"Inside the palace there are many fine paintings and other works of art. There are portraits of Polish kings and queens, and other rare pictures, but not as many as in the Castle of Villanov, which we afterwards visited. In the latter, which was the residence of John Sobieski, and now belongs to Count Potocki, there are paintings by Rubens and other celebrated masters, and there is a fine collection of armor, including the suit which was presented to Sobieski by the Pope, after the former had driven the Turks away from Vienna. It is beautifully inlaid with ivory and mother-of-pearl, and covered with arabesques of astonishing delicacy. We could have spent hours in studying it, and you may be sure we left it with great reluctance. [Illustration: A BUSINESS MAN OF WARSAW.] "Warsaw has a population of nearly three hundred thousand, and there are a good many factories for the manufacture of carriages, pianos, cloth, carpets, and machines of various kinds. The city is the centre of a large trade in grain, cattle, horses, and wool, and altogether it may be considered prosperous. Much of the business is in the hands of the Jews, who have managed to have and hold a great deal of wealth in spite of the oppression they have undergone by both Poles and Russians. "The women of Warsaw are famous for their beauty, and we are all agreed that we have seen more pretty faces here than in any other city of Europe in the same time. The Jews of Warsaw are nearly all blonds; the men have red beards, and the hair of the women is of the shade that used to be the fashion among American and English actresses, and is not yet entirely forgotten. We bought some photographs in one of the shops, and are sure they will be excellent adornments for our albums at home. "In the evening we went to the opera in the hope of seeing the national costumes of the Poles, but in this we were disappointed. The operas are sung in Italian; the principal singers are French, Italian, English, or any other nationality, like those of opera companies elsewhere, and only the members of the chorus and ballet are Poles. Russian uniforms are in the boxes and elsewhere in the house, and every officer is required to wear his sword, and be ready at any moment to be summoned to fight. The men not in uniform are in evening dress, and the ladies are like those of an audience in Vienna or Naples, so far as their dress is concerned. The opera closed at half-past eleven; our guide met us outside the door, and when we proposed a stroll he said we must be at the hotel by midnight, under penalty of being arrested. Any one out-of-doors between midnight and daylight will be taken in by the police and locked up, unless he has a pass from the authorities. In troubled times the city is declared in a state of siege, and then everybody on the streets after dusk must carry a lantern.