he Vistula, on which Warsaw is chiefly built, is
high, and the pretty, gay, and animated city, with its stately lines
of streets, wide squares, and spacious gardens, is picturesquely
disposed along the brow of the cliff and on the plains above. Across
the broad sandy bed of the stream, here "shallow, ever-changing,
and divided as Poland itself," and which is on its way from the
Carpathians to the Baltic, is the Prague suburb, which, formerly
fortified, has never recovered from the assault by Suvoroff in
1794, when its sixteen thousand inhabitants were indiscriminately
put to the sword. A vast panorama spreads out in every direction
from this melancholy and dirty point of vantage. Opposite is the
Zamek, or castle, built by the Dukes of Masovia, and enlarged and
restored by several of the Polish kings, from Sigismund III. to
Stanislas Augustus Poniatovski. Its pictures and objects of art
are now at St. Petersburg, and Moscow, and the old royal apartments
are occupied by the Governor-General. The square in front of the
castle was the scene of the last Polish "demonstrations," in 1861,
when it was twice stained with blood.

In the Stare Miasto, or Old Town, strongly old German in aspect,
stands the cathedral, built in the Thirteenth Century, and restored
on the last occasion by King John Sobieski. A still more ancient
sacred edifice is the Church of Our Lady in the Nove Miasto, or New
Town; but it certainly retains no traces of deep antiquity. Beyond
the great Sapieha and Sierakovski Barracks towers the Alexander
Citadel, with its outlying fortifications, built in 1832-35, at the
expense of the city, as a penalty for the insurrection in 1830.
In the same direction, but a considerable distance from the town,
is Mariemont, the country seat of the consort of John Sobieski;
also Kaskada, a place of entertainment much frequented by the
inhabitants of Warsaw, and Bielany, a pretty spot on the Vistula
commanding a fine view. The churches and chapels, mostly Roman
Catholic, are numerous (eighty-five), and so are the monasteries
and convents (twenty-two).

Near Novi Sviat (New World) Street, we find the Avenues, or _Champs
Elysees_, bordered by fine lime-trees, in front of elegant private
residences. Crossing a large square, in which the troops are exercised,
and the military hospital at Uiazdov, formerly a castle of the
kings of Poland, we reach the fine park of Lazienki, a country
seat of much elegance built by King Stanislas A