tural gift of
languages. In secret these daughters of Poland are extremely
patriotic, though the public expression of such sentiments is hardly
admissible under the circumstances. It is not surprising that they
should regret the loss of a condition of society which made them all
princesses, so to speak. The representatives of this class are little
seen in public, very many having removed to Paris, where they
constitute a large and permanent colony. When encountered here, they
are vehemently earnest as to patriotism, and ready to encourage any
extravagant measure looking towards a possible restitution of Polish
nationality.

A fellow traveller between Warsaw and Vienna, in responding to a
casual remark touching the extraordinary beauty of the Polish
ladies,--"ladies whose bright eyes rain influence,"--told the author
of a gallant friend's experience with the gentler sex of several
nationalities. It seems that the person referred to lost his heart in
Germany, his soul in France, his understanding in Italy, and was made
bankrupt of his senses in Poland. When his affections were thus
reduced to a complete wreck, the gentleman settled down to
matrimonial felicity in Russia! Some of the Jewish women of Warsaw,
of the wealthier class, are extremely handsome, so marked in this
respect that it was a pleasure to look at them. Many of the race are
blondes of the most decided stamp. Unlike Parisian, London, or Vienna
beauties, their charms are all quite natural. They require no rouge
to heighten the color of their glowing complexions, no shading of the
eyes, no dyeing of the hair, no falsifying of the figure, no padding.
These Jewesses are beholden to Nature alone for their charms of
person.

The Polish language as spoken by the people of Warsaw is indeed a
puzzle to a stranger, being a sort of Slavic-Indo-European tongue.
When Poland enjoyed a distinctive nationality, no less than six
different dialects were spoken in the several provinces of the
kingdom. There is so much similarity, however, between the Polish
language proper and the Russian tongue that the people of the two
nationalities easily understand each other, and on the borders there
is a singular conglomerate of the two tongues spoken by the
peasantry. Until towards the close of the eighteenth century, the
Polish historians wrote almost exclusively in the Latin language, and
her poets also expressed themselves in that classic medium; hence the
paucity of Polish lite