Mackensen has been surrounded by Spahis in Fóth. At dawn some French officers entered his room, made him a prisoner, and gave him half-an-hour in which to make his preparations, and then, before the sun rose, and without attracting attention, took him with his escort by car to Gödöllö. It is said that they are going to send him somewhere south. Károlyi’s Government, although it is alleged that the arrest was made by the Government’s request, has lodged a protest with the French. The organ of the Freemasons, _Világ_, remarked cynically that: “in the noise of great catastrophies the voice of little individual tragedies is lost....” Any tragedy is individual for them when it happens to gentile races, but whatever touches their race becomes a public calamity. At noon another rumour spread over the town. Balthasar Láng, one of the props of the War Office, an old friend of mine, has been arrested. Better news had been reaching us for some time. Counties in the north had begun to organise, and far from the treasonable Soldiers’ Council, home-defence committees had been formed. The men folk of the north-western counties had stood to arms and opposed the advancing Czechs at Vágselye, but it had not come to a battle. As soon as the enemy heard that armed resistance was awaiting him, he turned in his tracks and retreated. Hope rose. It would have been so easy for the armed Hungarian population to expel the intruders who refused to face a battle. Baron Láng was one of the organisers of this plan. It is said that the president of one of these home-defence committees, Szmrecsányi, spent the night before his departure at Láng’s house, and that with traditional Hungarian carelessness he left his motor waiting all night in front of the house, so that the secret police of the Soldiers’ Council got wind of his visit and reported the matter, and the Soldiers’ Council insisted on action being taken. At the time, Count Alexander Festetich, Károlyi’s brother-in-law, had been put at the head of the War Office to screen the little Jewish electrician who really ran the show, and this weak nobleman was obliged to have Láng arrested. He ordered him to appear before him, and had him detained on the spot. It was the fate of one man only, but it affected so many....