HUNGARY: Poor Man’s King

One reason why Hungary remains a slightly grotesque “kingless kingdom,” ruled by His Serene Highness salty old Admiral Nicholas Horthy de Nagybanya, is the notoriously high cost of supporting a Habsburg Court. Thousands of Hungarian Legitimists would like to restore “Little Otto,” 20-year-old son of their late King Karl, but they know the extravagance of his regal mother Zita, fear she would insist that the State lavishly support dozens of penniless Habsburg archdukes. Last week in ancient Debrecsen, famed today for its tobacco-pipes, sausages and soap, Legitimists staged a monster pro-Otto rally several times disturbed by anti-Otto students who shouted “Long Live Horthy!”

When police had dispersed the students, Legitimist Deputy Father Greiger startled Hungary by announcing that the Habsburgs are now willing to come back on the cheap. “We need have no fear of extravagance!” cried Father Greiger. “Otto has told me that on becoming King of Hungary he is prepared to be definitely a poor man’s king. … It is slander to say that Otto speaks Hungarian with an Austrian accent. He speaks better Hungarian than Koloman de Kanya, our present Foreign Minister”—who speaks with the West Hungarian accent of his native town Sopron.