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Heathen Master Filcsik

Cleveland Ohio
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Heathen Master Filcsik,
From the Magyar of Kalman
Mikszath: Translated
by William N. Loew.

[Illustration]

Cleveland Ohio: Printed at The
Clerk's Private Press - mcmx




[Illustration]

_Introductory Note._


Through the kindness of William N. Loew, Esq., of the New York Bar, who
has generously placed the manuscript at our disposal, we are able to
offer a translation of one of the shorter stories by a living Hungarian
writer.

The Magyar literature offers a mine of gold to the translator, but on
account of the difficulties of the language very few have explored it.
With the exception of the great novelist, Maurus Jokai, the works of the
majority of the first class authors are unknown to the average American
reader.

The difficulties of the Magyar tongue have been referred to. It is the
one great literary language of Europe that is of non-Aryan origin. It is
syllabic agglutinative, that is, the word inflections are made up by
adding syllables to the root word that is never lost. The verb is
particularly flexible and many of the tenses cannot be rendered
adequately in English because they are constructed after a different
system. The fine distinctions possible for the Magyar verb can only be
felt, and not translated. This will explain the seeming inconsistency
of the tenses in our story, where presents, futures, and perfects appear
to be used indiscriminately, and yet the whole action has taken place in
the more or less remote past. In this way the translator has endeavored
to convey the vivid action of the original so far as the English verb
system would allow him.

The author, Kalman Mikszath, is a follower of Jokai, but without the
great master's originality. He has been called the "Mark Twain" of
Magyar literature, and is looked upon by his compatriots as their
leading humorist. He is a prolific writer of the _feuilliton_, that
peculiar institution of the continental newspaper, and several
collections of these have been published. Some of his works have been
translated into English, but so far as could be learned, not this story
of "Heathen Master Filcsik." His subjects are drawn generally from
scenes relating to North Hungarian peasant life, and are told with a
directness that makes the action move along rapidly. He also uses the
folk lore in his works, the present tale being founded upon older
material current in the country districts. Many of the details of his
stories are left to the reader's imagination; he touches only the high
lights, the shadows must be given form by the reader himself. His humor
manifests itself in the most unexpected ways, even in this grim story of
the unforgiving cobbler, there are touches of a sly, suggestive humor
that brighten the otherwise sombre narrative.

    Cleveland, Ohio,
    March 17th, 1910.





[Illustration]

Heathen Master Filcsik.


There is a foolish rumor current all over Csolt, Majornok and Bodok,
that the famous fur cloak of old Filcsik is only a figment of his
imagination. He speaks constantly of it; he boasts about it; he claims
to wear it somewhere, but, as a matter of fact (so it is said) he has no
fur cloak, and in all likelihood never had one.

Yet he did have one. The people of Gozon (he moved into our midst from
beyond the Bagy) and especially the older ones recollect it well.

It was a long yellow cloak, with a wide collar of black lambskin from
the two ends of which two lamb's feet were hung, hoofs and all, in their
natural state. It was buckled in front by two beautiful silver clasps
and in the corners below each clasp were embroidered two large green
tulips. In addition it was ornamented by the needle worker's art with
many kinds of birds in bright colors, while on the back you discovered
the city of Miskolcz with its rows of houses and many churches. You
could even see plainly a Calvinistic chanticleer on one of the church
towers! It was perfect--a masterpiece of furrier's work, on which its
maker had spared no labor or material.

True, it was not Master Mocsik, the furrier of