Page:A history of Hungarian literature.djvu/176

 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE his hostess took bim into a room which contained nothing but a portrait of Kossuth enshrined in a littie chapel. It was on May 2, r833, that Deák first spoke in Parlia. ment. His subject was the aholition of corporal punish­ ment. Since that time there was no great cause or piece of legistation upon which his wisdom did not sbed some light. In political controversy he was the country's acknowledged leader, who stated the nation's case in the clearest terms and defended it undauntedly. His most important achievement was the compromise with Austria in 1867, the fundamental conditions of which he had laid down in 1861. The twelve years which followed the war of 1848-9 were years of grea t depression in H ungary. The Austrian Government had suspended the Constitution, abolished the ministry, the palatinate, and the provinciai system, refused to summon a Parliament, and altagether dealt with Hungary as a conquered province. Those were the years of absolutism, when neither in Austria nor in Hupgary, newly deprived of her independence, was there any Partiament or responsible Government. Many believed that Hungary was ruined, that her future would resemble that of Poland, and that together with the Magyar language, the whole nation would be wiped out. But towards the end of the fifties despotism lost its strength, and it became more and more evident that it could not effectively administer the n ation's affairs. The Austro-Italian war (1859), which ended in the defeat of Austria, demonstrated still more. clearly the in­ capacity of Austrian rule, and the King decided to put an end to the old system of government and allow each country to have a Parliament. He therefore issued on October I 86o the so-called 1 1 October Decree, " in accord-