s of uncle
and aunt, while we are privileged to those of nephews and nieces.

[Footnote 1: _Bacsi_, contraction for _batya_--"elder brother," or
"uncle."]

Uncle Lorincz belonged to that medium class whose duty is to manage
the laws and rights of the people, keep up their national
prerogatives, look after their interests, in short, to labour without
noise or fame,--a man of whom neither history nor poets speak, for the
upright and honourable man is not so rare a character among us as to
render it necessary to emblazon his name in history; and what could a
poet make of an honest man who has neither romance enough to carry off
his neighbour's wife, nor to shoot his best friend through the head
for looking askance at him? Such a man as Uncle Lorincz, for instance,
who comes into the world without the aid of star or horoscope, grows
up without becoming a virtuoso on the piano, goes through his classes
satisfactorily, and without occasioning any mutiny, and, finally,
returns like a dutiful son to his parents, who assist him to look out
for a good wife, whom he marries without any poetical occurrences; and
who, when his parents are gathered to their fathers, inherits their
blessing and their property unencumbered by debt--for this class of
our countrymen consider debt as a species of crime; their principle
being that an honest man should not spend more than his income. This
principle had taken such root in Uncle Kassay's mind, that, rather
than run up an account at the shoemaker's, he has been known, in his
scholar days, to feign illness and keep his room, when his boots
needed mending, until the necessary money arrived from home; and the
same sense of honour, combined with the most lavish hospitality,
characterized him through life.

Having been directly called upon by the county, he had accepted the
situation of szolgabiro or sheriff--which the Hungarian takes upon
himself _ex nobili officio_--from a generous sense of duty, rather
than for the lucrative advantages attached to it, which by no means
compensate for the dinners he is obliged to give; but he readily makes
a sacrifice for the honour of the employment, and the confidence of
the people in that incorruptible conscience which is chosen as the
earthly providence of an entire district, to keep order and administer
justice among twenty or thirty thousand people.

At the time our story commences, Lorincz and his worthy assistant were
actually discussing some affair