ugh the field of freedom and water it with his
blood! No! an unknown spy will accuse him; he must defend himself before
a perjured court; his battlefield will be a dungeon underground, and an
all-powerful enemy his judge. The blasted wood of the gallows will be
the monument of his grave; a few woman's tears, soon dried, and the long
talks of his countrymen in the night-time will be his sole honor and
memorial after death." (Transl. Brandes, Poland.)

Such is the character of Polish womanhood, in reality and in poetic
fiction. Inexhaustible riches dwell in its type. The sins of past
centuries have been avenged bitterly upon them and their children; but
they live on, true to their Polish nature. The variety of the human
races, created by Divine Providence, with all their manifold
peculiarities, their virtues and faults, would suffer greatly, and the
human family would be seriously impoverished, should the species "Polish
Woman" ever be merged in the conquering nations and vanish with them,
however great and nobly endowed the latter may be. If the realization of
this wish be the hope of statesmen, the historian of culture can only
desire that the race remain according to a Tacitean word regarding the
Teuton "similar only to itself."

CONTENTS

DEDICATION

PREFACE

I. THE WOMEN OF THE PAGAN TEUTONS.
II. THE YEARS OF THE WANDERINGS.
III. THE YEARS OF THE WANDERINGS (CONTINUED).
IV. THE CENTURIES OF SUBMERGENCE AND OF NATIONALIZATION.
V. THE DAYS OF THE MINNESINGERS.
VI. THE COMING OF THE MASTERSINGERS.
VII. WOMEN OF THE RENAISSANCE AND THE REFORMATION.
VIII. AN ERA OF INTELLECTUAL DESOLATION.
IX. WOMAN HELD IN TIGHTENING BONDS.
X. THROUGH STORM AND STRESS TO CLASSICISM AND HUMANISM.
XI. EMANCIPATION OF GERMAN WOMEN.
XII. WOMEN OF RUSSIA.
XIII. WOMEN OF POLAND

List of Illustrations

Emma carrying her lover, G. L. P. Saint-Ange.
Capture of Thusnelda, H. Konig.
A Teutonic alliance, Ferdinand Leeke.
Fredegond watching the marriage of
Chilperic and Galswintha, L. Alma-Tadema.
Princess Sophia and the old and new school
religionists, V. G. Peroff.
Kalmuck interior, Racinet.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Women of the Teutonic Nations, by
Hermann Schoenfeld

*** END OF THIS PROJECT