Free They Were Found Wanting by Miklós Bánffy

painted poles, compasses, measuring tapes and a set of binoculars on a tripod – all the tools of forest-planning .
    Winckler, a highly qualified forester, was explaining his plans. Firstly, he said, he had made himself familiar with the Abady holdings by himself walking all over them. Now, he suggested, the plantations should be laid out on each side of a main drive which, starting from where they stood, would run from one end of the property to the other right to where, just east of Count Uzdy’s holdings, the Abady forests marched with municipal lands. On each side, north and east, smaller drives would separate each stand of timber into 50-acre plots. All this he explained to Abady, showing him detailed maps that he had drawn up himself. One problem remained to be decided: should they now let each plot follow the contours of the valleys on the side of the plateau until they ended naturally on the crests of the surrounding hills, or should they disregard the lie of the land and plan the separate plots on a strictly geometric basis which, of course, had certain administrative advantages but which would entail reckoning with different soil conditions. The first proposition was more complicated to administer but, from the point of view of husbandry , might well prove the more profitable.
    Abady was trying hard to pay attention to what the manager was saying. It was important to him, as the whole future profitability of the holding depended on what was now being decided and so he made every effort, mentally, to take in what was being suggested. His mind was with it. His eyes were not.
    Abady’s eyes did not see the maps. They looked elsewhere, into the distance, where, far away through a gap between the young foliage of two great oaks, just visible behind a lacy curtain of pale green leaves, could be seen two vertical lines, the colour of newly churned butter, which shone in the early morning sunlight . They were the two remaining walls of the donjon of the ruined fortress of Almasko. From where he stood these two distant lines were only tiny strips but one felt that they must in reality be very high indeed, standing like two exclamation marks reaching into the sky demanding attention. At their feet lay the forests, wave after wave, until at length they ended at the two oak trees between which the ruins could be glimpsed. It was like a window, just large enough for the two massive walls to shine through from the far horizon, from the distant past …
    Balint moved his position: one single step and the forest closed up, the ruins disappearing. Now his whole attention was given to the forest manager.

    By the late afternoon they had walked to all the more important parts of the forest, returning at last to the sloping meadow from which they had set out. Here Abady’s tent had been erected as, although the meadow was by no means at the heart of the property but was close to the eastern border only a few hundred metres from the Uzdy forests, it had an excellent water supply which was always important to the people of the Kalotaszeg.
    The sun had already disappeared below the Kiralyhago – the King’s Pass – but, high above, the light clouds which had started to gather during the afternoon, shone brightly in the distant sunshine.
    The foresters were busily occupied in bringing wood and building a fire and preparing their beds. Winckler was writing up his notes.
    Balint set off to walk in the forest, following a narrow deer track.

    Now that at last he was on his own Balint walked slowly, and his thoughts returned to the time he had just spent in Budapest and to the violent debates in Parliament which had arisen only a few days before.
    Discussion had raged about Apponyi’s proposals for a new schools law which, while bringing substantial financial help to the minority schools (and incidentally adding a heavy load to the State budget), would at the same time have exacted an even more intensive instruction in the Hungarian