And the Prince's pocal has to be filled pretty often. Transylvanian banquets generally ended with a wager on the part of the gentlemen to drink one another under the table. At such banquets John Kemeny has no equal. Now too he invites the bolder spirits to take up the usual challenge. The greater part of the guests, however, decline the invitation. Only three persons respond to the Prince's challenge. The first is Wenzinger, the leader of the German mercenaries, a big, raw-boned man, with a closely-shaven head, bright blue eyes, somewhat stooping neck, and scarcely visible grey eyebrows. The second is Paul Beldi, Captain-General of the Szeklers, a grave, handsome, amiable-looking man with a very high forehead. The wine he has taken gives a sparkle to his gentle eyes, and his taciturn lips are parted in a half-smile--drink produces no other effect upon him. He wears a simple yellow camelot dolman, with a scarlet, silver-embossed girdle round the waist; his white shirt-collar extends far over his dark-blue kerchief. His smoothly-combed hair is parted down the middle, brushed behind his ears, and falls in long locks over his shoulders. The man with delicate white hands who sits opposite to him, Denis Banfi, Lord-Lieutenant of Klausenburg, is the third competitor. He is a middle-aged, broad-shouldered, haughty-looking man, with an air of savage truculence on his aristocratic face. His thick black beard has never yet been touched by a razor. His dark, chestnut brown locks lie in spiral rolls upon his forehead, and flow down over both shoulders in rich crisp curls. His round face is red by nature, but wine has now made it redder than ever. His sparkling eyes glance defiantly around. When he addresses any one he strokes his double chin, screws his neck on one side, and speaks in a sharp, irritating tone, at the same time throwing back his haughty head provocatively, and assuming an expression of endless condescension. His dress consists of a purple dolman with large enamelled buttons, and over that a short, heavy, white silk tabard trimmed with swan's-down, the sleeves of which are slit up to the elbows and garnished with rubies. His golden knightly belt is thrown over his shoulder with lordly negligence. At the head of the table sits John Kemeny himself, with the consorts of Beldi and Banfi one on each side of him. Kemeny, despite his frequent intercourse and close relations with the West, still prefers to adopt the oriental costume. He is characterized by short clipped hair, a long beard, a grave, dignified face, and a curt, monosyllabic style of speech. The ruling expression of his face is an unmistakable, fatalistic indifference to everything about him, an indifference which was ere long to overwhelm him in so terrible a catastrophe.