"The mountains will be tunnelled, and the canal is to run under them." "Now just listen to me, my good sir! If you do not respect my official capacity, otherwise the Imperial Hungarian Presidency of the County Assembly, which I represent, you should at least have regard to my grey hairs, and find some other fool to impose on with your scheme. Why, this would take millions of money." "The actual estimate amounts to sixty millions." "Sixty millions! What are you dreaming of? Why, the Emperor has not got as much as that out of the whole Hungarian revenue in twenty years." "The financial provision for this undertaking lies ready to hand. A syndicate has been formed which will answer for the needful funds, and directly Pesth is brought into connection with the sea its commercial possibilities can be developed. Imagine a water-way from Pesth to Trieste, one of the great emporiums of the world's trade in the centre of Hungary!" But his Excellency could not imagine it. "Tut, tut," he cried, and his eyes flashed angrily. "What do you mean by taking such a chimera seriously? A canal from the centre of Hungary to the coast, what does it mean but foreign traders sucking the life and strength out of this country to glut their markets with our wealth. We won't have anything of the kind! The ruling classes of this country will have something to say to that. We will not let the people of this nation be plunged into misery thus. Why, foreign traders would just exploit our mineral wealth to their hearts' content, and leave the poor folk of this country starving. No, no, my friend, don't you think we will ever have anything of the kind." Ráby would not give in; he was by this time quite at home on these questions. He could, moreover, give excellent reasons why every land that has a seaport is prosperous, for trade does not impoverish people, it enriches them. To which his Excellency retorted that of course trade was a good thing for nations who knew how to get the best of their neighbours, but for a simple unsophisticated folk, like the Hungarians, it meant ruin. In the midst of this heated controversy, the two did not perceive that the district commissioner had entered without being announced, and was listening with much amusement to the debate. The district commissioner could not abide wrangling, so he promptly turned the conversation on to neutral topics. "Eh, what is all this about? We, at any rate, have nothing to do with the nation's economics. Tell us rather what is going on in Vienna. For remarkably funny events have happened surely since we met." And the speaker laughed slily, as if struck by some comical reminiscence. Ráby knew well enough what caused his companion's mirth. He was thinking, doubtless, of Fruzsinka and the two other "wives." And the thought pierced him with a sudden stab of pain. The good-natured official suppressed his ill-timed laughter, however, as he diverted the subject.