Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1918-11-08

1t is Just 20 years since Countess
Karolyi, Hungarian noblewoman
whose sons life had been taken be-
cause he was one of the Hungarian
rebels in the uprising against the
Hapsburgs in 1S4S, cursed Emperor
Francis Joseph in words which
have been recalled over and over
again by the whole world as one
horror after another has befallen
the house of Hapsburg, recalls a
writer in the New York Evening
Post
Now her grandson, Count Michael
Karolyi, president of the Hunga-
rian Independent party and of the
Hungarian national council, is
leading the ancient Hungarian ma
tional movement at last to victory,
and is telling the world that a sue
! cessful revolution has been waged
in Budapest and that the govern
ment is in the hands of the national
council
Evidently the long, long fight of
! the Karolyi family has not been in
vain, and with the years the an
cient, negative curse has passed
into a positive and constructive
warfare, not for the defeat of the
royal family so much as for the
final independence of the Hunga-
rian people.
May heaven and hell blast his
happiness. May his family be ex-
| terminated! May he be smitten in
! the persons of those he loves! May
| his life be wrecked and may his
| children be brought to ruin!" were
! the words of the Countess Karolyi.
Emperor Francis Joseph was
only IS years old then and had just
been made emperor with the abdi-
cation of Emperor Ferdinand and
perhaps the boy was too young to
deserve so harsh a curse for the
policies and traditions Of his line.
And perhaps it was not the curse,
but rather the Hapsburg tyrannies
which had inspired the curse which
brought on the long sudden deaths
visiting the Hapsburg house.
| At any rate, the long series came.
| lasting all through the long, seam
ed life of Francis Joseph, and go
| ing on until now, after he himself
had mercifuIly been taken away.
The elder Karolyi, uncle of the
present Count Michael, lost his life
in the same fight which Michael is
winning now. He was the brother
of Count Alloys, the famous Austro-
/ Hungarian diplomatist, and OF
Count Stephan, father of Count Mi
chael. Their mother, "the cursing
! countess" was a Karolyi only by
marriage, but she was fiercely loyal
TO the traditions of her husband and
her sons, and rebelled with them
in the uprising of As. 1t was the
same fight for a Hungarian nation
al independence in particular and
! for liberal ideas in general.
In 1880 there had been mutter-
ings of the storm, but the storm
itself had been delayed. Historians
call 1t the age of transition, when
all over the earth nationalities and
individuals began to assert them
selves as separate and individual
entities.
The people wanted a constitu-
ton and they wanted freedom OF
| thought and speech, and a country
| of their own. The Hapsburgs had
no mind for understanding these
new things. They were, as may be
seen from Princess Melanie Meter
nich's diar$, naively surprised al
the new ideas. They had married
and intermarried among themselves
until there was no room or chance
for the glimm ering or new men
tally. They had grown to be lit
tie insane themselves, and so they
| thought the people had gone mad.
/ The old emperor was kind, but
weak, a little feeble, so he did the
easy thing and turned it all over to
Young Francis Joseph. And all
that Francis Joseph and the men
| he had around him knew to do was
10 hang and shoot and take the
/ heads off the rebels.
Besco waffle syrup, Beardsley's.