King Business

The report that an unknown assailant attempted to assassinate Regent Nicholas Horthy von Nagybanya (TIME, Feb. 9) proved to be untrue.

The false report and the recent publication of a reproduction of part of the late Emperor Karl's diary have to some extent revived in academic form the peculiar position of Hungary.

Hungary is still a kingdom--its old constitution is unchanged. In place of the King is a Regent, Admiral Horthy. His powers are limited mainly to exercising the royal functions without the effective power of vetoing legislation. Just for whom he is Regent is a problem that most Hungarians shirk; some say for himself; some say for Prince Otto, oldest son of Kaiser Karl; some say for a King who is yet to be elected. The problem is, however, satisfactorily settled for the time being by electing Yankee Jeremiah Smith as financial king--a Yankee at the Court of the Habsburgs or, in the parlance of jazz, a Yankee-doodle doing it.

But this state of affairs is only temporary. For 1,000 years, Hungary has been a monarchy. Until 1526, when the Turks won the all-important Battle of Mahacs, Hungary had had a national King, but in that year the inheritance was claimed by a Habsburg and Hungary was ruled as a part of the Austrian Empire until the Ausgleich of 1867, which set up the Dual Monarchy and gave the country once more a King of its own in the person of the same Habsburg Emperor of Austria. It was little more than a change of form.

For Emperor Karl there undoubtedly existed a warm national affection, but this availed him nothing at the end of the War. Almost without a blow, Hungary became for a few months a Republic under Count Michael Karolyi, although it would be truer to say that Budapest, the capital, became a Republic. Bolshevism succeeded Republicanism and was even shorter lived; for in August, 1919, after a harrowing Rumanian occupation, the Monarchists, led by Admiral Horthy, were once again in power. Horthy was elected Royal Governor, usually translated as Regent. He was invested with some of the royal powers, was empowered to enact the legislation of his Royal Hungarian Government--but for whom was he acting? When Karl was alive, Horthy publicly declared that he was keeping the throne warm for his Monarch. After Karl's death in 1922, both he and his Premier, Count Bethlen, were known to have expressed themselves privately in favor of "King" Otto. But Horthy's love of splendor, his occupation of the Royal Palaces, his insistence upon a regal etiquette, have combined to discredit his intentions.

Now from the late Emperor's Diary, published by Karl Werkmann, his private secretary, reproduced by the Italian Corriere della Sera of Milan and reproduced by The Living Age, comes a new story about Horthy's alleged perfidy.

The following is a conversation between Karl and Horthy which took place in 1921 at the Royal Palace in Budapest. The Emperor, who had not forgotten that he had failed to abdicate as the Apostolic King of Hungary, had previously signed a manifesto:

"I have returned to my beloved Fatherland, following the impulse of my own heart, and from this date have resumed the throne. God be with me." He had gone to Horthy to demand that he hand over the Government to him and the ensuing conversation was allegedly written down very shortly after the meeting:

"First of all, I thanked Horthy in the most cordial way for what he had done for the nation and for the King. I lauded his services and assured him that the King and the nation would never forget them. Then I asked him to turn the Government over to me.

"HORTHY: 'What does Your Majesty propose to do for me if I turn over to you the Government?'

"I pretended to have misunderstood him: 'What do you mean by your question?'

"HORTHY: 'This. What will Your Majesty give me in exchange?' . . .

"I felt such disgust rising in me at this vulgar bargaining that I was nauseated, and I had to force myself by an effort to answer: 'But you--what do you want?'

"HORTHY : 'See here, I want to know what Your Majesty is ready to offer me!'

"I: 'Horthy, when a person has commanded the forces that have liberated a country from Bolshevism, when he has been able to terminate a hostile occupation, when he has faithfully governed that country, restoring law and order, and then voluntarily hands it back to its King, then the position to which he is entitled is unquestionably an exceedingly high one, and it will be recognized abroad--by the whole world--that he is, so to speak, the right arm of the King. Such a post, Horthy, under these circumstances, belongs to you!'

"But Horthy insisted again: 'And what else does Your Majesty offer:'

"I: 'I confirm the title of Duke that you have conferred upon yourself.'

''Thereupon Horthy suddenly burst into a long lamentation. He recited his piece so badly that even I, prone as I am to believe the best of everybody, could see at once that he was merely acting a part. He protested with a great show of alarm that he was not thinking of himself, but of Hungary, poor Hungary ! What would happen to the country? Revolutions, intervention by the Big Entente and by the Little Entente, and invasion by the Little Entente, rival pretenders for the throne, resistance by the people, and so on.

"Glad to see the country itself brought into the discussion instead of Horthy personally, I proceeded to answer his objections point by point, concluding with these words: 'Everything will be done according to constitutional procedure. I shall form a Cabinet at once.'

"HORTHY : 'Your Majesty will not be able to find a Prime Minister. The army is disloyal to you, and there will be bloodshed.'

"I answered that it would be easy enough to find a Premier, as I already had general assurances on that point even from one of Horthy's own Cabinet, Vass. . . .

"Horthy said that before he surrendered his powers he wanted one thing more--to be appointed commander-in-chief of the Army. I saw that if I did not satisfy the man's gross greediness I should have reason to regret the fate of the country and my whole undertaking, . . .

" 'You will be commanding officer under me; but turn over the Government.'

"HORTHY: 'I want one thing more.'

"I: 'What do you want, then?'

"HORTHY : I want to be reappointed commander of the fleet.'

"I: 'Good. If we get a fleet again you will be its commander.'

"Horthy then renewed his laments upon what might happen. I answered that I had already considered these things. He must realize what a tremendous benefit a King would be to the country if everybody rallied loyally to his support. If Horthy truly loved Hungary, he ought to turn the Government over to me. . . .

"HORTHY: 'But if I surrender the Government, I want still one thing more.'

"I: 'What?'

"HORTHY: 'Your Majesty should confer a high honor upon me.'

"I forgot entirely that Horthy is a Protestant. 'If you turn the Government over immediately,' I said, Til give you the Order of the Golden Fleece.'

"Horthy seemed greatly pleased, and said that was satisfactory.

"I: 'Now, surrender your authority.'

"HORTHY: 'Impossible! No! I can't do it. I have thought better of it. What is the matter with my head? I have sworn an oath of loyalty to the National Assembly.'

"I: 'But long before that, you swore an oath of loyalty and fidelity to me with your own hands between my own.'

"HORTHY: 'That oath is no longer valid. It has been superseded.'

"I: 'No, it has not. I have not freed any soldier from his oath of loyalty. Moreover, you, Horthy, are bound to me by a second oath, a private oath--that of a Lord Chamberlain.'

"HORTHY : 'That no longer counts. . . . Only my last oath binds me--the one to the National Assembly.'

"I: 'That oath is not worth a snap of the fingers before a King. . . .'

"HORTHY : 'But I have my duty to the country.'

"I: 'You have no duty to the country. Your duty as Regent ends the moment the King and the country desire to restore the traditional regime. The moment I arrived here, therefore, your responsibility to the country terminated. I alone am responsible before God and to the country, because it was I who took the coronation oath, and not yourself.'

"Horthy was silent for a moment, but his face showed dissent and irritation.

"I: 'If you refuse to hand over your powers to me, then it means revolution good and earnest. The whole Government will be again back on a revolutionary basis. Turn over your authority!'

"HORTHY : 'No!'

"I: 'Mr. Admiral, I order you, in the name of your oath to me as a commanding officer, to obey and to turn over the Government to me.'

"HORTHY : 'No.' After a pause: 'Moreover, the Army has taken its oath to me and has taken no oath to a sovereign. Your Majesty cannot count on the Army. . . .'

"I: 'How can you expect your soldiers to be loyal to you if you yourself are a perjurer? I am absolutely convinced that my officers and my troops are still loyal to the oath they originally gave to their King, and are obedient to the oath given to you only in so far as it may be interpreted as you yourself have always interpreted it therefore--that is to say, as an oath to the Admiral of the Emperor and King.'

"HORTHY : 'I would shoot any man disloyal to his oath to me.'

"I thought to myself: 'He is pronouncing his own well-merited sentence.'

"I found myself confronted by a disloyal resistance, an obstinate will that would not bend to any argument, because it was deaf to reason. All trace of noble sentiment seemed to have vanished from the man. I had no friend at my side. I did not know what had become of the two gentlemen who had accompanied me. I did not have even my revolver. Outside the door stood Horthy's aide-de-camps and his other satellites ready to obey his orders . . . so I said bluntly: 'You stick to your opinion, and I to mine. Now, what do you propose to do? Make me a prisoner?"

"With an affected smile and forced calmness, he said slowly and hesitat- ingly: 'No, I shall not make Your Majesty my prisoner.'

"I: 'Then give up the Government. . . .'

"As our conversation had already grown interminable, I insisted upon my opinion: 'I give you five minutes to think it over.' But at the end of five minutes Horthy's attitude remained the same."

A few days later, Karl left the country in an automobile and in the early autumn of the same year made his dramatic second visit, coming from Switzerland by airplane. Horthy on this occasion opposed Karl with armed force and even had the train in which he was traveling with his wife shelled. The second attempt, like the first, ended in failure and Horthy, to the great indignation of a large section of the public, had the ex-Emperor handed over to the British like a common prisoner.

Karl's last view of Hungary was from the deck of a British monitor which carried him down the Danube, through the Black Sea to the AEgean waters and landed him at Funchal in Madeira, where he died the following April.

He left a widow--Zita--to find sanctuary in Spain with her children. That young Otto* will ever restore his mother's fortunes is perhaps too much to hope.

*A personal friend of the exiled family published a story of their distress. Young Otto, said she, had been outdoors playing. He tore his breeches. While they were being mended he was obliged to keep to his bed, for be had but one pair.