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Seeing in the mazurek the female dancer almost carried away in the arms and on the shoulders of her cavalier, abandoning herself entirely to his guidance, one thinks one sees two beings intoxicated with happiness and flying towards the celestial regions.
Absolutely Slavonic, though a local dance of the province of Mazovia, the Mazurek or Mazurka, is written in three-four time, with the usual displaced accent in music of Eastern origin. Brodzinski is quoted as saying that in its primitive form the Mazurek is only a kind of Krakowiak, "less lively, less sautillant."
The mazurek, thus degenerated among the people, has been adopted by the upper classes who, in preserving the national allures, perfected it to the extent of rendering it, beyond doubt, one of the most graceful dances in Europe.
The mazurek in its primitive form and as the common people dance is only a kind of krakowiak, only less lively and less sautillant. The agile Cracovians and the mountaineers of the Carpathians call the mazurek danced by the inhabitants of the plain but a dwarfed krakowiak.
A light and in some sort pastoral dress for the women, and the Polish military costume so advantageous for the men, add to the charm of the picture which the mazurek presents to the eye of the painter.
The music of the mazurek is altogether national and original; through its gaiety breathes usually something of melancholy one might say that it is destined to direct the steps of lovers, whose passing sorrows are not without charm.
The proximity of the Germans, or rather the sojourn of the German troops, has caused the true character of the mazurek among the people to be lost; this dance hap become a kind of awkward waltz.
As modern dances lend themselves especially to the triumph of the women, because the costume of the men is so little favourable, it is noteworthy that the mazurek forms here an exception; for a young man, and especially a young Pole, remarkable by a certain amiable boldness, becomes soon the soul and hero of this dance.
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