concerned, but pleased at my success. One of them is so kind as to set a hairpin straight for me. At such an entertainment, the struggle to be first, though depriving it of some of the pleasure which it should directly give, affords us the interest of a game in which, the harder it is to win, the more intoxicating the victory becomes.
After the cotillon, which I danced with Imszanski, I stood up with Janusz for the "Oberek." He is a perfect master of ceremonies, and as such he is sans peur et sans reproche.
I like to dance with him most of all. He bears me along like a runaway steed. Careering in a tiny orbit, towards the centre of which we lean all the time, we turn round and round with vertiginous speed, like two planets run mad. Locked in each other's arms, carried onward by our own impetus, we glide along with half-closed eyes, involuntarily, all but unconsciously, with a passive motion, as if by ourselves unable to keep so tremendous a pace. Around us we perceive only a confused mass of thick clotted brightness; the lights, the mirrors, the brilliant circle of lookers-on, are no longer distinguishable as
