The Life of a Polish Child

Her father, constantine, was the orphan son of landless nobles whose upbringing had been underwritten by the state. In 18 63, constantin was shipped off to help suppress a revolt in poland that saw him both perform well and probably emerge with some sympathy for the poles. He met his wife, eliziavetta vassiliona, who too had been the orphan daughter of respectable nobility. And though she would always be a devoutly orthodox wife and mother, she had little good to say about the kind of noble family she had lived among.