E-text prepared by Andrew Leader of polishwriting.net THE COMEDIENNE by WLADYSLAW S. REYMONT Translated from the Polish by Edmund Obecny Frontispiece by Frederick Dorr Steele G. P. Putnam's Sons New York and London The Knickerbocker press 1920 Copyright, 1920 by G. P. Putnam's Sons PUBLISHERS' NOTE The provincial actors of Poland are sometimes colloquially called "comedians," as distinguished from their more pretentious brethren of the metropolitan stage in Warsaw. The word, however, does not characterize a player of comedy parts. Indeed, the provincials, usually performing in open air theatres, play every conceivable role, and as in the case of Janina, the heroine of this story, the life of the Comedienne often embraces far more tragedy than comedy. Wladyslaw Reymont is the most widely known of living Polish writers. The Academy of Science of Cracow nominated him for the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is the author of numerous novels dealing with various phases of everyday life in Poland, many of them translated into French, German, and Swedish. The Comedienne is the first of his works to appear in English. Reymont himself was a peasant, rising from the bottom until to-day the light of his recognized genius shines in the very forefront of the Slavic intellectuals. It is interesting to note that for several years the author was himself a "Comedian," traveling about what was then Russian Poland with a company of provincial players. The Comedienne CHAPTER I Bukowiec, a station on the Dombrowa railroad, lies in a beautiful spot. A winding line was cut among the beech and pine covered hills, and at the most level point, between a mighty hill towering above the woods with its bald and rocky summit, and a long narrow valley, glistening with pools and marshes, was placed the station. This two-story building of rough brick containing the quarters of the station-master and his assistant, a small wooden house at the side for the telegrapher and the minor employees, another similar one near the last switches for the watchman, three switch-houses at various points, and a freight-house were the only signs of human habitation. Surrounding the station on all sides were the murmuring woods, while above, a strip of blue sky, slashed with gray clouds, extended like a wide-spreading roof. The sun was veering toward the south and glowing ever brighter and warmer; the reddish slopes of the rocky hill, with its ragged summit gashed by spring freshets, were bathed in a flood of golden sunlight.