Chapter Ten.
Kossuth. “The Times.”
During the year 1852 a strong friendship had sprung up between Captain Mayne Reid and Louis Kossuth, the ex-governor of Hungary, who was at that time living in London. Captain Reid entered enthusiastically into the Hungarian cause and attended many public meetings on behalf of the refugees.
In February, 1853, when the ill-fated insurrection at Milan took place, Kossuth was anxious to join the insurgents as soon as possible.
Captain Reid proposed that Kossuth should travel across the Continent disguised as his servant. A passport was actually got from the Foreign Office for this purpose, and bears date 24th February, 1853, “for the free passage of Captain Mayne Reid, British subject, travelling on the Continent with a man-servant, James Hawkins, British subject.” All was in readiness for their departure, when a telegram in cipher was received by Kossuth that the rising had proved only an émeute.
Fortunately for Captain Reid, who was thus spared risking his life on the altar of friendship, as he was quite prepared to do. Capture in Austria would have been certain death for one, if not both of them.
He remained a staunch friend to Louis Kossuth during the latter’s residence in England, ever ready to defend him with the pen, as he had been with the sword.
The Times of February 10th, 1853, contained these lines at the head of its Notices to Correspondents: “At 2 o’clock this morning we received a letter, signed ‘Mayne Reid,’ denying, in absurdly bombastic language, the genuineness of the proclamation which we published on the 10th inst., and which we introduced as ‘professing to be addressed by M. Kossuth to the Hungarian soldiers in Italy.’ Such documents are seldom very formal, but we had good reason for believing it to be genuine, and shall certainly not discredit it without better authority than that of ‘Mayne Reid.’”
The letter to which The Times refers—or rather a copy of it—was sent by its author to the Sun.
“Louis Kossuth and the Italians.