The year 1844 will be ever memorable in our national annals, on account
of the breaking out of a great plague, on which physiologists have
conferred the title of "Polkamania." This remarkable affliction first
originated in the Black Forests of Bohemia, where it took the name of
Polka—which is, no doubt, a corruption of Pole-ca, a word evidently
derived from the pole cat, to which, as an excessive nuisance, the Polka
has some kind of affinity.
The boors, or bores, of the Black Forest communicated the Polka to some
Parisians, who always take quickly any malady of the kind, and it very
soon spread among the people of the French capital. It was introduced
into England a short time after, by a coryphèe coming over to fulfil an
engagement at Her Majesty's Theatre. The poor fellow was, indeed, very
bad with it, and it was thought that it would have died a natural death,
for it did not seem to be very taking until Monsieur Jullien happened to
catch it, and infected several places of public amusement with the
severe calamity. The malady now spread with fearful rapidity, and even
Mr. Baron Nathan fell a victim to it in its fiercest shape, while others
of less exalted rank in the Terpsichorean world had it in a much milder
form than the Baron. The symptoms of the disease are too well known to
need a lengthy description. It causes a contraction of the leg, and a
drawing up the heel to a considerable height, accompanied by a violent
twisting of the head from side to side, and numerous contortions of the
body. It gives a strange sort of motion to the arms, occasions a
repeated stamping of the feet, and induces altogether a singularity of
action which is not to be found in other cases of mania. It is to be
expected that the malady will soon wear itself out, like other previous
visitations of a somewhat similar character.
[Illustration:
BOXING-NIGHT—A picture in the National Gallery.
]
THE NATIONAL GALLERY.
A DIALOGUE.