The Assessors form the rural police of a district. According to the ukases, they are sometimes chosen by the inhabitants, sometimes appointed by the government; these latter are called Crown Assessors. Judges of Appeal are also called Assessors, but we are not here speaking of them.
The Regents perform the writing-out of documents, and record verdicts. They are all nominated by the clerks of court. ↩
Falcon. ↩
Crop-tailed. ↩
Pronounce Soplitza. ↩
It may not perhaps seem irrelevant here to observe that the name of Soplica has been rendered doubly famous in Polish literature by the “Memoirs of Severyn Soplica,” written by Henry, Count Rzewuski; a work purporting to be the personal recollections of a Polish nobleman of the old school, and comprising historic and social sketches, of great interest to students. The selection of a pseudonym is due to the immense influence of the present work of Mickiewicz. ↩
This is not quite the proper rendering. The English village, and the Polish wies or wioska, are not quite alike in signification. The latter means a gentleman’s farm-estate. —E. S. N. ↩
An onomatopoeic exclamation, whose use explains itself. ↩
Provincial or local diet, diminutive of sejm. ↩
Poniatowski. ↩
This is an ordinary method of addressing an assembly, and used even at the present day in Poland, and has no suggestion of subserviency, although sounding unnatural in English. —E. S. N. ↩
Joseph, Count Niesiolowski, the last Wojewode of Nowogrodek, was president of the revolutionary government at the time of Jasinski’s insurrection. ↩
George Bialopiotrowicz, the last Public Writer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, also took an active part in Jasinski’s insurrection. He tried prisoners of state in Wilna, and was much respected for his virtues and patriotism. ↩
The mythical founder of Poland, from whom is taken this expression for unremembered antiquity, as in the time of King Arthur, of King Dagobert, King Wamba, etc. ↩
Podkomorzy’s wife. ↩
Carver’s daughter, title of honour. ↩
This is an example of the change of grammatical gender which Polish family names undergo, when applied to the female members of a house. The adjectival ski always changes to ska, as John Sobieski, Clementina Sobieska. Such names were originally territorial, and are therefore true adjectives, and declined as such. Names in other terminations have also different forms for men and women, though the rule is not so invariable in these latter. ↩
Pisarz, or writer, here signifies a sort of farmyard official, who is at the same time the bookkeeper; but his duties are more in the farmyard, and in the fields, than over the desk. In farmyard hierarchy the gradation is—wlouarz, peasant overseer; pisarz [something superior to a peasant, an overseer of the whole farmyard, or bookkeeper]; ekonom (Lat. aeconomicus) or podstarosci, under-manager of the whole farm estate; rzondzca, or manager. —E. S. N. ↩
In Slucko there was a manufactory of brocade and rich girdles for the whole of Poland, perfected by the efforts of Tyzenhaus. ↩
Vocanda (Lat.), a long and narrow book, in which were written the names of the parties going to law. Every advocate and Wozny was obliged to keep such a vocanda. ↩
A Jewish-Polish word, signifying the administrative committee or board of a synagogue. —E. S. N. ↩
Jews’ cap. ↩
These are almost the very words of the chorus of Dombrowski’s famous March. ↩
General Kniaziewicz was despatched from the army of Italy to lay the conquered standards before the Directory. ↩
The legion of the Danube, under Jablonowski, was despatched to Haiti, for the purpose of subduing the successful insurrection against the French by the negroes under the brave and unfortunate Toussaint L’Ouverture (1802). The story of this war and its consequences is foreign to the subject-matter of the present work, and therefore need not be here detailed. Nearly the whole of the Polish forces in Haiti perished from the unhealthiness of the climate, only a few returning to Europe. A certain number also made common cause with the blacks, and settled in Haiti. ↩
The original word here used for princes is cary, i.e., “czars,” a title which, it may not be uninteresting to notice, does not exclusively apply in Slavonic languages to the Czar of Muscovy. He is often styled “the White Czar,” or “Czar of White Russia.” But the word originally meant no more than prince or king. The Czar of Turkey is a term for the Sultan; and the Czar of Abyssinia, the Tartar Czars are also spoken of. Linde derives Czar merely from Caesar, and accordingly the great Julius himself has been spoken of as a Czar in some old manuscripts. In the Russian Bible the Czar of Glory stands for Christ. ↩
The English word, of course much disguised in Polish spelling, is used. Is it a credit to England that so many terms exclusively relating to horse-racing have passed into a like usance in foreign countries? ↩
The name
