About the Florian's Thor, with its round towers of old, sorrel-colored
brick, and the Czartoryski Museum, there is nothing to say that the
guide-book would not say better. In the museum, a tattered Polish flag
of red silk, with the white eagle, a cheerful bird with curled tail,
opened mouth, chirping defiantly to the left, imprest me, and a portrait
of Szopen (Chopin) in fine profile when laid out dead. For amusement,
there was a Paul Potter bull beside a Paul Potter willow, delightfully
unconscious of a coming Paul Potter thunderstorm, and a miniature of
Shakespeare which did not resemble any of the portraits of him that I
am familiar with. Any amount of Turkish trappings and reminiscences of
Potocki and Kosciuszko, of course. As I had no guide-book, I am quite
prepared to learn that I overlooked the most important relics.
In the cathedral, away up on the hill of Wawel, above the river Vistula
(Wisla) I prowled about among the crypts with a curious specimen of
beadledom who ran off long unintelligible histories in atrocious
Viennese patois about every solemn tomb by which we stood. So far as I
was concerned it might just as well have been the functionary who herds
small droves of visitors in Westminster Abbey. I never listen to these
people, because (i) I do not care to be informed; and (ii) since I
should never remember what they said, it is useless my even letting it
in at one ear.
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