Page:A history of Hungarian literature.djvu/125

Later on, when an old national institution (the right of the nobility to raise troops themselves for the country's defence) was attacked in literary works and in the Press, Alexander Kisfaludy tried to defend it. But unluckily for him, the writer with whom he got into controversy was the most brilliant publicist of the century, Louis Kossuth.

As an elderly man he saw a young man beginning to acquire a celebrity that put his own into the shade. As that success was due to the drama, he also tried to write plays, but failed. And the successful rival was his own younger brother, Charles Kisfaludy.

Charles Kisfaludy (1788-1830), the second of the great reformers of Hungarian literature, was the younger brother of Alexander Kisfaludy. The two brothers differed widely from one another in character, in talent and in their outward life. Charles was a thorough bohemian, of a dreamy yet light-hearted disposition. Alexander, on the other hand, had a well-balanced mind. As a gentleman farmer he managed his property judiciously, and he was an excellent husband and father. He was of a cheerful temperament, and it is only in his works that we find him sad and serious, for his life was tranquil and happy, while that of his brother Charles was restless and full of adventure. Charles had a profound knowledge of human nature, while Alexander showed himself an indifferent explorer of it; his own soul he could reveal in his lyric poetry, but he did not thoroughly understand the souls of other men.

The first troubles in Charles' life sprang from a quarrel with his father. His vehement and unyielding disposition caused him to be disowned. Charles, like his brother, became a soldier, and he, too, fought against Napoleon at the battle of Leoben.