The young girl, with the prodigious power of assimilation peculiar to her race, learned everything, loving knowledge for its own sake, but, nevertheless, always deeply moved by the history of that unknown country, which was that of her mother, and even her own, the land of her heart and her soul-Hungary.

She knew, from her mother, about all its heroes: Klapka, Georgei, Dembiski; Bem, the conqueror of Buda; Kossuth, the dreamer of a sort of feudal liberty; and those chivalrous Zilah princes, father and son, the fallen martyr and the living hero.
Prince Tchereteff, French in education and sentiment, wished to take to France the child, who did not bear his name, but whom he adored.

France also exercised a powerful fascination over Marsa's imagination; and she departed joyously for Paris, accompanied by the Tzigana, her mother, who felt like a prisoner set at liberty.

To quit Russian soil was in itself some consolation, and who knew?
perhaps she might again see her dear fatherland.
Tisza, in fact, breathed more freely in Paris, repeating however, like a mournful refrain, the proverb of her country: Away from Hungary, life is not life.

The Prince purchased, at Maisons-Lafitte, not far from the forest of Saint-Germain, a house surrounded by an immense garden.