PROUD LITTLE MAN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 October 1940, Page 6

PROUD LITTLE MAN

COUNT OF THREE FEET THREE. Let us meet Joseph Boruwlaski, who always styled himself a count. Born in Poland in 1739, he was one of six children, and though he had all along a high opinion of himself, he never stood more than 39 inches. A more graceful little man, or a more charming gentleman never smiled his way round Europe, for though the count was a dwarf he had the manners of a prince. Brought up by a widow, he was af- . terwards cared for by a countess with whom he travelled in Germany, France and Holland. At Vienna he had a proud moment when Maria Theresa took him on her lap and gave him a ring which Marie Antoinette had been wearing a moment before. In Paris he spoke with Voltaire, and was.the guest of honour at a dinner for which everything was made in proportion to the little guest. After his marriage he found himself a poor man with no shelter for his head, but the King of Poland gave him a small pension and a coach, and he was able to set out on his travels. How many thousand of miles he went it would be hard to say. He was in the north of Europe and in the south. He visited Lapland and Finland, and even Nova Zemble. He went east and was taken ill in Damascus, and he came west till he reached England after a stormy passage. Presented to George the Third, he began a series of tours up and down our land, giving concerts and meeting distinguished people. He spent a holiday at Blenheim where he was the guest of the Duke of Marlborough, leaving his shoes behind so that the Duke might put them in a cabinet in which he kept a collection of curiosities.

He spent his last years at Durham. Living in comfortable retirement, this proud little man would often have been glad of a little extra money, but he refused to exhibit himself, though he allowed anyone who called on him to give his valet a shilling. Year after year he lived at Durham, folk beginning to say he would never die. But his end came on September 5, 1837, when he was 98. They laid him to rest, little man that he was, in the shadow of the great cathedral. His gravestone has only the letters J. 8., but there is a monument to his memory in St. Mary's church not far off.