit of bestowing provinces on the younger princes, who thus became formidable vassals, bound to the king by no strong ties, (that of blood clearly went for nothing,) but on the contrary, excited by their very relationship to aspire to the throne itself, and possessing revenue and troops sufficient to make success not altogether improbable.

To these two circumstances may be ascribed half the troubles endured by the country at this period. The ambitious schemes of the Eastern

and Western Empires were indeed alarming; but, had all been united within, they would hardly have obtained even their temporary successes. Want of union has indeed been the bane of Hungary, even in later and more enlightened times.

Yet it is worth notice, that, throughout the disturbances which followed the death of Géza, the fidelity of the people to his son István III. remained unshaken. István IV. and László II. were crowned, indeed, but never recognized by the nation at large. There is considerable interest in the remarks chronicled by Bishop Otto von Freisingen, who gained some personal experience of Hungary and her people on his way to the Holy Land. If we bear in mind that he saw everything from a German point of view, and that he was thoroughly penetrated with the Emperor's idea of subjecting it to Germany, his remarks are doubly interesting, as whatever of approval mingles with them can certainly not be attributed to any desire to flatter. He appears to be particularly struck by the general interest taken in public affairs, saying, 'The Hungarians begin no serious undertaking without long and frequent deliberation. When the nobles come to court they bring their chairs with them, and earnestly discuss the affairs of the state, which they also do in their own homes. He then goes on to speak of the prompt obedience paid to the king, and the readiness with which an army is assembled at his summons.' One strange remark the Bishop makes, namely, that 'the Magyars knew little of the art of war, and what little they knew, they had borrowed from foreign nations.' In answer to this Fessler observes that 'their military tactics did indeed differ from those of Germany, which he held to be the only right ones; but they stood them in good stead in many a hard-fought battle, and were adopted by other nations.' But Otto was still smarting under the remembrance of the defeat of Leerfelde, and apparently could not afford to be either just or generous; witness his remarks upon the habits of the Magyars, whom he evidently greatly despises for living chiefly in tents throughout the summer and autumn. 'The houses in towns and villages are miserable,' says he, mostly made of reeds, seldom even of wood, still more seldom of stone. One cannot help wondering why divine Providence should have given such a beautiful land as Pannonia to such men—no, not men, but human monsters.'

That last little remark betrays a lurking conviction, that Providence would have done far better to bestow the coveted land on sensible Germans; and therefore, seeing the undoubted bias of his mind, we can but believe the Bishop rather blackened the Magyar character, to render more plausible the scheme of annexation.

However, it is doubtless true, the people still had a lingering love for the nomad life. The country was but thinly populated; and the hardy Magyar peasant, in the warm months of the year, much preferred living in a tent near his fields and cattle, to returning home to his distant house. As for the huts, the poor peasant who lives, at this day, in the districts not

abounding in either wood or stone, is still obliged to be contented to make his dwelling of reeds and lime.

Béla III. had not lived so long in Constantinople, without imbibing something of the ideas there prevailing, touching the absolute nature of the royal prerogative. He disliked summoning the Diet to meet, for the discussions were often stormy, and preferred settling the affairs of the nation in a select council of the bishops and great barons. Theoretically, every free man might attend the Diet, or national assembly, which ought to have been summoned at stated times; but practically, only those came who liked, who lived near the place of meeting, who were anxious about their own rights or the affairs of the nation. Béla I. had caused the people to send representatives to the memorable Diet at Stuhlweissenburg; and László I. seems to have held one which was largely attended by the people; but the latter had not yet the privilege of regularly sending chosen deputies; and if the king chose only to summon the select regale concilium, or Council of State, the people, as a body, had no means of making their wishes known. For the present they bore this curtailment of their privileges with patience; but a time was coming when, as their position became more unbearable, their courage would rise proportionately, and urge them to successful resistance.

(To be continued.)

THE CAGED LION.

CHAPTER VI.

MALCOLM'S SUIT.

'THAT is a gentle and gracious slip of the Stewart. What shall you do with him?' asked King Henry of James, as they stood together at one end of the tilt yard at Westminster, watching Malcolm Stewart and Ralf Percy, who were playing at closhey, the early form of nine-pins. 'I know what I should like to do,' said James.

'What may that be?'

'To marry him to the Lady

Henry gave a long whistle.

Esclairmonde de Luxemburg.'

'Have you other views for her?'

'Not I Am I to have designs on every poor dove who flies into my tent from the hawk? Besides, are not both of them vowed to a religious life?'

'Neither vow is valid,' replied James.

'To meddle with such things is what I should not dare,' said Henry. 'Monks and friars are no such holy beings that I should greatly concern me about keeping an innocent lad out of their company,' said James.