The Polish captivity : an account of the present position of the Poles in the kingdom of Poland, and in the Polish provinces of Austria, Prussia, and Russia
DATE DUE nF.c- i-OIDfi < * f'j GAYLORD PRINTED IN U.S.A. I Cornell University Library The original of tliis bool< is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924082470281 THE POLISH CAPTIVITY. LONDON : PRINTED BY WOODFAT.L AND KINDER, ANQEL COUUT, SKINNUK Sl'KEKT. THE POLISH DIET VOTING THE CONSTITUTION OF THE 3 OF MAT THE POLISH CAPTIVITY: AN ACCOUNT OF THE PEESENT POSITION OF THE POLES THE KINGDOM OF POLAND, AND IN THE POLISH PKOVINOES OP AUSTEIA, PRUSSIA, AND RUSSIA. BY SUTHEELAND EDWAEDS. " Poles, we appreciate and admire the greatness of soul, tho sensitiveness and the firmness Trhich distingnish your national character, and which have heen displayed in your efforts to recover the political existence of your country, which you love above everything." — ALEXiHDBB I., in 1815, " My grandmother and the King of Prussia, Frederick II., in partitioning Poland, committed a fault. . . The ruling Powers will never be able to eqjoy these strange acquisitions in peace. The existence of Poland is something natural and in- dispensable. It would be superfluous to discuss the means of re-establishing it, for when a thing is natural and indispensable it arrives of itself." — Thb Akohsueb Fbbdi- KAHD OF Austria, in 1848. IN TWO VOLUMES.— VOL. II. LONDON: WM H. ALLEN & CO., 13, WATERLOO PLACE, S.W. 1863. Tlie Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved. m fc37 / ij P^^D,u)4IUx CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE The Poles under ihe Austrian Goveenment. — Galicia and THE " CZAS " 1 CHAPTER II. The Foetukbs of Ceacow 16 CHAPTER III. The Austeians in Poland 33 CHAPTER IV. The Poles under the Prussian Govbenment. — In the Grand Duchy of Posbn 73 CHAPTER V. Polish Prussia and Prussian Poland , . . . .91 CHAPTER VI. Poland, Prussia, and the " Nationality " Theoey . . 105 CHAPTER VII. The Poles on Germany in Geneeal 118 VI CONTENTS. CHAPTER VIII. PAGE The Poles of Lithuania 131 CHAPTER IX. Some Effects of the Partition 146 CHAPTER X. The Poles in the Ukraine 163 CHAPTER XI. Private Life in Poland 176 CHAPTER XII. The Novgorod Memorial 188 CHAPTER XIII. The Polish Question in Russia 211 CHAPTER XIV. Constitutional Movement in Russia ' 228 CHAPTER XV. Emancipation of the Serfs 30o CHAPTER XVI. The Last Movement. — Union and Disunion between Rus- sians AND Poles ' g^^ APPENDIX I. Extract from the Marquis Wielopolski's " Letter from a Polish Gentleman to Prince Metternioh" . . 330 CONTENTS. VU APPENDIX II. PACK The Soveeeion of Russia's Title 339 APPENDIX III. The Baron and his Wife ; or, The Forced Marriage . 344 APPENDIX IV. Address from the Inhabitants of Warsaw, 1861 . . 351" LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS. VOL. II. fAGE The Polish Diet, etc. Frontispiece. BOULEVABDS OF CrACOW 2-3 Entrance to Cracow 74-75 Peasants of the Neighbourhood of Cracow . 115 Peasants or the Neighbourhood or Wilna . . 146 Parish Church of Cracow " 150-151 Peasants of Podolia 175 Cloth Market of Cracow 178-179 The Vistula of Cracow 184 THE POLISH CAPTIVITY. CHAPTEE I. THE POLES UNDER THE AUSTRIAN GOVERNMENT. 6ALICIA AND THE " CZAS." For tlie present, the Polish question is certainly a question without an answer. No probable solution can be found for it, but in the meanwhile, as the Poles are in greater force in the Kingdom than in Prussian or Austrian Poland, the Kingdom js naturally the scene of all the great demonstra- tions in favour of national independence. It would be a mistake, however, to suppose that the inhabitants of Galicia and Posen are a bit more satisfied with their position than those under the domination of Eussia; and so impossible is it to introduce the " Grerman element " into Poland with success that, until news was received of the Eussians firing upon the people at Warsaw, the Galicians would gladly have changed the VOL. II, B 2 GALTCIA AND THE " CZAS. sovereignty of tlie Austrian Emperor for that of the Tsar. The secret of this inclination does not lie in any inexplicahle affection on the part of the Poles for the Eussians, hut in the old in- vincible hatred of Slavonians for Grermans, in the special hatred of the Gralicians for the Austrian Government, and above all, in the general tendency of the Poles to reunite and to live together even under the harshest of despotisms, rather than remain divided under separate Governments, however liberal. What the Poles most desire is unity, which might be a step towards independence, and they would rather form one nation enslaved than remain the fragments of a nation with all imaginable political privileges except the only one they care for — that of governing themselves. There does exist, at the present moment, a far greater unity of sentiment and purpose between the fragments of the partitioned country than people have any idea of in Western Europe, and, unless the railway between Warsaw and Cracow be broken up, and the formation of the railway between Warsaw and Posen suddenly discontinued, this sympathy and interchange of ideas between the dejected members of a body which stiU hangs together and lives, though long thought to be dead, will certainly go on increasing. The general liberty enjoyed by the inhabitants of Austrian LIBERTY IN GALICIA. 3 Poland appears to me, when I think of the position of the Poles in the Kingdom, immense : Cracow might still be a free city for any trouble that a visitor is put to about his passport. As for police, not only are they scarcely seen, but their action is nowhere felt except in connection with criminal cases. Go from Cracow where you please — to Lemberg, to Vienna, into Hungary — no questions are asked, no inspection of passports is necessary ; all you have to do is to pay your money at the railway station, or drive quietly out of the town in whatever direction you please ; whereas at Warsaw it is impossible to make an excursion of a few miles beyond the suburbs without getting your passport vise, while to a traveller from "Warsaw to Cracow, it is an in- dispensable preliminary to visit three offices, and to obtain the signatures of a half-a-dozen different officials. In addition to this liberty of locomotion, the Austrian Poles have great freedom of discussion allowed them in their journals. Books of all kinds, for and against the Austrian Grovernment, and, indeed, against and in favour of all possible and conceivable Governments, are publicly sold ; and yet, with aU this, there is one newspaper which is strictly prohibited, and cannot be sent through the post to Cracow, or any part of Galicia. This is the Djennih Poznanski or Posen Journal, the most outspoken in the cause of Polish nationality B 2 4 GALICIA AND THE CZAS. of all the newspapers published in the Polish language, and which accordingly has its edition frequently confiscated by the Prussian police. As the Djennih Poznansici is forbidden in Gralicia, so is the Czas (equally, of course, with the Djennik) excluded from the Kingdom of Poland ; but Cracow being the nearest town to the Russian frontier in which Polish news can be freely discussed, its chief newspaper has become, from that fact, of as much interest and importance to the inhabitants of Warsaw as an independent journal published in their own city would be. It must be remembered that in Eussian Poland the press is not merely " fettered and gagged," in the vague sense in which these words are often apphedtojournalism in despotic countries, where the journalist, however, is allowed, now and then, to whisper a passing remark on some subject deeply affecting the interests of his country. I have already mentioned that the effect of the censorship in the Kingdom is to prevent newspapers from publishing one syllable of comment on any- thing that takes place in Eussia or Poland, or in any other country in connection with Eussian or Polish affairs, while newspaper correspondents who send their comments to be published elsewhere are threatened, and in some cases have actually been visited with imprisonment. Thus the Warsaw journals published the list of the members of the new Council of State directly THE COUNCIL OF STATE. 5 it was formed, but expressed neither approbation nor disapprobation of the appointments, being con- demned to dead silence on all such subjects. The principal Cracow newspaper, however, without becoming at all enthusiastic about the Emperor's " reforms," admitted that faith had been fuUy kept with the Poles as regarded the nominations, and that, if not the best possible, at least a very good selection of names had been made. Every one regretted at first that the name of Count Andrew Zamoyski did not appear on the list, but it reaUy would have been impossible to do him a greater injury than to appoint him to a place in a Council where, from the limited nature of his functions and from the absolute necessity of his working with the Eussian Grovernment, he would soon have lost the popularity he at present enjoys ; and which, from the services he is constantly rendering to the country, he is sure to retain. The difficulty for a patriotic Pole who wishes to serve his country in an official capacity is to preserve a good name with the Poles and yet not run counter to aU the pro- jects of Eussia ; to do his duty fairly and honour- ably by the Grovernment, and, at the same time, escape such reproaches as are constantly levelled at the Marquis Wielopolski, though it is, after all, to him that the re-establishment of the Warsaw University and the increase of the number of gymnasiums in the Kingdom of Poland from five to 6 GALICIA AND THE " CZAS. thirteen, and the introduction of publicity in law proceedings, are due. Indeed, the Poles have always been ready to accept in good faith any political concessions made to them ; but hitherto that seems only to have been made a reason for withdrawing them. On this sub- ject, and on that of the Grovernment of the Kingdom of Poland generally, it may be interesting to quote the remarks of the principal journal of Cracow, entitled the Czas (Hour). The reader wiU learn not only what the Poles living in Poland think of the Eussian Grovernment, but also to what extent writers under the Austrian Grovernment are allowed to attack what was once a friendly Power. Eussian writers attack Austria in a similar manner. Thus, the work of Eussian journalists is done by Austrians, and that of Austrian journalists by Eussians. Neither Government escapes and no one is punished. This sort of thing would not have taken place in the time of Catherine and Joseph. " If," wrote the Empress Catherine, soon after the first parti- tion, " the link best calculated to perpetuate tho- rough harmony and union between the three Courts remains imperfect, it will be attacked with more vigour by foreign interests, in proportion as it will be thought less indissoluble, as it will be less re- spected." But to proceed to the Czas .• — " If," says the writer (Sept. 20, 1862), " we were AREEST OP COUNT ZAMOYSKI. 7 not thoroughly informed— by the daily acts of the Eussian Grovernment since the days of the Empress Catherine, who, under the pretext of guaranteeing the liberties of the Polish Eepublic, violated, in the most open manner, not only the established laws of that Eepublic, but the laws of all nations, dragged the senators of an independent State from its capital, and banished them to Siberia, and, in the name of civilization and mercy, massacred the whole population of Praga — were we not informed, from its acts during the last one hundred and fifty years, what sense of right there is in its conduct, we certainly should hardly be- lieve our eyes, seeing as we do, full of indignation and amazement, the deeds committed by that Grovernment during the last eighteen months, which will remain in history an indelible evidence of its sense of right, and which will be looked upon by fature generations with disgust. " A new proof of this sense of right appears to be the late conduct of the Eussian Grovernment, with regard to Count Andrew Zamoyski, who, when he was asked what were the wants of the country, and an appeal was made to his good faith, submitted to that Grovernment the openly- expressed wishes of the nobles. We say appears to be, for although the public opinion of the whole country knows the conduct of the Eussian Govern- ment, it is yet loth to believe that the imprison- 8 GALICIA AND THE " CZAS. ment of a noble and righteous man, and the consequences that will result therefrom, will close this subject ; for this would be so treacherous an act, that it still awaits the last words of the Grovern- ment regarding it ! But before we consider the conduct of the Government in this matter, as yet incomplete, let us recall the deeds of a similar nature, though not, perhaps, of equal importance, committed by the Eussian Government in the course of the past year^ and which are a good specimen of its sense of right. " After the bloody deeds of the 25th and 27th February of last year, the Eussian Government allows a municipal delegation to be formed, con- fers with it, praises its acts, almost gives up to it the government of the town ; and the delegation, without any armed force, without police, ukases, or bayonets, keeps exemplary order and peace, accompanied by complete liberty. Subsequently this same Government orders the members of this very delegation to be sent to prison, stigmatizes the course of action it pursued, and which the Government authorized, as illegal, and sends them to Siberia or the fortresses. " About the same time, in March, last year, the Government authorizes the formation of a com- mittee to erect a monument in memory of the victims of the 27th, to receive subscriptions for this monument, and for a relief fund for the AREEST OF COUNT ZAMOYSKI. 9 families of the deceased. The Viceroy and the highest dignitaries send money to the committee, and praise its acts. Shortly after, the Government arrests the members of this committee, com- missions of inquiry cross-examine them, military tribunals try them, and send them to Asiatic fortresses ; the siibscription fund is seized ; an inquiry is instituted into this fund, and many persons are imprisoned on the pretext that they have secretly retained some of it ; and the erection of the monument is not only forbidden, but the graves are levelled with the earth, and those who were found praying by them sent to Orenburg. " The Viceroys, Prince Gortchakoff and General Lambert, publish addresses to the Poles, speaking of love for their country, of respect for the Polish nationality, of the anxiety of the monarch to develope it. Meanwhile, under the veU of this graciousness, the smallest manifestations of nation- ality, in dress, singing, or words, are treated as State crimes, and all the prisons and fortresses are filled with persons convicted of taking part in national manifestations. "The Government loudly proclaims to Europe reforms for Poland. It informs the various courts of them by diplomatic circulars ; it calls upon the nobles to vote for members for the municipal and provincial councils, it praises them for the quiet and order with which the elections are carried on. 10 GALICIA AND THE " CZAS. Then, all of a sudden, when the elections are completed, the Grovernment publishes, or rather aggravates, the state of siege which has long been in existence; forbids the councils to assemble; places under the surveillance of the police those whom it has ascertained by the elections to possess the confidence of their feUow-citizens ; shuts up the whole population in their houses; gives up their fortTines and lives to the unlimited power of thousands of dictators; the accusing trium- virate, the commissions of inquiry, and the military tribunals decimate the population ; and thinMng that, by the severest of terrorisms, it has crushed the spirit of the nation, the Grovernment opens, in the midst of this lawless state of things, the provincial and municipal councils : thus making the reforms a mere name, given to some small and insignificant institutions as a cloak for its arbitrary conduct. " Notwithstanding the continuance of the state of siege, and the advice of a small and unin- fluential party not to take part in the councils under such circumstances, the members elected, listening only to the voice of duty, and obeying the mandate which they received from their fel-. low-citizens at their election, have sat in the council so soon as they were allowed to do so, v/ith the resolution to fulfil conscientiously their duties and attributes, as laid down by the law, ARREST OF COUNT ZAMOYSKT. 11 notwithstandiiig the arbitrariness of the military government. The law orders the Municipal Council of Warsaw to visit the municipal prisons ; a delegation for the Council does so, and gives a conscientious report of the dreadful state in which it found the prisons and prisoners ; and the Gro- vernment which ordered them to carry out this law, brutally dismisses the president of the town. " Let us now consider the last act of the Eussian Government, which is, perhaps, of the same nature, but of greater significance than those which pre- ceded it. " The Grrand Duke Constantine issued an address in which he called on the Poles to trust in him and co-operate with him in promoting the pros- perity of the country. Then, having called to his presence an honest Pole, possessing the confidence of his fellow-citizens, he asked him what would be necessary to secure to the Government the support of the nation, and requested his advice, and an open statement of the wants of the country. Count Andrew Zamoyski, after declaring his own convic- tions, added that he had no authority whatever to express the desires of the nation, but that he would ask the nobles in the various provinces and towns who possessed the confidence of their fellow-citizens, and lay their opinions before the Grand Duke. The Namiestnik of the Emperor, the highest au- thority in the Government of Warsaw, consented. 12 GALICIA AND THE " CZAS. The nobles of tlie greatest influence and consi- deration, both in the towns and the provinces, assembled, and, in answer both to the Grand Duke's address and his questions, openly and confidently expressed the convictions and wants of the country. Count Andrew Zamoyski, in answer to the question put to him, forwarded the address of the nobles.* What was the conduct of the Grovernment on this occasion? On the 15th of September, the police suddenly surrounded the house of the Count; the chief of the police and the commandant of the town take him to the Grand Duke's palace ; there it is said, he was directed at once to proceed to St. Petersburg, in order to give an account to the Tsar of his 'ille- gal ' conduct. This candid and upright man is accordingly sent to St. Petersburg under escort, and the official journal, after calling the assemblage of the nobles with the knowledge of the Namiest- nik an 'illegal' one, the expression of the wants of the country ia obedience to an appeal from the Namiestnik an abuse, and the conduct of Count Andrew Zamoyski, who had been also appealed to by the Namiestnik, conduct for which he was liable to be called to account — announced that the Count was sent to St. Petersburg. " Such is the present position of the question. " The opinion of the majority in Warsaw is not as yet willing to believe that the matter initiated ARREST OF COUNT ZAMOYSKI. 13 by the Grrand Duke Constantine has been closed by the Eussian Government with an act which would give its conduct in that matter the same character as that of the acts we have above alluded to. It is unwilling to believe that the Grand Duke has shut up the road to every decisive step ; and that the Duke, looked upon in Russia as the leader of the Liberal and national party, has thus contradicted his own words and his own appeal. The opinion of the country is waiting to see whether in St. Petersburg, after recognizing what is the real state of things of Poland, another turn will be given to the whole matter, and whether the Grand Duke, who is compromised in it, wiU. not take an initiative in bringing about this change. "While waiting and suspending its final decision, the public opinion asks. Which Government really rules in Warsaw? That with whose knowledge the meeting of the nobles took place, and which almost sanctioned it, or that which called it illegal ? That which called for an open expression of the national wants, or that which named such expression an abuse ? That which appealed to Count Zamoyski, or that which declared that he should account for his conduct, as being contrary to order, and sent him to St. Peters- burg? If both these Governments are one, what name shall we give to this double-faced conduct ? If an act performed with the knowledge and au- thority of the Emperor's lieutenant can be stigma- 14 GALICIA AND THE " CZAS. tized as illegal, does not ttis stigma also attach to the lieutenant ? And where is the illegality ? In the purport and the candour of the declaration ? Or does the crime not rather lie in this, that the nohles who were asked for an expression of the wishes of the country did not falsely state its wants and rights ? If, instead of three hundred nobles, possessing the confidence of their feUow-country- ' men, and supported in their statements hy the his- tory of the past, by the tradition of ages, and the declaration of thousands of electors, thirty had dared to say that the country was satisfied with the reforms that have been announced, that they have been and may be introduced under the present sys- tem, that the whole of the population is on the side of the Grovernment, and only a small party of ' agitators ' against it — their statement, contrary as it would have been to the convictions, wants, and principles of the nation, would have been regarded by the Grovernment as the voice of the nation, and their declarations would have had all the sanction the law could give them. That candour and con- fidence which had been appealed to, constitute, then, the whole of the offence in the reply ; con- scientiousness in expressing the convictions and wants of the country, all the crime. Falsehood would have been a recommendation in the eyes of the Government. "Happen what may, if the Government persists AEREST OP COUNT ZAMOYSKI. 15 in its system, and refuses to satisfy the wants of the nation, as once more openly expressed, let it not think that by the banishment of one man, however upright and possessed of the public con- fidence, it will break the opposition of the country as shown against encroachments upon its rights, or that it will eradicate the recollection of its past, or the feeling of its wants and its mission. Not a few men of the same stamp have died or been banished since the time when, after the exile to Kaluga of the Polish senators, an ancestor of Count Andrew Zamoyski, the Chancellor of the same name, gave up his appointment, refusing to attach his seal to decisions enforced by foreign influence ; and, not- withstanding all these punishments, the nation still defends its rights with an internal strength which is constantly increasing." CHAPTEE II. THE FORTUNES OF CKACOW. Cracow during tlie last three-quarters of a century has led a more varied political life even than Warsaw, and has seen nearly as much suffering. Warsaw remained the capital of Poland trntH 1795, when the ancient kingdom was put an end to, and Warsaw passed under the claws of the Prussians. In 1807 it became the capital of the Duchy of Warsaw, formed by Napoleon, and in 1815 of the little Kingdom of Poland formed by Alexander. Cracow remained Polish until the third partition, when it fell beneath the Austrian yoke. Ponia- towski cleared it of Austrians in 1808, and in 1809 it was annexed by treaty to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. In 1815 it was made an independent Republic — under the protection of three despots. In 1833, and again in 1837, the three despots introduced various reforms in the constitution of their EepubHc, which they com- pleted in 1839 by dissolving the Diet. THE CRADLE OF LEKII. 17 An old Polish tradition contains an account of an attack made upon Lekh in his cradle by a three-headed dragon. Migkievicz pointed out, in 1842, that the cradle of Lekh was Cracow, the last resting-place of Polish independence. The attack did indeed come in 1846, when Cracow, while in a state of profound quiet, was bombarded by the Austrians, and afterwards given to them as a reward by the Emperor Nicholas — to whom it did not belong. As if to prove themselves grate- ful, the Austrians bombarded it again in 1848; but Austrian gratitude is not eternal, and in 1854, at the beginning of the Crimean war, the rulers of Cracow thought it advisable to erect forts outside the city, which could only have been intended as points of attack against the Eussians themselves. The poUcy of the Marquis Wielopolski is more inteUigible in Galicia than in the Kingdom of Poland, and (as I have already mentioned) it was after the massacres of Gralicia, organized and paid for by the Austrian Grovernment, that he first pro- claimed it in his celebrated letter to Prince Metter- nich. (See Appendice.) Whether the Eussians have or have not behaved better to the Poles than the Austrians, the Poles have, at least, more to ex- pect from them ; and if Eussia went to war with Austria, she would only have to proclaim the re- establishment of Poland, in its ancient limits, under the Eussian sovereignty, in order to secure at once VOL. II. ^ 18 THE FORTUNES OE CKACOW. the support of the Galicians. The only possible counter-project to this would he the re-establish- ment of Poland as an independent kingdom — a difficult scheme, to carry out which it would be necessary not merely to defeat a few Russian armies, but to destroy the Russian Empire. Russia will certainly never allow her actual pos- sessions in Poland to be alienated from the Russian Crown J whereas there is reason to beheve that Austria would willingly contribute to the forma- tion of an independent Poland by the abandon- ment of Galicia, though she will never give it up to Russia until absolutely forced to do so. The fact is, both the German Powers soon learned to fear the Poles, however much they may have affected to despise them. In December, 1771 (on Christmas Day) Frederic the Great wrote to Cathe- rine the Great a magnanimous letter, in which the following passage occurs : " As for the Poles, we must expect that they will make a great outcry whenever possession is taken, for this vain, in- triguing nation cries out about everything; but the army on the Vistula will soon make them cease their noise, and, after the conclusion of peace with the Turks, can pacify Poland." Eleven months afterwards, however, when the treaty of partition had been arranged between the three Powers, and Poland had been invaded by their armies, " the Great Frederic " wrote to Count Solms that, FREDERIC ON POLISH CHARACTER. 19 "although the Poles appeared to have given up their original project of dying sword in hand, rather than sign what they call the disgrace of Poland," yet, he thought, "their signature to the cession would never he obtained unless they were compelled to give it by force." In 1774, the parti- tioning Powers having made fresh demands, the Poles requested them to keep to their engagement of 1773, and to withdraw their troops, upon which ■ Mr. Carlyle's hero observed, in a despatch to Count Solms, that " those signs were more than sufficient to prove that the Poles were not , of so easy a nature as was, perhaps, imagined at St. Peters- burg;" and that the Diet "would never come to any conclusion, with all this fuss, unless Eussia showed her big teeth and declared plainly her intentions." * If Frederic had lived some years longer, he would have found that the Poles were indeed " not of so easy a nature." The Grermans quite under- stand now that they can do nothing with them beyond taking them for soldiers, taxing them to excess, robbing them of their salt-mines, and esta- blishing German colonies on their territory. They know that there can never be any union or sym- t= Frederic IJ., Catherine et le Partage de la Pologne, par Frederic de Smitt, part ii. p. 80. D'Angeberg (Recueil de Documents, dc), p. 97. c 2 20 THE rOKTtlNES OF CBACOW. pathy between Germans and Poles (except mo- mentarily, perhaps, for some special revolutionary purpose), and therefore strive, with the most earnest folly, to transform their Polish subjects into Grer- mans, and make them forget their ancient liberty and glory. Austria does not know what to do with Galicia. She does know that, on the first menace from Russia, she would have to fall back to the Carpathians ; and that from the moment that Eussia adopts a really liberal policy towards the Poles of the Kingdom, all Galicia will be Eussian. Prussia, too, pleads that, in self-defence, she is obliged to Germanize Posen, which she justly regards as the advanced post of Slavonianism, and which she knows is ready to throw itself into the arms of Eussia whenever Eussia chooses to appear as the protector instead of the oppressor of the Poles. This character Eussia must, sooner or later, assume, for Poland, in its present state, is worse than useless to the Eussian Empire; it is a con- stant source of danger to the Government, and is an obstacle in the way of those reforms which all the educated classes in Eussia desire and expect. Eussia, at the present moment, has aU her right side paralysed, and cannot move forward either for peace or for war. As long as Eussia remains in this enfeebled state, the German Powers have, of AN OPPORTUNITY FOR THE TSAR. 21 course, nothing to fear. But they are quite aware that when " the wound in the Eussian arm " * is healed, Russia will have to make a blow at Germany for the sake of Posen and Galicia. The Grerman Powers are really, then, in a hope- less position as regards their Polish subjects. They know that they must some day lose them, and their plan has hitherto been to see whether it is not possible to turn some of them into Germans before the others take their departure. An ambitious and warlike Emperor of Russia, professing advanced Liberal opinions, and a deep regard for the rights of Slavonian nationalities, (" Woe to Europe when the Tsar of Russia wears a beard ! ") might easily settle the Polish question in the most advantageous manner for his Empire. A reaUy kind-hearted and, at the same time, reso- lute Emperor (only the two qualities are so seldom found together), might, without being ambitious or warlike, confer immense benefits on some fifteen millions of Poles, his own subjects, by simply * M. Wuttke, a German, the Marquis Wielopolski, a Pole {Lettre d'un Gentilhomme Polonais au Prince Metternich), and M. Aksakoff, a Eussian (the Day, a journal published in Mos- cow), all agree that Poland is a wound — the German says in the arm, the Pole and the Eussian say in the body, of Eussia. The Pole and the Eussian are both of opinion that the wound ought to be healed ; the German, however, hopes it may be kept open for the benefit of Germany, though he too foresees that, sooner or later, " Slavonia must be made whole." 23 THE FOBTUNES OF CKACOW. executing the provisions of the Treaty of Vienna. By requiring Austria and Prussia to observe the Treaty as well, he could cause those benefits to be extended to nearly seven millions of Poles * now under Grerman dominion, and Poland would speedily be restored to national life, though not to political unity. National and representative institutions, with liberty of navigation and liberty of commerce throughout the Poland of 1772, are guaranteed by the Treaty of Vienna to the subjects of aU the three Powers. If Russia were to render the navi- gation of her portion of the Vistula free for the inhabitants of all parts of Poland she would have the best possible right to call upon Austria and Prussia to follow her example in that respect. Both England and France protested against the Constitution of the Kingdom of Poland being aboHshed after the insurrection of 1830-31 ; and Lord Palmerston, in a despatch dated March 22, 1831, directed the British Ambassador at St. Pe- tersburg to remonstrate with the Imperial Go- vernment on the fact of its never having granted " national and representative institutions " to the inhabitants of the Polish provinces not included in the Kingdom. If the Emperor of Bussia would begin by granting constitutional rights and tbe * I call all the inhabitants of Poland Poles, without con- sidering what provincial idiom they speak. AN OPPORTUNITY FOR THE TSAR. 23 free use of the Polish language to all his Polish subjects, would he not have a perfect right to protest against German being maintained as the language of education and of the public offices in Posen? Would he not have a right to require that Austria should govern Gfalicia as a thoroughly Polish province? Would he not even be justified in announcing his desire to see the Treaty of 1815 observed in all respects — even as regards Cracow — and in adding his protest against its continued annexation to the protests entered by England and Prance when it was first annexed ? If the act was contrary to the precise stipulations of a European treaty, it does not matter whether the Emperor Nicholas approved of it or not. Is Alexander II. obliged to set aside a treaty recognized by Alex- ander I. because this treaty was broken by the Emperor Nicholas ? And could England and France complain if Russia even now were to de- clare that they were quite right in the matter of Cracow, and that Austria ought not to have ab- sorbed it ? If Eussia were to adopt this simple, safe, per- fectly legal and honourable policy, what would the effect at once be on the Poles of Prussia and Austria? Simply that Warsaw would become their capital quite as much as it is now that of the Eussian Poles. 24 THE FORTUNES OF CRACOW. Just after tlie first partition of Poland, when Austria and Prussia showed such greediness for spoil that scrupulous Eussia was absolutely shocked, Catherine II. wrote a letter to Maria Theresa, in which (as I have already mentioned) she sought to impress upon her devout friend the impolicy of any one of the criminal Powers making demands which all three were not prepared to sup- port. The Hnk between Russia and Austria has been broken more than once since Catherine's time. Nevertheless, the Eussian generals in 1809 manoeuvred so as to avoid coming into coUision with Austrian troops, and during the campaign of 1813 this attention was fuUy returned by Prince Schwartzenberg, the commander of Napoleon's Austrian contingent. Austria, however, had already learnt to regret the partition of Poland, and in 1814 a secret treaty was drawn up (signed January 3rd, 1815) by which Austria, France, and England engaged to declare war against Eussia and Prussia if those two Powers persisted in carrying out their intentions with respect to the Duchy of Warsaw and the Kingdom of Saxony. (The Duchy of "Warsaw was to have been made over to Eussia, and Prussia to have taken the whole of Saxony. Alexander would thus have become king of all Poland, with the exception of a narrow strip re- tained by Prussia.) COUNT ZAMOTSKI AT VIENNA. 25 Austria has behaved infamously to the Poles — that no one will think of denying — but she has found that it is to her interest to have an inde- pendent Poland placed between herself and Eussia, and that, under present circumstances, there is a great chance of Galicia, sooner or later, falling under Eussian power. Accordingly, in 1830, instead of openly assisting the Eussians, like Prussia, she secretly assisted the Poles. Arms, provisions, and medical stores were conveyed across the Austrian frontier into the Kingdom of Poland ; the political emissaries from the Provisional Govern- ment at Warsaw were well received at Vienna ; and when the Emperor of Austria knew that Count Andrew Zamoyski was in his capital, though he could not receive him, he said, " Tell the Count that I feel I am about to appear before the Great Judge, and that the possession of Galicia weighs upon me like a crime. I would gladly give it up, but not to Eussia. To an independent Poland I would give it up with joy." " In that case," the Count is said to have re- plied, " I had better take it. I am here to repre- sent the Polish Government." Of course Galicia was not to be ceded in this summary manner. Of course, too, its cession by the Austrian Government would, in any case, be an act, not of simple virtue, but of high political necessity. The formation of an independent Poland 26 THE FORTUNES OF CRACOW. would not enrich Austria, but it would make Eussia (in a political sense) " poor indeed," and therefore, relatively, would increase the influence and security of her neighbours. In 1848 Austria made another "demonstration" in favour of an independent Poland. All Grer- many — all Europe, except the free States and the orientally-despotic State of Eussia — ^was in a revo- lutionary ferment. Deputies from Gralicia waited upon the Emperor Ferdinand I. and gave a fresh proof of the moderation of the Poles- — a modera- tion in which there is nothing astonishing, inas- much as liberty is their legitimate inheritance — ■ by asMng merely for such rights as they would already have possessed had the stipulations of the Treaty of Vienna been fairly observed ; together with trial by jury, and the equalization of aU classes before the law. The address embodying these demands was presented by a number of Polish " aristocrats " — sons and grandsons of the men who had taken the first steps towards the emancipation of the peasantry in Eastern Europe, long before Eussia, Austria, or Prussia, with their despotic systems, and their servile court nobility, had ever thought of such a measure. As to the question of language, the Polish " aristocrats " did not forget that in Eastern Galicia the ordinary language of the peasantry is Euthenian, though every educated peasant also speaks Polish. Indeed, THE LANGUAGE QUESTION. 27 the Poles, in the whole course of their history, never once made an attempt to force their lan- guage upon the populations who had, of their own free will, joined their fate to that of Poland. This form of injustice is thoroughly despotic in its nature and origin, and no constitutional country ha ever practised it except Prussia, which, after all, is only a despotism adorned with a few unmeaning constitutional forms, to be put aside whenever it suits a strong centralized Grovernment, supported by a privileged penniless aristocracy, and acting through a host of dependent administrative officers, to dispense with it. Hungary, it is true, by a temporary error, sought, at one time, to oppose the Grermanizing tendencies of the Austrian Grovernment, by making the Ma- gyar the official language of Hungary. It must be remembered, however, that the Magyar is the lan- guage of all the educated classes in Hungary, and it is simply untrue that the Hungarians tried to form their language upon the " annexes " of the kingdom. It was only in communications from the Hungarian Grovernment that the Magyar lan- guage was to be used. They were to be replied to in Latin, the ordinary official language of the annexes, and of Hungary itself until 1848. !No candid person will seek to establish a comparison between this arrangement and that by which 28 THE FORTUNES OF CRACOW. German has been made the local official language of Galicia and Posen — and this in spite of what the treaties expressed by stipulating that the Poles are everywhere to enjoy " national institutions." In presenting their address to the Emperor, the Galician deputies did not conceal that the ultimate object of their wishes was the restoration of Poland in its ancient limits. In the meanwhile, they desired for the present to ensure the peace of Galicia as an Austrian possession; and after the Emperor had replied to Prince Lubomirski, who read the address, that he had the greatest pleasure in granting all his demands, the Archduke John added : — " Now we can speak frankly. My grandmother and the King of Prussia, Frederic the Second, in partitioning Poland, committed a fault. This par- tition has been a great misfortune for all Europe. From that moment peace and loyalty disappeared, and the traffic of nations commenced, to the injury even of the rulers themselves. The partitioning Powers can never enjoy in peace these strange ac- quisitions. The existence of Poland is something natural and indispensable. It would be superfluous to discuss the means of establishing it, for when a thing is naturally indispensable, it takes place of itself. Accordingly, I think it would be more prudent not to discuss these means, but to employ PANSLAVONIANISM. 29 them at once, so as to prepare this re-establishment. I know, gentlemen, as well as you, the clangers with which we are threatened by Panslavonianism. Eus- sia can inundate Galicia with 150,000 troops ; for that reason we must act with prudence. Another danger consists in the present organization of our bureaucracy. I regard it as a direct instrument of the fall of the Austrian Empire, and it must be completely reformed I assure you, gen- tlemen, that in speaking to you as a Grerman, I am something more than that — I am, above all, a man, and an advocate of whatever can procure the wel- fare and happiness of humanity," &c., &c. The reforms promised and partly introduced by the Austrian Government in Galicia, had the fate which so many other Austrian reforms have met with. Perhaps, before this book appears, the truth will be generally known as to the proposition for re- establishing Poland said to have been made by Austria during the Crimean war. The story hitherto circulated has been that France was willing to accept the Austrian proposition, and that Eng- land, "always devoted to her own private inte- rests,"* refused to accede to it. Probably, England * M. Charles Forster, in his interesting and, generally, most impartial account of Poland, writes, in a tone of complaint, that, at the time of the first partition of Poland, " L'Angleterre, toujours devouee avant tout a ces int&rets particuliers, tentait de 30 THE FORTUNES OF CRACOW. did not care to make war for the aggrandizement of France, but would liave been willing to assist in re-establishing Poland, for whose cause the great- est sympathy has always been felt by the English people, if her ally would have consented that that, and that alone, should be made the object of war against Eussia on a large scale. Curiously enough, I could find no one in Gralicia who believed in the good intentions of Austria towards Poland. The Galician explanation of the Austrian proposition was simple enough. The Austrian Government, say its Polish subjects, simply wished to know what the real intentions of the Allies were in regard to Poland. Had Austria learnt that the re -establishment of Poland formed any part of the plan of the Allies, she would at once have declared in favour of Eussia. The last step taken by Austria on behalf of Poland was the formation of the Galician Diet in connection with the new quasi- constitutional system introduced into Austria. Lelewel, in his Analysis and Parallel of Tliree Polish Constitutions, makes the ingenious remark, well worthy the attention of Austrians and Eussians, that there are two kinds faire rentrer dans le devoir Le Nord de VAmerique." Ancient Poland cannot be accused of having attended much to her own interests, or the country would not have been at the mercy of Russia for many years before Russia formally con- sented to share Poland witli her neighbours. 