At Pesth they were subject to much privation. Their prison quarters were comfortless, destitute of furniture, with only straw for the invalids, and open to the gaze of the soldiery. This continued for many months. When, at last, Madame Meszlenyi was brought to trial she pleaded her own cause, maintaining "that she had done only what womanly duty and Hungarian right imposed on her conscience and sense of honour." So eloquently did she plead for her own and her children's liberty, and exhibit such a wide knowledge of the constitution of the country, and a power of grasping every detail, and meeting every difficulty of the position, that the judge before whom she was tried said, in astonishment: "What shall I do with this woman?" The principal ground of Madame Meszlenyi's skilfully-argued defence was that she had nothing to do with the war, which was entirely the result of the deliberations and actions of those who had the conduct of state matters, but her own conduct had been in the service of humanity only, that she had not been engaged in making war, but only in succouring the wounded in war. But the eloquent pleading of Madame Meszlenyi was in vain; and had not help come from an unexpected quarter, her heroic soul would have flashed out from the scaffold. At the last moment, however, officers of the Austrian army petitioned the Court and urged in her favour her humane action towards the wounded of their own army. "We," they said, "and multitudes of Austrians owe our lives to the magnanimity of this woman." And this truthful plea prevailed. She had seen only fellow creatures in suffering, and directing all the wounded on the field to be brought to her hospitals, she had tenderly nursed and cared for friend and enemy alike. "The poor fellows are often on our side in their hearts," she would say. The result of this disinterested interposition on her behalf was that, instead of the prisoner being condemned to the scaffold, she was, for the time being, honourably acquitted. After her release Madame Meszlenyi continued to reside in Pesth with her mother. The confiscation of her property rendered it necessary that she should have recourse to some means of livelihood, although, had she been willing to live on bounty, the sister of Kossuth would have known no want. She consequently engaged in the, to her, congenial task of the education of the young; and so thorough and conscientious and loving was the manner of her work in this, as in everything to which she put her hand, that success began to crown her endeavours. Her movements were, however, strictly under the eye of the Austrian Government, who became afraid that her school might be the means of promulgating the obnoxious principles of patriotism. It was accordingly required of her that she would undertake that she would not teach history. Her answer was that she could not give an undertaking contrary to her principles, and the school had accordingly to be abandoned.