Young Doctor Eszterhazy

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It was the year that the bears were so bad in Bosnia.

The year that the bears were so bad in Bosnia and Queen Victoria actually said, “We are not amused,” was a year very crucial in the affairs of Far-Northwestern Europe, as well as those of Scythia-Pannonia- Transbalkania.

The always-tremulous Union of Scandia and Froreland was once again in a state of perturbation, the Frore Nationalists now insisting upon a separate Bureau of Weights and Measures, and the Scands (entirely as a matter of principle, having nothing to do with the imposts on stockfish and goat-cheese) resisting this under the well-known motto, Where will it end? That Froreland and Scandia constituted “Two Gloriously Free Monarchies Conjoined by One Single and Magnanimous Monarch” was a truth as well-known as it was troublesome. The monarch at this time was Magnus IV and III, “Staunchly Lutheran and Ever-Victorious King of the Scands, Sorbs, Goths, Lapps, Lipps, and Frores; Protector of the Skraelings, Terror of Iceland and Ireland, and Benefactor of the Butter Business” — known more generally as Magni — the reaction of the King to this most recent and non-negotiable demand, was to put down his glog-glass and offer to “settle the matter once and for all” by shooting dice for Froreland with the Khan-Tsar of Tsartary — Finnmark and Carelia to be the counter-stakes. This sporting suggestion was met with a most ringing silence all round about the Arctic Circle.

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