You're a boor, a _betyar_, a good-for-nothing rascal, a runaway ragamuffin, that's what you are! And you'll be glad enough to kiss my hand, and beg me to make you one of my lackeys, to save you from starvation or the gallows." "Excuse me," replied Mike Kis, deftly twisting his moustache, "but I am Michael Kis, Esq., proprietor of Almasfalva, which I purchased the day before yesterday from the trustees of the estate of Kazmer Almasfalvi, for 120,000 florins, with the full sanction of the Court, wherefore my title thereto is unexceptionable." Master Jock fell back in astonishment.

"One hundred and twenty thousand florins! When and where did you pick up all that money ?" "I got it honourably," said Michael Kis, smiling.

"I won it at cards one evening, when I and a few of my gentlemen friends sat down to play together.

To tell you the truth, I won a good deal more than that, but the balance will do to build up a splendid castle on my estate, where I can reside during the summer." To Master Jock this part of the matter was quite intelligible; much larger sums than this used to be lost and won during the sessions of the Diet at Pressburg.

But one thing he could not understand at all.
"Pray how did you get your diploma of gentility ?" he asked; "you are not a gentleman by birth." "That was a very simple matter.