Master Jock could scarce await the dawn of St. John Baptist's Day; he was as delighted as a child who knows that some long-wished-for amusement awaits him. He was awakened long before sunrise by the baying of the dogs and the rattling of the baggage-waggons into the courtyard. The huntsmen were coming back from the forest with newly shot game; over the sides of the lofty wains the horned heads of the noble antlered stags bobbed up and down; heaps of pheasants were carried between two poles; well-fattened heath fowl were slung over the shoulders of the beaters. The cook came forth to meet them in his white kantus, and tapped row after row of the fat game, his face beaming with satisfaction all the time. Master Jock himself was looking down from the latticed-window into the courtyard; even then the day had only just begun to dawn, and the eastern curtain of the sky was aflame with purple, pink, carmine, and saffron hues. The whole plain around was calm and still; and silver mists lay here and there over the fields like fairy lakes.
And now the Nabob lay down for another little snatch of slumber. We know, of course, that early
morning dreams are the sweetest. And he dreamt that he was speaking to his eagerly desired nephew Bélá, sitting beside him, and drinking the loving cup with him; and so it came about that the sun was already high in the heavens when Palko shook him out of his slumbers by bawling in his ear: "Get up! Here are your boots!"
Master Jock leaped out of his bed with the vigour of a sprightly lad. The first question he asked was: "Has any one come?"
"As many as muck," replied the old servant; thereby showing his appreciation of the arrivals.
"Is Mike Kis here?" continued Master Jock, as he drew on his boots.
"He was the first of all. His father could not have been a gentleman; no gentleman could have had a son who is up and about two hours after dawn."
"Who else is here?"
"There's Mike Horhi. No sooner had he got to the door than he suddenly recollected that he had left his tobacco-pouch in the inn at Szabadka, and would have gone back for it had I not torn him out of the carriage by force."