bewildered astonishment at
the comfort and well-being in Poland when sent under an escort of
Cossacks to introduce Rossian _improvements_. 'What has become of them?'
we asked innocently. 'Ha!' was his naive reply; 'St. Petersburg has
since then grown into a splendid city!'

Let us call the attention of Russo-maniacs to the fact that eighty years
ago, soon after the second partition of Poland, flax in Riga brought
eight hundred and seventy florins, while in 1845 it hardly brought two
hundred and forty florins; and the famous wheat of Sandomir sold, at the
first-named period, at sixty, while in 1856 it brought barely
thirty-five. Yet money now is cheaper than before 1800.

Did the Polish nobleman, selfish and wicked as now seems the fashion to
describe him, force the peasant of Samogitia to servile work, when the
latter had an opportunity of drawing a good profit from the results of
his labor in the neighboring marts of Memel, Liban, Riga, Mittau,
Venden, etc.? No, must we answer to our readers. _There_ might have been
seen a boor's wife dressed in sky blue lined with fox fur, and drawn to
church in a comfortable kolaska, by two excellent, plump, Samogitian
ponies; and neither did the father of the family exhaust his strength in
night watches or day labor, as he had twenty teams to dispose of, and
could offer to an unexpected visitor a broiled chicken with milk sauce,
and a couple of bottles of brown stout from Barclay, Perkins & Co., of
London. Such prosperity, although then declining, was still to be found
in 1830. Why does it not exist to-day? Let this question be answered by
civilizers and democrats from Tambow, Saratow, or Penza, and their
jealous apologists.

Our writer seems to think he has made a wonderful discovery when he
exultingly exclaims: 'How surprised these pretended _liberals_ would be
to see that their efforts only tend toward reconstituting a monarchical
Poland (was Poland really monarchical?--we may doubt) under the
protection of a _feudal_ and Catholic Church!' Such charges were also
made in the eighteenth century, and were suggested by similar motives. I
do not feel called upon to defend the Catholics of Poland. I would
simply retort upon the authors of such suggestions, by referring to
certain distinguished rabbis, as Heilprin, Meintzel, Jastrow, etc.; to
Protestants, as Konarski, Potworowski, Kasaius, Krolikowski, Czynski,
and hosts of others; and also to Mohammedans, as Baranowski, Mucha,
Biela