rian; "but why couple him with Tzernebock?
Tzernebock was a word which your Valter had picked up somewhere without
knowing the meaning. Tzernebock was no god of the Saxons, but one of the
gods of the Sclaves, on the southern side of the Baltic. The Sclaves had
two grand gods to whom they sacrificed, Tzernebock and Bielebock; that
is, the black and white gods, who represented the powers of dark and
light. They were overturned by Waldemar, the Dane, the great enemy of
the Sclaves; the account of whose wars you will find in one fine old
book, written by Saxo Gramaticus, which I read in the library of the
college of Debreczen. The Sclaves, at one time, were masters of all the
southern shore of the Baltic, where their descendants are still to be
found, though they have lost their language, and call themselves Germans;
but the word Zernevitz near Dantzic, still attests that the Sclavic
language was once common in those parts. Zernevitz means the thing of
blackness, as Tzernebock means the god of blackness. Prussia itself
merely means, in Sclavish, Lower Russia. There is scarcely a race or
language in the world more extended than the Sclavic. On the other side
of the Dunau you will find the Sclaves and their language. Czernavoda is
Sclavic, and means black water; in Turkish, kara su; even as Tzernebock
means black god; and Belgrade, or Belograd, means the white town; even as
Bielebock, or Bielebog, means the white god. Oh! he is one great
ignorant, that Valter. He is going, they say, to write one history about
Napoleon. I do hope that in his history he will couple his Thor and
Tzernebock together. By my God! it would be good diversion that."

"Walter Scott appears to be no particular favourite of yours," said I.

"He is not," said the Hungarian; "I hate him for his slavish principles.
He wishes to see absolute power restored in this country, and Popery
also--and I hate him because--what do you think? In one of his novels,
published a few months ago, he has the insolence to insult Hungary in the
presence of one of her sons. He makes his great braggart, Coeur de Lion,
fling a Magyar over his head. Ha! it was well for Richard that he never
felt the gripe of a Hungarian. I wish the braggart could have felt the
gripe of me, who am 'a' magyarok kozt legkissebb,' the least among the
Magyars. I do hate that Scott, and all his vile gang of Lowlanders and
Highlanders. The black corps, the fekete regiment of Matyjas Hun