The KASHUBE is a dialect spoken in Pomerania, near Danzig, by about 200.000 souls. The Kashubes, however, mostly consider themselves Poles.
LITTLE RUSSIAN, also called Ruthenian or Ukrainian, is spoken in Eastern Galicia, in the Carpathians from Uzhorod to Munkács, Northern Bukowina, and Southern Russia, along the Black Sea and the rivers Dniester, Dnieper and Don. It is rich in national poesy, and, like the Serbo-Croatian, has preserved some of the purest characteristics of the Slav race. It constitutes a bridge between the Polish and the Russian, being to a certain extent a mixture of the two languages. It chiefly differs from the Russian in the pronunciation of jery, jať, e, o, and u, cf. dilo (Russ. djelo), buv (Russ. byl), dovg (Russ. dolg), ridny (Russ. rodnoj), vže (Russ. uže), usjaki (Russ. vsjaki).
RUSSIAN, also called Great Russian, is the official language of the Russian Empire. It is the most important of all the Slavonic languages and every Bohemian ought to learn it, especially in view of the great facility with which he can acquire it as compared with non-Slavonic nationalities. By learning it one acquires at the same time the key to all other Slavonic languages, so that one can learn any one of them in less than six months.
The grammatical forms and syntax in Russian are purer and more elaborate than in any other Slavonic tongue. The knowledge of Russian opens one the door to an immense literature, whose beauties have thus far found only a very fragmentary interpretation in America. Bohemians in America ought to devote special attention to the learning of Russian language and affairs, because Russia has a great future before her, and the friendliest relations should be cultivated between her and the United States.
Among the extinct Slavonic languages a special mention deserves the Polabian, which was spoken by the Slav tribes who lived on the river Elbe, i. e. Vagri in Lauenburg and Holstein, Bodrici in Mecklenburg, and Lutici (Veleti) in Brandenburg, as far back as the latter part of the 18th century.