Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/317

Rh LITERATURE.] POLAND 305 terka. In 1820 he was sent to the university of Warsaw, where he had Goszczynski as a fellow-student. Since 1830 he has resided in Paris. Besides the longer poem previously mentioned, he is the author of many charming lyrics in the style of the Little-Russian poems, such as Shevchenko has written in that language. Michael Grabowski (1805- 1863) belongs also to this school by his fine Melodies of the Ukraine. A poet of great vigour was Stephen Garczynski (1806-1833), the friend of Mickiewicz, celebrated for his War Sonnets and his poem entitled The Deeds of Wadaw. Among later authors, some of whom still survive, may be men tioned Wincenty Pol, born in 1807 at Lublin. He wrote a fine descriptive work, Obrazy z Zycia i Podr6zy (&quot; Pictures of Life and Travel&quot;), and also a poem, Piesn o Ziemi Naszej (&quot;Song of our Land &quot;). For about three years from 1849 he was professor of geography in the university of Cracow. In 1855 he published Mohort, a poem relating to the times of Stanislaus Poniatowski. Ludvvik Wiadyslaw Kondratowicz (who wrote chiefly under the name of Syrokomla) was born in 1823 in the government of Minsk. His parents were poor, and he received a meagre education, but made up for it by careful self-culture. One of his most remarkable poems is his Jan Dgborog, in which, like Mickiewicz, he has well described the scenery of his native Lithuania. He everywhere appears as the advocate of the suffering peasants, and has conse crated to them many beautiful lyrics. In Kaczkowski the Poles have a novelist who has treated many periods of their history with great success. His sympathies, however, are mostly aristocratic, though modified by the desire of progress. An important writer of history is Karl Szajnocha, born in Galicia of Czech parents in 1818. He began his labours with The Age of Casimir the Great (1848), and Bolesiaiv the Brave (1849), following these with Jachoiga and Jagielio, in three volumes (1855-1856), a work which Spasovich, in his Russian History of Slavonic Literature, compares in vigour of style and fulness of colour with Macaulay s History of England and Thierry s Norman Conquest. Our author was still further to resemble the latter writer in a great misfortune ; from overwork he lost his sight in 1857. Szajnocha, however, like Thierry and the American Prescott, did not abandon his studies. His excellent memory helped him in his affliction. In 1858 he published a work in which he traced the origin of Poland from the Varangians (Lechicki poczatek Polski), thus making them identical in origin with the Russians. He began to write the history of John Sobieski, but did not live to finish it, dying in 1868, soon after completing a history of the Cossack wars, Dwa lata dziejtiw naszych (&quot;Two Years of Our History&quot;). A writer of romances of considerable power was Joseph Korzeniowski, tutor in early youth to the poet Krasinski, and afterwards director of a school at Kharkoff. Besides some plays now forgotten, he was author of some popular novels, such as Wedrowki orijginaia (&quot;Tours of an Original&quot;), 1848; Garbaty (&quot;The Hunchback&quot;), 1852, &c. He died at Dresden in 1863. But the most fertile of Polish authors beyond all question is Kraszewski (born in 1812). His works con stitute a library in themselves ; they are chiefly historical novels, some of which treat of early times in Poland and some of its condi tion under the Saxon kings. Up to 1879, when he celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his commencing authorship, he had written two hundred and fifty separate works in four hundred and forty volumes. One of the most popular of his novels is Jermota the Potter, a pathetic and noble story, which much resembles George Eliot s Silas Marncr, but appeared in 1857, some time before the publication of that work. A charge of treason was recently brought against Kraszewski by the German Government, and he is now (1885) undergoing a sentence of imprisonment at Madgeburg. Among the various works of Kraszewski may be mentioned an interesting one on Lithuania (Litwa), which contains many valuable accounts of Lithuanian customs ; perhaps, however, the historical and philo logical parts of the work are not always very critically treated. He is the author of two volumes of poetry. As lyrical poets may also be mentioned Jachowicz, Jaskowski, author of a tine poem The Beginning of Winter, Wasilewski, and Holowinski, archbishop of Moghileff (1807-1855), author of religious poems. The style of poetry in vogue in the Polish parts of Europe at the present time is chiefly lyrical. Other writers deserving mention are Cornelius Ujejski (born in 1823), the poet of the last revolt of 1863; Theophilus Lenartowicz (born 1822), who has written some very graceful poetry ; Sigismund Milkowski (born in 1820), author of romances drawn from Polish history, for the novel of the school of Sir Walter Scott still flourishes vigorously among the Poles. Among the very numerous writers of romances may be mentioned Henry Rzewuski (1791-1866); Joseph Dzierzkowski wrote novels on aristocratic life, and Michael Czajkowski tales of adventure ; Valerius Wielogiowski (1865) gave pictures of country life. Of course at the head of all writers in this department must be con sidered the unfortunate Kraszewski. In 1882 the Poles lost, in the prime of life, a very promising historian Szujski (born in 1835), and also Schmitt, who died in his sixty-sixth year. Szujski commenced his literary career in 1859 with poems and dramas ; in 1860 appeared his first historical production, Rzut oka na History e Polski (&quot;A Glance at Polish History&quot;), which attracted universal attention; and in 1862 he commenced the publication in parts of his work Dzieje Polski ( &quot; The History of Poland &quot;) the printing of which ceased in 1866. The value of this book is great both on account of the research it dis plays and its philosophical and unprejudiced style. One of the last works of Szujski, written in German, Die Polen und Ruthenen in Galizien, attracted a great deal of attention at the time of its appearance. Schmitt got mixed up with some of the political questions of the day he was a native of Galicia and therefore a subject of the Austrian emperor and was sentenced to death in 1846, but the penalty was commuted into imprisonment in Spielberg, whence he was released by the revolution of 1848. In 1863 he took part in the Polish rebellion, and was compelled to fly to Paris, whence he only returned in 1871. His chief works are History of the Polish People from the Earliest Times to the mar 1763 (1854), History of Poland in the ISthand 19th Centuries (1866), and History of Poland from the time of the Partition (1868), which he carried down to the year 1832. In opposition to the opinion of many historians, his contemporaries, that Poland fell through the nobility and the diets, Schmitt held (as did Lelewel) that the country was brought to ruin by the kings, who always preferred dynastic interests to those of the country, and by the pernicious influence to the Jesuits. Adalbert Ke,trzynski, who succeeded Bielowski in 1877 in his post of director of the Ossolinski Institute at Lemberg, is the author of some valuable monographs on the history of Poland. He was born in 1838. Kasimir Stadnicki has treated of the period of the Jagielions ; and Szaraniewicz, professor at the university of Lemberg, has written on the early history of Galicia. Thaddeus Wojciechowski has published a clever work on Slavonic antiquities. Xavier Liske, born in 1838, and now pro fessor of universal history at Lemberg, has published many historical essays of considerable value, and must be a linguist of great attainments, as separate works by him have appeared in the German, Polish, Swedish, Danish, and Spanish languages. The Sketch of the History of Poland &quot; (Dzieje Polskie w Zarysie) by Michael Bobrzynski, born in 1849 in Cracow (where he is professor of Polish and German law), is a very spirited work, and has given rise to a great deal of controversy on account of the opposition of many of its views to those of the school of Lelewel. Vincent Zakrzewski, now professor of history at Cracow, has written some works which have attracted considerable attention, such as On the Origin and Growth of the Reformation in Poland, and After the Flight of King Henry, in which he describes the condition of the country during the period between that king s departure from Poland and the election of Stephen Batory. Smoika has published a history entitled Mieszko the Elder and his Age. Wiadystaw Wisiocki has prepared a catalogue of manuscripts in the Jagielion library at Cracow. Dr Joseph Casimir Pleba/iski is now editor of the Biblioteka Warszaivska, a very valuable literary journal which stands at the head of all w^orks of the kind in Poland. He has also written a dissertation (in Latin) on the liberum veto, which puts that institution in a nev light. Felix Jezierski, the previous editor of the above-mentioned journal, published in it translations of parts of Homer, and is also the author of an excellent version of Faust. The history of Polish literature has not been neglected. We first have the early history of Felix Bentkowski (1781-1852), followed by that of Michael AViszniewski (1794-1865), which, how ever, only extends to the 17th century, and is at best but a quarry of materials for subsequent writers, the style being very heavy. A &quot;History of Eloquence&quot; (Historya Wymomj w Polsce) was pub lished by Karl Mecherzyuski. An elaborate history of Polish literature is now in course of preparation by Anton Matecki, who is the author of the best Polish grammar (Gramatyka Historycznc- Pordivnaivcza Jezyka Polskiego, 2 vols., Lemberg, 1879). The Polish bibliography of Karl Estreicher, now director of the Jagielton library at Cracow, is a work of the highest importance. One of the most active writers on Polish philology and literature is Wladysiaw Nehring, whose numerous contributions to the Archivfilr Slavische Philologic of Professor Jagic entitle him to the gratitude of all who have devoted themselves to Slavonic studies. Wtadimir Spasowicz, a lawyer of St Petersburg, has assisted Pipiu in his valuable work on Slavonic literature. The lectures of Professor Cybulski (ob. 1867) on Polish literature in the first half of the 19th century are written with much spirit and appreciation. The larger poetical works which appear during that time are carefully analysed. In recent times many interesting geological and anthropo logical investigations have been carried on in Poland. In 1868 Count Constantino Tyszkiewicz published a valuable monograph on the Tombs of Lithuania and Western Ruthcnia. _ A diligent searcher for antiquities is Prof. Joseph tepkowski of Cracow, who has greatly enriched the arcliKological museum of his native city. XIX. - 39