book i never favv a road fo barren o f interefting fcenes a s that
. from Cracow to Warfaw ; there is not a iingle objeft
throughout the whole tradt, which can for a moment draw
the attention of the molt inquifitive traveller.
The country, for the moft part of the way, was level, with
little variation of furface : it was chiefly overfpread with vaft
tradts of thick gloomy foreft; and even where the country
was more open, the diftant horizon was always fkirted with
wood. The trees were moftly pines and firs, intermixed
with beech, birch, and fmall oaks. The occafional breaks
in the foreft prefented fome pafture ground, with here and
there a few meagre crops of corn.
Without having actually traverfed it, I could hardly have
conceived fo comfortlefs a region : a forlorn ftillnefs and fo-
litude prevailed almoft through the whole extent, with few
fymptoms of an inhabited, and ftill lefs of a civilized country.
Though in the high road, which unites Cracow and Warfaw,
in the courfe of about 258 Engliih miles, we met in our
progrefs only two carriages and about a dozen carts. The
country was equally thin of human habitations : a few
ftraggling villages, all built of wood, fucceeded one another
at long intervals, whofe miferable appearance correfponded
to the wretchednefs of the country around them, ln'thefe
affemblages of huts, the only places of reception for travellers
were hovels, belonging to Jews, totally deftitute of furniture
and every fpecies of accommodation. We could feldom
procure any other room but that in which the family lived;
in the article of provifion eggs and milk were our greateft
luxuries, and could not always be obtained ; our only bed
was ftraw thrown upon the ground, and we thought our-
felves happy when we could procure it clean. Even we,
1 who
who were by no means delicate, and who had long been ac- ch a p .
cuftomed to put up with all inconveniencies, found ourfelves, ' ,
diftreffed in this land of defolation. Though in moft countries
we made a point of fufpending our journey during
night, in order that no fcene might efcape our obfervation ;
yet we here even preferred continuing our route without
intermiffion to the penance we endured in thefe receptacles
of filth and penury: and we have reafon to believe that the
darkneis of the night deprived us of nothing but the fight
of gloomy forefts, indifferent crops of corn, and objedts of
human mifery.
The natives were poorer, humbler, and more miferable
than any people we had yet obferved in the courfe o f our
travels: wherever we flopped, they flocked around us in
crouds ;. and, aiking for charity, ufed the moft abjedt gef-
tures.
The road bore as few marks o f human induftry as the
country which it interfedls. It was beft where it was fandy ;
in other parts it was fcarcely paffable; and in the rnarlhy
grounds, where fome labo'ur was abfolutely neceffary to
make it fupport the carriages, it was raifed with fticks and
boughs of trees thrown promifcuoufly upon the furface, or
formed by trunks of trees laid crofsways.
After a tedious journey we at length approached Warfaw;
but the roads being neither more paffable, nor the country
better cultivated, and the fuburbs chiefly confifting of the
fame wooden hovels which compofe the villages, we had no
fufpicion of being near the capital of Poland until we arrived
at its gates.
Vol. I Z C H A P .