The people about me my senses would strike, In spite of the facts, as extremely alike;-- In physical aspect dyspeptic or bilious, In manners affected, or quite supercilious, In mind, rather flippant--of false education-- In heart, scarcely worthy of recommendation. There was clearly a lack of the highest ability, With a splendid array of the 'purest gentility.' Of course I was not in condition to judge, And some would pronounce an emphatical 'fudge' At such an opinion as mine, and would scout it, Insisting that I 'could know nothing about it.' To which the narrator would humbly submit-- He has written what seemed to his mind as a fit And truthful recountment of all that he saw, Without a regard for the general law For stuccoing statements, to give them, forsooth, A pleasanter face than is worn by the truth. The end came at last. I was glad, I avow;-- As glad--well, as glad as the reader is now, When he knows that I'll shortly be making my bow. The company left, and I marched in the van, A wiser, though hardly a happier, man. Of course there are 'morals' attached to my poem, Though it may be a difficult matter to show 'em. Well, first (let me see, now), the foolishest passion Of mortals is that for obeying the fashion. It has been, and now is, a curse to humanity, A sinful, ridiculous species of vanity, The very quintessence of perfect inanity, And is likely to lead to a 'moral insanity.' A second we'll have, and I think that will do-- (You will probably not recollect more than two): If you have any taste for the honest and hearty, Don't go to a GRAND METROPOLITAN PARTY. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 12: See account of the 'Prince's Ball,' given in New York, some time during the last century.] DIARY OF FRANCES KRASINSKA; OR, LIFE IN POLAND DURING THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. PREFACE. The following work is from the pen of Clementina Tauska, probably the most celebrated among the female writers of Poland. Her talents and judgment were so highly appreciated by her native country, that she was appointed to the superintendence of all the Polish schools for young ladies, as also to that of the large establishment at Warsaw devoted to the education of governesses. The Diary of Frances Krasinska paints in the most lively manner the usages, manners, and customs of Poland during the eighteenth century, and possesses the charm of childlike _naivete_, united to acute observation and deep feeling. The authoress has seized upon all that is peculiar and picturesque surrounding the heroine, and has laid bare before us a woman's heart in all its strength and weakness, its love and ambition, its joys and sorrows.