POLES
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POLES
cards are returned by penitents in the confessional
and the names are cancelled. Thus a record is kept
of all those who have satisfied their Paschal obliga-
tion. While the custom is hable to misinterpreta-
tion and even abuse, the Polish clergy are loath to
abolish it because of many excellent features. In no
other way in the large city parishes where the popula-
tion is constantly shifting can the clergy meet many
of their people. On the feast of the Assumption
the faithful bring flowers and greenery to the church
to be blessed, and the day is called the feast of Our
Lady of the Greenery. Polish women are careful
in their observance of the custom of being churched
after childbirth. It is not uncommon for the
brides to come to church very soon after marriage
to receive the blessing iiovw nuptce. Seldom does a
PoUsh marriage take place except with a nuptial
Mass.
Name-days, not birthdays, are celebrated, and sponsors are regarded as relatives by the interested families. On the death of a parishioner the church bell is tolled each day immediately after the Angelus until after the funeral, at which very frequently the Office of the Dead is chanted. The Poles love their own vernacular songs, and in most of their churches one may hear them chant the "Little Hours" before High Mass on Sunday mornings. Nor is Latin popular with Poles, who frequently sing all parts of the High Mass except the responses in Polish.
Hospitality ceases to be a virtue with the Poles. Generous to a fault, they turn a deaf ear to no peti- tion for assistance, especially if the object appeals to national or religious sympathies. Poles are lovers of processions, flags, banners, uniforms, and marshals' batons. A Polish church on festal days resembles some national fane whither the battle-flags of nations have been brought from fields of glory. The Pole is not utilitarian, and all this to him is more than useful, serving as it does to bind him more closely to the Church, whose feasts are given added solem- nity. The observance of national festivals is reli- giously kept. May recalls the adoption of Poland's famous Constitution; November, the Revolution of 1830; and January, Poland's last war for freedom, the Revolution of 1863. The various organizations vie with one another in preparing these celebrations, which serve the useful purpose of affording instruction in Poland's history to the younger generation and to the invited Americans.
Polish Charitable Institutions. — Besides contribu- ting to the support of the various diocesan charities the Poles maintain a growing number of such in- stitutions for those of their own nationality. Only the more important are noted: Felician Sisters, orphanages, 5, orphans, 585; Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis, orphanages, 1, orphans, 105; Bernardine Sisters, orphanages, 1, orphans, 120; Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth, orphanages, 1, orphans, 160.
A very large orphan asylum is now building in Chicago, which will be supported by all the Polish parishes of the archdiocese and will be placed in charge of the Felician Sisters. There are three Polish homes for the aged in which 200 are provided for. In 1909 St. Felix's Home for Polish working girls, Detroit, conducted by the Felician Sisters, assisted 202 girls; another such institution in East Buffalo, New York, conducted by the same com- munity, assisted 207 girls; in the Polish day nurser- ies of Chicago and Milwaukee nearly 20,000 children were cared for; St. Mary's Hospital, Chicago, con- ducted by the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth, cared for 2,150 patients. The Immigrant Home, East Buffalo. New York, aided 8978 immigrants. St. Joseph's Home for Polish and Lithuanian Immi- grants, New York, has since its foundation in 1890
given aid to 86,912 immigrants. Both homes are
now in charge of the Felician Sisters.
One of the most notable of the early PoUsh emi- grants was the patriot -poet, Julian Niemcewicz, who came to America in 1796. He had been Secre- tary to the Polish Senate, adjutant-general of Kos- ciuszko in the latter's struggles for Pohsh inde- pendence and his companion in captivity in St. Petersburg. He became an American citizen and remained in the United States until the formation by Bonaparte of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, when he returned to Poland and was actively engaged in Poland's cause until his death in 1841. The leading spirit of all movements among the Poles in .\merica throughout the period of political immigration was Henry Corvinus Kalusowski, the son of one of the chamberlains of Stanislaus Poniatowski, the last King of Poland. He came to America in 1834. Re- turning to Poland he represented a Polish con- stituency in the Prussian Parliament, and upon his expulsion by the Prussian Government again came to the United States. During the Ci\'il War he or- ganized the Thirty-first New York Regiment. Later held positions in "the State Department in Washing- ton, and translated all official Russian documents relating to the purchase of Alaska by the United States. He died in 1894.
Other political immigrants were: Tyssowski, the " Dictator of Cracow" ; the learned Adam Gurowski, who in his "Diary of 1861-1865" betrayed a keen insight into the conditions of the Civil War period; Lieutenant Bielaw^ski, Paul Sobolewski, translator of the Polish poets into English; Leopold Julian Boeck, soldier, statesman, scholar, who had been Professor of Higher Mathematics in the Sorbonne before coming to New York, where he founded the Polytechnic Institute, said to be the first of its kind in America. He later occupied chairs in the Uni- versities of Virginia and Pennsylvania. He was appointed American Educational Commissioner at the Universal Exposition in Vienna by President Grant, and served in a similar capacity at the Cen- tennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The quality of the Polish immigrants previous to 1870 was such as to give them a prominence out of proportion to their numbers, and the record of the Poles in the Civil War was a really brilliant one, although there were not more than a few hundred Poles in the various divisions of the Union Army. The most prominent of these was General Krzyzanowski, who gained his military title in this war serving under Carl Schurz, who in his memoirs speaks very favourably of his services. Others who served with distinction were Louis Zychlinski, Henry Kalusowski, Peter Kiol- bassa, Joseph Smolinski, the youngest cavalry officer in the Union Army, and Edmund Louis Zalinski, who served on General Miles's staff, and after the war occupied the chairs of military science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and other institutions of a similar nature, and became an au- thority on military science and an inventor of military appliances. The most commanding figure among the American Poles was Father Vincent Barzynski, C.R. As a leader of men, whose vision extended far into the future, he stands unique. He was the central figure of the most dramatic chapters in the history of the Poles in America. He gave the Poles St. Stanislaus College, their first orphanage, their first Catholic paper (the "Gazeta Katolicka"), their first daily paper ("Dziennik Chicagoski"), he formed the first teaching corps of Polish nuns, and brought into being the Polish Roman Catholic Union. The rnost typical of the Polish American laymen to achieve distinction was Peter Kiolbassa, through whose ef- forts the Resurrectionist Fathers came to Chicago. He served as captain in the Union Army during the Civil War, and later served the State of Illinois and
