In consequence of his French origin, the language had been taught him with peculiar care.

But he did not like it, he did not think it sufficiently sonorous, and he deemed its genius cold.

This opinion is very prevalent among the Poles, who, although speaking it with great facility, often better than their native tongue, and frequently using it in their intercourse with each other, yet complain to those who do not speak Polish of the impossibility of rendering the thousand ethereal and shifting modes of thought in any other idiom.

In their opinion it is sometimes dignity, sometimes grace, sometimes passion, which is wanting in the French language.

If they are asked the meaning of a word or a phrase which they may have cited in Polish, the reply invariably is: "Oh, that cannot be translated!" Then follow explanations, serving as comments to the exclamation, of all the subtleties, all the shades of meaning, all the delicacies contained in THE NOT TO BE TRANSLATED words.