YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

POLAND'S CASE FOR INDEPENDENCE

POLAND'S CASE FOR
INDEPENDENCE

BEING
A SERIES OF ESSAYS ILLUSTRATING THE
CONTINUANCE OF HER NATIONAL LIFE

NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY

First published in 1916
(All rights reserved)

The Polish Information Committee leaves full freedom to
the authors of the Studies published by it, and thus its
members do not necessarily endorse thf individual views
of the authors.

PREFACE
The present volume contains a series of essays
designed to illustrate the continuance of Polish
national life, and to interpret the manifestations
of that life to foreigners, and especially to the
people of Great Britain. Each of the authors has
written his respective study independently ; but,
taken together, they present a case which can hardly
fail to attract the attention of many readers in
many different parts of this country. In this con
nection the grateful thanks of the Polish Infor
mation Committee are due to the distinguished
writers who so cheerfully and readily consented
to write Prefaces to commend the studies to the
British public.
If, as the authors of these successive essays show,
Poland succeeds in circumstances of the utmost mis
fortune and difficulty to manifest and develop to-day
the fullness of her national life — if Poland has never
ceased to have the hasting of a struggle for the
control of her own life, if Poland ranks next after
the six Great European Powers in respect of her
population, if Poland has a distinctive economic

6 PBEFACE
development, if Poland still counts for something
in the history of science, literature, music, and
painting — surely these are momentous facts which
all the thinking men and women of Great Britain
should well weigh and consider.
From the very outset of this Great European
War it has begun to be understood that, among the
numerous problems which will have to be settled
at its conclusion, the Polish question will be of
the very utmost importance.
A great part of this gigantic struggle has been
waged on Polish land, and aims at the possession of
Polish territory. Polish towns have been destroyed,
Polish villages burnt, Polish industries ruined, and
the remaining remnants of the nation's glorious
past have been annihilated. Worst and most de
plorable of all, her sons have had to fight against
each other in the different armies. Yet, when the
day of peace comes and the ministers and diplo
matists of Europe are gathered round a table to
discuss the grave and vital problems of the future,
there will be none to represent that Poland which
has known famine and devastation, that Poland
Which has become the cockpit of the East, where
innumerable armies have fought and held up the
others. Will Poland suffer because she has not had the
control of her own armies? Is force the only,

PREFACE 7
method by which to compel attention in the affairs
of nations?
The writers of the succeeding papers do not
believe that force is the sole international remedy.
They feel that sympathetic knowledge of Polish
affairs is an indispensable preliminary to a just
settlement, and it is this sympathetic knowledge
which, with all recognition of their faults and fail
ings, they endeavour to give within the confines
of their studies.
Poland, as will be clear after a study of this
book, never ceased struggling and fighting for her
independence, even after the days of her disappear
ance as a separate State. Notwithstanding constant
persecutions at the hands of her oppressors, she was
still able to develop her economic resources, and
to keep pace with other nations, more happily
circumstanced, in respect of the development of
science, literature, and art.
Does not all this go to show that a country,
Which has manifested such an indestructible vitality
has a right to the independence which she has so
strongly craved? THE POLISH INFORMATION COMMITTEE.

CONTENTS

PAGE

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY. By August
Zaleski, with an Introduction by Dr. R. W.
Sbton Watson . . . . .13
The growth of the Polish State, p. 20 — Poland at the
height of her development, p. 26 — The decline of
Poland, p. 30 — The beginning of the regeneration and
the fall of Poland, p. 36 — The temporary recon
struction of an independent Polish State, p. 41 — The
struggle for liberty, p. 47.
POLAND'S STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. By
Rajmund Kucharski, with a Foreword by Lord
Wbardale . . . . . .57
Partitions of Poland — Polish Legions — Napoleon —
Duchy of Warsaw, p. 63— Vienna Congress, p. 66 —
Kingdom of Poland, p. 69 — Constitution — Grand
Duke Constantin — Nevossiltzeff — Diets — Struggle for
Constitution — Secret Societies — Lukasinski, p. 71 —
Insurrection of 1830-31, p. 73 — Reprisals, p. 75 —
Polish emigration to Paris — Adam Mickiewicz —
Political parties — Prince Czartoryski — J. Lelewel,
p. 77 — " Democratic Society " — Massacres of 1846 in
Galicia, p. 81 — Insurrection of 1848 — Adam Mickie-
wicz's Legion in Italy, p. 82 — Principle of Nation
alities — Policy of Napoleon III, p. 85 — Wielopolski —
Muravieff — Bismarck and Buchanan, p. 92 — A Letter
of the Archbishop Felinski, p. 94 — Reprisals, p. 95 —
Prophecy of Lammenais, p. 98.

10 CONTENTS
PAGE
THE POPULATION OF THE POLISH COMMON
WEALTH. By Arthur E. Gurney, with a
Preface by Ludwik Janowski . . . 101
German Poland, p. 101 — Austrian Poland, p. 118 —
Russian Poland, p. 125.
POLAND AS AN INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT.
By STANISLAW POSNBR, with an Introduction by
Sidney Webb ..... 139
Idea of geographical individuality, p. 143 — Geogra
phical boundaries of Poland, p. 145 — Natural resources,
p. 146 — Industry, p. 151 — Poland's market in the
East and the struggle for political independence,
p. 159 — Vistula and Danzig, their economic import
ance for Polish national life, p. 167 — Conclusion,
p. 175— Bibliography, p 176.
AN OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY OF POLISH LITERA
TURE. By JAN DE HOLEWINSKI, with a Preface
by G. P. GOOCH . . . . 177
The dawn of Polish literature, p. 183 — The renaissance
in Polish literature, p. 186 — Engraftment of French
classicism, p. 189 — Advent of romanticism, p. .195 —
Polish literature from the 1863 revolution to the
present day, p. 213.
A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART.
By Jan de Holewinskt . . . .231
Synopsis of conditions met with by art in Poland,
p. 233 — Epoch of romanticism, p. 238 — Coming of
Gothic style, p. 242 — Renaissance epoch in Polish
art, p. 246 — Attempts at independence, p. 248 — Ex
pansion of Polish art, p. 250.

CONTENTS 11

PAGE

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND. By Mar
guerite Walaux, with an Introduction by Emil
Mlynarski ...... 263
General characteristics of Polish music, p. 269 — Three
periods in the history of Polish music, p. 272 — Early
music, p. 272 — Church music, p. 273 — Military music,
p. 274 — Folk songs, p. 274 — Polonaise, p. 975 — Mazur,
p. 277— Krakowiak, p. 278— Dumy, p. 278— Lithu-
anian folk songs, p. 279 — Polish kings as patrons of
music, p. 280 — First Polish operas, p. 282 — Chopin,
p. 283 — Moniuszko, p. 299 — Modern composers, p. 300.
INTELLECTUAL POLAND. By Leon Litwinski,
with a Preface by the Rt. Hon. VISCOUNT
Bryce, O.M. . . . . .301
Conditions of intellectual life in Poland, p. 305 —
Vitalities of the Polish intellectual propensities,
p. 315 — The organization of Polish intellectual life,
p. 330— Epilogue, p. 340.

LANDMARKS OF
POLISH HISTORY
BY
AUGUST ZALESKI
With an Introduction by
R. W. SETON-WATSON, D.Litt.

INTRODUCTION
The Great War has produced a welcome reaction
against that indifference towards problems of
foreign affairs which was so marked and so
regrettable a feature of the past fifteen years.
British public opinion was absorbed in the internal
affairs of these islands, and often tended to neglect
even the greatest of our Imperial problems.
European politics were allowed to remain a
sealed book ; and if this was true even of such
near neighbours as France and Germany, it applies
with tenfold force to the vast and complicated chain
of problems which link up Russia, Austria-Hungary,
and the Balkans. The policy of splendid isolation
had been abandoned, but despite the growth of a
system of ententes, little or no effort was made
to break down the attitude of intellectual isolation
which had gradually replaced the old traditions of
active interest in continental affairs.
Our outlook upon the Polish Question may be
regarded as a classical instance of this psycho
logical change. In the early days of last century
Poland held an equal place with Greece and Italy
in the sympathies of the West, and her tragic fate
after the unsuccessful risings of 1830 and 1863

16 INTRODUCTION
accentuated those sympathies still farther. But in
the fifty years which followed there has been a
snapping of old sentimental ties, a loss of inter
course, and an almost sepulchral silence. Poland
has been almost forgotten, and is only slowly
swimming back into our ken, as the result of the
ghastly tragedies of a world war. It is fitting that
our reviving interest should take the form of
humanitarian help ; for the Entente Powers have
made the cause of small nations their own, and
of these Poland has suffered not less cruelly than!
Belgium and Serbia. But our interest cannot rest
upon a merely humanitarian basis. To-day the
Polish Question has once more become one of the
keys of the European situation. During the century,
and a half which have elapsed since the first par
tition Poland has been in very great measure the
determining factor in the relations between Russia,
Prussia, and Austria. Prussia,, by identifying Russia
with herself in holding down the Poles, has created
a permanent breach between the two main branches
of the Slavonic race, and at the same time main
tained and strengthened the community of interests
between the two chief exponents of reactionary and
non -representative government in Europe. Now
that war has rudely severed the main threads which
united Berlin to Petrograd, it ought to be possible
to restore confidence and friendship between
Russians and Poles. It is obvious that real
concord in the Slav world is unrealizable unless
liberty be accorded to the Poles, and that the estah-

INTRODUCTION 17
lishment of Russo -Polish amity on sure founda
tions would be welcohied with enthusiasm by
every branch of the Slavonic race. Fortunately,
there is a growing perception, among all classes
of Russians, of the root-fact that friendship with
Germany means the perpetuation of the unnatural
feud with Poland and German exploitation of
Russian and Pole alike. Equally clear is the
corollary that Russia's lasting reconciliation with
Poland would deal a death-blow to Germanic influ
ence in Russia, both in the political and in the
economic field. The mistakes of the Russian
administration in Galicia— now frankly admitted
as such in Petrograd and Moscow— and the German
conquest of Russian Poland have combined to create
a situation to which the old ostrich policy of
bureaucratic Russia is obviously incapable of pro
viding a solution.
But if the Polish Question vitally affects Russia
and her whole future, it is also of the greatest
possible importance for the Western Powers in their
struggle against German " kultur." At the eleventh
hour British public opinion has suddenly awakened
to the significance of Germany's political plan. The
realization of the programme of " Berlin-Bagdad "
has ceased to be Utopian ; it is assuming a con
crete form under our very eyes. It involves the
creation of a new " Central Europe " (Mittel-
europa)—a huge State dominated by Germany and
subjecting the Roles, Czechs, Slovaks, Magyars,
Roumanians, and Southern Slavs to its thrall. The
2

18 INTRODUCTION
economic exploitation of Poland, already inaugu
rated by the German conquerors of Warsaw, would
form an essential feature of this scheme.
The Allies are to-day confronted with a stern
alternative. Either they must confess themselves
beaten and reconcile themselves to a German hege
mony over the whole territory which lies between
Hamburg and Basra, or they must answer the
programme of " Central Europe " by a rival pro
gramme, not less practical and more ideal than'
that of the Germans. The "rights of the smaller
nationalities of Europe," more than once publicly
advocated by Mr. Asquith in the name of his
Government, represent an abstract statement of
such a programme ; but the phrase is absolutely
meaningless unless it is restated to-day in concrete
terms of the European situation. The first step
towards the creation of a new Europe must be the
emancipation and regeneration of the democratic
and progressive Slav nations. Free Poland, free
Bohemia and Jugoslavia (based on the national
unity of Serb, Croat, and Slovene) — side by side
with a free Magyar State and an enlarged Roumania
—all these will be so many barriers on the path of
aggressive Germanism. Without them no barrier
is possible ; and of them all Poland will be the
most powerful, the richest, the best organized, and,
with Bohemia, the most highly cultured. With its
population of probably not less than twenty
millions, in close and intimate alliance with other
Slavonic nations, it will take rank in the hierarchy

INTRODUCTION 19
of nations immediately after the Great Powers.
Poland can never be revived in its old historic
form as the mistress of other races ; but it has less
to fear from a strict application of ethnographic
principles than any of its neighbours. The country,
of Sobieski and Kosciuszko, of Copernicus, Mickie-
wicz, and Chopin has nothing to fear from the
free development of its own destiny, on those lines
of self-help, co-operation, and intense patriotism
of all classes which have enabled it to survive
120 years of national extinction and foreign
oppression. Mr. Zaleski's brief survey of Polish history forms
an admirable introduction to a series whose aim is
the interpretation of Poland to British readers, and
will be welcomed by all those who have the cause
of Slavonic freedom and progress at heart and by
the even larger number of those who realize the
vital part which the relations of Slav and Briton
will play in the future development of Europe.
E. W. SETON-WATSON.

Landmarks of Polish History
i
THE GROWTH OF THE POLISH STATE
The Polish State had its beginnings in a union
of several Slavonic tribes. These combined under
the rule of the Piast dynasty to defend themselves
against the aggressiveness of the more civilized Holy
Roman Empire in the West and the less civilized
Northern and Southern tribes. In 964 King
Mieczyslaw I married Princess Dombrowka of
Bohemia, embraced the Roman Catholic faith, and
thereby dealt a severe blow to all his enemies. He
destroyed the pretext for German invasions, which
had as their aim the conversion of their Eastern
neighbours to Christianity ; and at the same time,
by getting into touch with the Western world, gained
a freer hand in dealing with his other enemies.
The eastward movement of the Teutons in the
Upper and Middle basin of the Vistula ceased, and
it was only in the lower reaches of the river that
they later managed to establish themselves in the
fourteenth century.
The fact that the Poles and Czechs and Croats
joined the Roman Catholic Church had far -reach-
so

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 21
ing results. It divided the Slavonic race into two
groups, which developed along different lines. The
Czechs and the Poles evolved a civilization essen
tially of the Western type, while the Southern Slavs,
Ruthenians, and Russians embraced the Church of
Constantinople and developed along Eastern models.
The former followed Rome,'' the latter Byzantium.
This difference remains to this day the basis of
the Slavonic Question.
The last King of the Piast dynasty began to
transplant Western civilization to that part of
Ruthenia which came to him as an inheritance
after the death of one of his distant relations, andi
which is now known as Galicia. Nearly half a
century later the young Queen Jadviga, by her
marriage with the Lithuanian Prince Jagiello, de
termined a similar movement in the North, with
the difference that Ruthenia was a member of the
Eastern Church when it came under Polish rule,
while Lithuania was pagan. In Lithuania, how
ever, the Poles encountered formidable competitors,
who, under the pretext of converting the Lithuanians
to Christianity, tried to establish their authority
over this country by means of the sword. These
were the two Teutonic religious orders (Cruciferi
and Ensiferi) settled on the shores of the Baltic.
They succeeded in overcoming some of the Lithu
anian tribes, while the rest were united into one
State, and, being strongly pressed from the north
west, advanced in a south-easterly direction, where
they subdued the remainder of the Ruthenian

22 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
Duchies. Thus, by the union with Lithuania, Poland
acquired an enormous field for her activity. This
field was further extended after the defeats which
Polish and Lithuanian forces inflicted repeatedly
on the German military Orders. In 1466 the
Teutonic Knights of the Cross had to abandon all
their possessions on the Baltic with the exception
of Eastern Prussia, held by them under the suze
rainty of the Polish Crown. The last of the Great
Masters of that Order, Albert of Brandenburg, em
braced the Protestant religion at the beginning of
the sixteenth century, secularized the Order, and
proclaimed himself Hereditary Duke of Prussia,
whilst remaining a vassal of the Polish Crown.
The same fate befell the Knights of the Sword.
They ceded to Poland the Province of Livland,
retaining that of Courland as vassals. The Jagiellons
were also able to; establish Polish influence in
Bohemia and Hungary, where a younger Prince
of that dynasty, Vladislav, was elected King by the
Czechs in 1471, and by the Hungarians in 1491.
The power of Poland rose to its highest point.
The rule of the Jagiellons extended from the
Baltic to the Adriatic and the Black Sea,
But military and political power is not the essence
of true greatness. Something more is required.
A spiritual supremacy means far more than
supremacy of the sword. From the time of their
adoption of Christianity, the Poles paid special
attention to, the furtherance of civilization. The
Italian missionary and monk brought with him

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 23
from the West the first wonders of science. Schools
were opened under the influence of the Church.
Poles entered into the great family of Western
civilization. Early in the thirteenth century this
movement was checked for a time by the appear
ance of the Tartars in Europe ; they vanquished
the Eastern Slavs and moved towards the West
with all their forces. The Poles broke their ad
vance and threw them back. From that time the
Poles were constantly engaged in opposing incur
sions of Tartars and Turks, and were the acknow
ledged defenders of Christianity from the Eastern
peril. But even the stress of this conflict could
not stop the advance of civilization.
From the thirteenth century we hear of many
Poles who sought knowledge at the Italian Uni
versities. The scholars brought back not only their
quota of knowledge, but new social and political
ideas. The fourteenth century marked the ap
proaching end of the Middle Ages. Poland entered
on a road of great internal reforms, and theology,
philosophy, and the knowledge of classical litera
ture and law advanced quickly. In 1367 a Faculty
of Law was opened in Cracow. In 1400 this was
transformed into a University with four faculties :
theology, philosophy, law, and medicine. While
some teachers were brought from abroad, the
majority were Poles, and it may be mentioned that
many of the latter were derived from the burgesses
of Cracow. And the standard of these Polish
scientists can be judged from the prominent place

24 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
they occupied as lawyers and theologians at the
Councils of the Church. Numerous students from
France, Germany, Hungary, and Italy sought learn
ing in Cracow. The teachers, who had amongst
their disciples such men as Copernicus and St. John
Kanty, must themselves have been men of no little
knowledge. When the University was instituted the
Poles fully realized its importance. It served only
in part to teach the young. At the time of its
opening the Poles had already prominent scientists
who, besides lecturing, devoted much of their time
to the general advancement of high science. At
his inaugural lecture, given in the presence of the
King and Queen, the first Chancellor of the Uni
versity, Peter Wysz, after expressing his thanks to
their Majesties, declared that " this University shall
stand and fulfil its duty so long as the King of
Poland's sceptre is unbroken." It not only justi
fied this hope, but did better. The sceptre was
broken, but the University still stands and dis
charges its task by bringing up new generations
of workers, who, in the toil of everyday life, strive
for the uplifting of their country.
With the advance of science came a great de
velopment of art and literature. Magnificent build
ings in the Renaissance style were erected. Much
fine work in prose and poetry was published, both
in Polish and Latin. Through the constant inter
course with the West, the ideas of the Reformation
flowed into Poland, and the new ideas were received
with applause both by the nobility and the

LANDMARKS OE POLISH HISTORY 25
burgesses. But the Protestantism of Poland had
a somewhat different character from that of
Western Europe. The quiet agricultural Polish
population did not care much about discussions
and quarrels about diverse religious dogmas. What
the Poles desired was to keep the religious dogmas,
hierarchy, and rituals intact. And the whole move
ment was rather national than religious. It had
as its chief aim the release of the Church from
dependence on Rome, and the formation of a Council
of Bishops, under the presidency of the King, as
the supreme power in religious matters. Owing
to the masterful policy of Rome this plan fell
through ; but the great national movement con
tinued, its chief result being to free Polish literature
from an excessive Latin element, and to induce an
accentuation of national feeling and a broadening of
ideas which were bound up with the Reformation.
It may be added that from early times the Poles
displayed a natural disposition towards religious
tolerance. Ample proof of this can be found in
the fact that the Inquisitions, so common in other
States, were unknown among them. It has always
been a fact that, themselves fervent Catholics, the
Poles have not forced their religion on the unwilling.
There is a good deal of truth in the assertion that
this was one of the many reasons why the Roman
religion flourished in Roland and Protestantism lost
ground.

II
POLAND AT THE HEIGHT OF HER
DEVELOPMENT
In Poland the scientific, literary, and religious
movement of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
could not fail to influence political ideas and their
bearing on the existing social and political structure
of the country. The study of classical philosophers
and political writers, modified by the trend of
Protestant thought, gave rise to a special school
of Polish political philosophers. This was based
on two main principles : firstly, the best form of
government is a republic ; secondly, all men are
equal before the law and absolutely free in so far
as they act within the limit of that law. These
ideas, however, were subject to the same limita
tion as in the classic republic. Only men of a
certain class were accounted full -citizens— namely,
the nobility. This principle, however, was applied
very differently in Poland as compared with other
European countries. Feudalism was unknown. At
the outset there was an attempt on the part of the
more influential aristocracy to take the government
of the country into its hands through the agency
of the Crown, but this venture met with stout re
sistance from the knighthood. The conflict was
short. Owing to the stronger position of the
knights as defenders of the country, the aristocracy

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 27
had even to abandon its special rights and influ
ence and merge into the knighthood. From the
coalecsence of these two classes the Polish nobility
arose. Within it all were equal. There were no
titles. The only distinction in rank depended on
executive offices, to which any noble could aspire.
But the nobility adopted the Aristotelian view of
the other classes. Both burgesses and villains were
looked upon as citizens without full rights. Their
status, however, was much better than that of
similar classes in other European countries of the
time, excepting England, where, owing to peculiar
economic circumstances due to an insular position
and the loss of population caused by the Black
Death, villainage decayed spontaneously.
While achieving internal equality as nobles, the
dominant class was also able to secure for itself
rights and privileges which practically placed the
government of the country in its hands. By the
end of the fifteenth century the Polish Parliament,
called in Polish " Sejm," was organized, and, by
securing the power of voting supplies and con
trolling the military service of the Knights became
virtually the Government. Parliament consisted of
two Chambers : the Upper Chamber or the Senate,
composed of higher officials of the State, and the
Lower Chamber, consisting of members elected by
constituencies. The powers of the King were
subject to constitutional limitations. In 1430 the
King had to sign an Act ensuring the personal
liberty of his subjects, whom he promised never
to arrest without fair trial. The maximum of

28 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
liberty was reached when, after the death of the
last Jagiellon King (1572), the throne was made
elective, every nobleman having a right to ascend
it. The State was called a Republic, and the King's
position became that of Primus inter pares. These
changes were not brought about in a haphazard
way ; they resulted from deep thought and scientific
inquiries. Even if mistakes were made and
eventually produced disastrous consequences, in
their time the reforms were the wonder of Europe.
The works of such Polish political writers as
Goslicki were translated into various European
languages, and subsequently suppressed by Govern
ments as dangerously liberal in their outlook.
Goslicki's principal work, first published in 1568,
was translated into English under the title : —
The counsellor . . . wherein the offices of magistrates, the
happie life of subjects, and the felicities of Common weales
is pleasantly and pithlie discoursed. A golden worke, re
plenished with the chief learning of the most excellent Philo
sophers and Lawgivers, and not only profitable and verie
necessarie for all those that be admitted to the administration
of a well-governed Commonweale. London, 1598.
Its purpose can be seen from the opening
phrases :—
As every man well knoweth those Commonweales be most
blessed where men do live in peace ; so are those countries
miserable where people are not maintained in securitie. And
as everie Commonweale is happie wherein subjects are good,
so in good Commonweales no subject can be unfortunate.
This work was republished in 1607, and a new
translation again attempted in 1733 by W. Oldis-

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 29
worth. In the preface to the latter issue the trans
lator says that even in his time the work is still
looked upon as " advanced," and tries to safeguard
himself against its possible suppression by invoking
the protection of many eminent men of the time.
He goes on to say :—
There have been many Authors who have written freely
of the Office and Duty of a King ; and they have met with
Favourable Reception, whilst they kept their Pens within the
Bounds of that Deference and Submission, which is due to the
Superior Grandeur and Dignity of the Sceptre. Goslicki has
with great Delicacy touched upon this Subject. . . .
When the Differences between a British and Polish Govern
ment are removed and set aside or amicably compromised and
adjusted, what Goslicki hath advanced in Defence of Loyalty
and Liberty, and to make these Two Principles compatible
will, I hope deserve the attention of such Patriots, as are alike
Zealous for the Prerogatives of the Crown, and the Interests of
the People.
In conclusion, Oldisworth says :—
As the People of Poland have all along been noted for their
Great Learning and Knowledge, the Inseparable Companions
and Sure Supporters of Liberty, so they have in midst of a
disadvantageous Soil and Clime always maintained a Character
of Dignity and Grandeur ; have often Distinguished them
selves by their Wisdom, Bravery, and Conduct ; and at one
time particularly in so Glorious a Manner, that they seemed to
have Good Claim to the Title of The Deliverers of Europe from
Infidelity and Slavery ; on which account, there is perhaps
a good dea of Deference due to them ; and they may well
be admitted as Advocates of That Liberty, which by their
Arms they so bravely Defended ; At least they may expect
to be Heard with Patience upon so Agreeable a Subject, by Us,
their Constant and Firm Allies, of whom, for our Love of
Liberty, they have had so Good an Opinion, that Remote as we
are from Them they have more than once attempted to set
an Englishman upon the Throne of Poland.

Ill
THE DECLINE OF POLAND
After the splendid development of Poland in the
fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, when
that country reached the zenith of her power and
won the esteem of Europe, both for her eminence
in the arts and sciences and her liberal constitu
tional and social systems, a decline ensued. It is
a commonplace that the essence of good politics
is compromise, and a lack of compromise largely
accounted for Poland's retrogression. The ideas
of liberty put forward so ably by Polish political
thinkers of the sixteenth century and carried into
practice so admirably at the time began to
degenerate in the seventeenth century.
The principle of personal freedom when carried
too far may easily lead the way to disintegration ;
popular control of the Government under similar
conditions may end in an undesirable weakening
of the executive. To a citizen of a State so well
organized as Great Britain social order in its widest
sense seems a necessity to be taken for granted,
and it requires an effort of imagination to realize
how much careful thought has been expended in
adjusting such principles as those of personal free-
30

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 31
dom and supremacy of the State, of popular con
trol and stable government. It is commonly
acknowledged by Polish and foreign historians alike
that the maladjustment of personal freedom and
popular control, on the one hand, and State
guidance, on the other, were the chief causes of
the internal disruption of Poland during the seven
teenth century. The principle of freedom was
carried to such excess that every law passed by
the Chamber of Deputies required a unanimous
vote. A single veto threw out a Bill ! This made
legislation by Parliament almost impossible ; the
main power passed into the hands of local councils,
which became almost autonomous. These councils,
called " sejmik," were composed of the local
nobility, and began to pass laws special to the area
in which they acted without reference to national
requirements. This system divided the country into
a number of small provinces too loosely connected,
and thus greatly diminished the coherence of the
State as a whole. As electors of the Kings, the
nobles were in a position to curtail the centralized
authority until it almost disappeared. The fact that
the King could be elected not merely from among
the Polish nobility but from one of the foreign
royal families, gave foreign monarchs the oppor
tunity to interfere in the internal affairs of the
country. Poland became the ground on which
France and Austria tried to gain supremacy in
Europe by extending their influence, while Russia
from the time of Peter the Great had in mind the

32 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
annexation of the country. Two other factors
tended to weaken Poland. In the first place, the
Roman Catholic reaction which affected all Europe
in the seventeenth century was very marked in
Poland. The admirable laws of the sixteenth
century, granting perfect freedom of conscience to
all inhabitants of Poland and resulting in an inflow
of Protestants from many European countries, were
forgotten. Indeed, in 1733 all non-Catholics were
deprived of the right of entering Parliament and
the Civil Service. The second factor was the limita
tion of the franchise to the nobility. It cannot
be too strongly impressed on the student of Polish
affairs that the term " nobility " in Poland con
noted a status peculiar to the country. The class
of nobles formed by the amalgamation of the aris
tocracy with the knighthood was very numerous—
in fact, it amounted to over 10 per cent, of the
population. A franchise limited to this proportion
might have been a success in the sixteenth
century, for then the prosperity of the Polish
bourgeoisie had not been damaged by the nobility,
who pursued their agriculture and did not interfere
with the traders ; and the burgesses, on their side,
were not strong enough to better their position.
But when Russia began to export large quantities
of corn and so damaged the interests of the Polish
gentlemen farmers, the nobility, unable to meet this
competition, used their power as a privileged class
to free themselves from the burden of taxation and
to increase that of the burgesses. This gave

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 33
rise to considerable friction, and the strained
relations between the classes resulted in oppression.
Simultaneously Poland was engaged in a series
of wars. She was subject to constant invasions
by Swedes, Moscovites, Turks, and Tartars. So
strong, however, was the organization of Poland
in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries that all the
misgovernment of the subsequent century did not
materially weaken her for a time. She withstood
all the attacks of the Turks and Tartars of the
period, and even proceeded to the rescue of Vienna
in 1683, When that city, and with her all Christian
Europe, was threatened by a great Mussulman in
vasion. The coup was so splendid that it won
for King John Sobieski, the commander of the army,
a fame that is fresh to-day.
All Europe united in his praise. Innumerable
books and poems were written in various languages
to commemorate this victory, England not being
the last to honour the Polish King. Among others,
Alexander Tyler published in 1685 a poem extend
ing to 155 pages, in which he gave a full biography
of King John III and described his gallant deeds.
This is how Tyler began his poem : —
When the whole world of men in Christendom,
The Eastern Church of Greece, Western of Rome,
The Orthodox, Reformed, purer Church,
And all their sev'ral sects lay at the Lurch . . .
Then like a mighty Angel sent from Heaven,
Or like those Cherubims to Eden given,
With Flaming sword to fence the tree of life,
Great Sobieski's Hand cut off the strife,
3

34 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
But internal disorder could not remain without
effect on the military power of the country, especi
ally as the governing class, fearing an increase of
the prerogatives of the Crown, would not vote
supplies for the maintenance of an Army, and still
clung to the old system of mobilizing the whole
nobility in case of war. As an outcome, Poland
suffered severe losses. Not only was she deprived
of a part of her territory, but also lost her status
as a Great Power.
Her territory beyond the Dnieper and Kieff were
ceded to Moscow. Sweden took Livland. The
rulers of Prussia, Moldavia, and Wallachia, who
were vassals of the Polish Crown, refused allegi
ance ; and much against the wish and interests of
Poland, the Prussian Prince went so far as to
assume the title of King within his territory.
Standing aside from the Thirty Years War,
Poland had no influence on the international
arrangements adopted at the Conferences of
Minister and Osnabriick, and finally established
by the Westphaiian Treaty. Exhausted by constant
wars and misgoverned, she had to endure the arro
gance of her former Prussian vassal. Such a state
of things could not continue long with a nation
like the Poles. In the second quarter of the eigh
teenth century a strong regenerating movement
began. At first this was the work of individual
men, but shortly it widened, and by the middle of
the century had grown to a great national move
ment. Sweeping reforms on a democratic basis

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 35
were initiated, but unfortunately they came too late.
The neighbouring Powers could not but view this
revival with disfavour, as it was already their object
to dismember the weakened country. As early as
1732 the Courts of Berlin, St. Petersburg, and Vienna
signed a convention whereby the high contracting
parties made it their business to prevent reforms
in Poland. As they could not attain their purpose
by diplomacy, they subdued Poland by arms when
she was already on the upward path. By this act
they not only increased their territory, but destroyed
a neighbour, whose liberal and democratic methods
might have had a perilous influence on their own
autocratically -governed people.

IV
THE BEGINNING OF REGENERATION AND
THE FALL OF POLAND
The regenerating movement in Poland was gaining
ground When King August III died in 1763. Thus
an election was in prospect. Parliament began by
introducing reforms to enforce the Executive ; to
facilitate the proceedings of the Houses, hampered
until then by the need of unanimous decisions ;
to improve the position of burgesses and peasants ;
to strengthen the economic condition of the coun
try ; and, finally, to increase the military power
of the State. Several of these reforms were carried
into effect, but the most salient never reached the
Statute Book because Prussia and Russia, whose
army occupied the chief towns in Poland, wished
to ensure the election of Russia's candidate,
Stanislas August Poniatowski.
Constant intrigues by the Ambassadors of the
neighbouring Powers caused great discontent among
the Poles, who started a counter -movement : the
Confederation of Bar. This led to much internal
disorder, as the King and his party were under.
Russia's protection, and had np thought of dis
carding it.
36

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 37
Meanwhile Russia vanquished Turkey, and
Austria, intimidated by the victory, drew nearer
to Prussia and Turkey in order to cripple Russia.
A remedy was soon found by Prussia. Wishing
to use Turkey as an ally against Russia, she pro
posed that the latter should not miake the most
of her victory, but take instead a part of Poland,
while Austria and Prussia compensated themselves
in the same way. All agreed to the proposal, and
a formal treaty was signed in February 1772. In
August the occupation of the annexed territory was
an accomplished fact. The Powers concerned re
quested the Polish Government to sanction the
partition. The King appealed to the Western
Powers, but the allied armies speedily occupied
Warsaw, and Parliament was coerced by arms to
sanction treaties with Austria, Prussia, and Russia,
ceding to them the territories which they had
previously arranged among themselves to seize.
At the same time Russia inserted a clause in
her treaty to the effect that no change of the Polish
Constitution should take place without her consent,
and to back this policy her Ambassador in Warsaw
had a Russian garrison at his disposal. Neverthe
less many reforms were initiated and established.
In 1778 the so-called Commission of Education was
formed, and. all business concerning public edu
cation fell to it. This was the first Board of
Education established in Europe. Its earliest work
was to secularize the schools and to reform them
on principles laid down by the French philosophers

38 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
of the time. Care was also taken to further agri
culture, industry, and commerce, the Government
assisting those who undertook new enterprises in
industry or sought to improve old ones on a sound
economic basis and with a reasonable prospect of
success. Political reforms were also in preparation.
Polish scientists, besides devoting time to the study
of social and political questions, entered into touch
with such eminent thinkers of the period as
Rousseau, Mably, and others ; these latter, on re
quest, wrote treatises on Polish affairs and recom
mended reforms. Unfortunately, promising reforms
could not always be put into practice, as the Russian
Ambassador used the treaty against them. In 1787,
however, the international situation was greatly
changed. Turkey declared war on Russia ; Austria,
according to her treaty with Russia, in her turn
declared war on Turkey. Profiting by this situa
tion, Sweden broke off diplomatic relations with
Russia and began hostilities. England, Holland,
and Prussia were ready to back Turkey. The Poles
had two roads open to them : to enter into an
alliance with Russia and Austria, or to join the
other Powers standing by Prussia. King Frederick
William II made very profitable offers to Poland,
promising her to free her from the influence of
Russia. On March 29, 1790, a defensive and offen
sive treaty was signed between Poland and Prussia,
by which each Power was bound to intervene should
the other be attacked.
But the international situation speedily changed.

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 39
Russia's ally, Joseph II, died, and his successor
Leopold, breaking off the alliance with Russia in
July 1790, concluded a treaty with Prussia. This
weakened the position of Poland, as her alliance
with Prussia was no> longer of vital importance
to the latter. Moreover, in August of the same;
year, the King of Sweden concluded peace with
Russia. Poland felt her insecurity, but continued
her constructive work ; to remedy most of the evils
of the governmental system a new Constitution was
enacted by Parliament and accepted by the King
on May 3, 1791. The Throne was made hereditary,
the right of liberum veto abolished. The position
of burgesses and peasants was substantially im
proved. The Constitution, acknowledged through
out Europe as a model of its kind, won the high
appreciation of many scientists and philosophers,
among them Edmund Burke. Austria and Prussia
joined in the chorus of appreciation, but it was
a cause of anxiety in Russia. Shortly afterwards
the international situation changed in favour of the
last Power. France declared war on Austria. With
Austria out of the field, Russia no longer feared
Prussia. In May 1792 the Russian Ambassador
formally declared war on Poland. But Poland had
not had time to carry out reforms under the new
Constitution, and was unprepared for war. In;
accordance with the treaty of 1790, the Polish
Envoy at Berlin asked for Prussia's support, but
the King answered that he did not consider himself
bound to intervene, as Poland had changed her

40 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
Constitution without his assent. Poland being
practically without an army, Russia entered
Warsaw. Meanwhile between the Courts of Berlin, St.
Petersburg, and Vienna negotiations were proceed
ing for a new partition, but as Austria was occu
pied with France, Prussia and Russia alone took
part in it. The Polish Parliament, meetmg at
Grodno, was again compelled to sanction the par
tition. A Russian garrison of thirty thousand men
remained in Poland at the disposal of the Russian
Ambassador, and the Constitution of 1791 was
shelved. Yet again the Poles resisted. A revolution was
proclaimed in Cracow on March 24, 1794, the leader
ship being placed in the hands of General Tadeusz
Kosciuszko. By the promise of liberation of the
peasants and their enlistment as volunteers a con
siderable army was formed, and war declared on
Russia. At first the Poles were victorious, but the
King of Prussia came to Russia's assistance, and the
Poles could not withstand the combination. While
hostilities were actually carried on negotiations for
a third partition proceeded. A treaty, was signed
between Austria, Prussia, and Russia in January,
1795. On November 25th of the same year King
Stanislas August was forced to abdicate. The three
participating Powers believed that now the Polish
Question was finally settled. They were to learn
however, that they had become masters of a race
whose individuality could not be killed.

THE TEMPORARY RECONSTRUCTION OF AN
INDEPENDENT POLISH STATE
By the 1795 partition the ancient Polish State
was brought to an end. The territory of a once-
flourishing Republic was divided among her three
neighbours. Russia annexed the Lithuanian and
Ruthenian provinces, while the territory forming
ethnographical Poland was unequally divided
between Austria and Prussia, the latter taking
the largest share, with Warsaw, the capital of the
country. Immediately after the three Powers, in the words
of Frederick, " partook and communicated of the
body of Poland," a fact which, in his opinion, would
bind the countries in an eternal friendship, the
Prussian Government sought to destroy everything
Polish. Even the old names of districts were re
placed by German ones, the areas of New East
Prussia and New Silesia being constituted. Further,
the Government introduced Prussian administration,
suspended Polish laws, forced the German language
on all State institutions ; also it removed Poles
from all official positions, and in general prevented
their participation in public affairs. Briefly, the
a

42 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
people were subjected to the regime of the Prussian
bureaucracy. The property of the Church was
seized by the Treasury. The great improvements
made in the position of the peasantry during the
last years of independence were abolished, their
status being reduced to the Prussian standard.
Similar methods were adopted in the Austrian
part, called now the Kingdom of Galicia and
Lodomeria. In Russian Poland Catherine II confiscated many
estates, and proved anything but a friend to the
Church. Her successors, however, the Emperors
Paul and Alexander I, were less arbitrary in their
methods. The latter discountenanced harsh treat
ment of the Poles, for some time at any rate. He
entrusted the supervision of education among them
to a Pole, Prince Adam Czartoryski, who introduced
a system based on the principles laid down by the
Polish Parliament before the dismemberment.
But the daily struggle against Austrian and
Prussian schemes did not occupy the whole atten
tion of the Poles. They were busily engaged in
forming plans for the reconstitution of their country
as a sovereign State. There were two possibilities
open to them at the moment : they could turn
towards Russia or France. The kindly disposi
tion of Alexander I towards the Poles made them
hope that he would be willing to reconstruct Poland
as an independent kingdom under his rule. The
project was laid before the Czar by, Prince Czar
toryski. The Czar hesitated for some time, but

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 43
unfortunately accepted advice tendered by the King
of Prussia, and rejected the proposal. All the hopes
of Poland now turned towards France, where a
good many Polish emigrants found shelter, and
from whence the message of liberty had gone forth
to all Europe. The Poles in France had organized
legions of their countrymen, and these fought side
by side with the French.
In 1806, when the King of Prussia declared war
on France, Napoleon decided to avail himself of
the services of the Poles. He proclaimed the inde
pendence of Poland as the chief aim of his cam
paign, and called for an insurrection in that country.
The Poles took to arms, Napoleon was victorious,
and by the following Treaty of Tilsit an independent
Polish State once more appeared on the map pf
Europe. But the Powers which took part in the
division of Poland used all their influence to prevent
the new State from' retaining its name. Thus the
Duchy of Warsaw was set up, and consisted of no
more than a part of Prussian Poland. All the
Baltic coast, with the exception of Dantzig, now
made a free city, went to Prussia, while the district
of Bialystok was handed to the Czar by way of
compensation. The Duchy of Warsaw was given as an hereditary
possession to the King of Saxony by Napoleon, who
granted it an ostensibly liberal Constitution, which
ensured religious toleration, the equality of all
citizens in the eyes of the law, the use of the
national language, a two-chamber Legislature with

44 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
a Ministry responsible to it, and an army of fifty
thousand. The creation of a small Duchy inevitably failed
to satisfy the Poles. Moreover, its Constitution
was in reality very unsatisfactory. The franchise
was very limited, personal liberty was not guaran
teed, and there was no freedom of the Press ; and
though emancipation of the peasants was a feature,
no provision was made for their subsistence, so
that they remained essentially dependent on the
landowners. Again, the Poles understood that
Napoleon created the Duchy for his own purposes,
and therefore did not feel safe against some new
turn of his policy. Notwithstanding all this, the
Duchy represented a great improvement on the con
ditions to which the Poles were subjected prior to
its creation. At once the huge task of organizing
the country was started, and once more the Poles
showed their characteristic vitality. They paid
special attention to economic development and
education. But the new order of things had
scarcely been established when Austria declared
war on Napoleon in 1809. Simultaneously the
Austrian armies crossed the frontier of the Duchy.
The Archduke Ferdinand, commanding the Austrian
army, declared that he was entering the Duchy
not as an enemy, but as the liberator of Poland
from French rule. The Poles, however, effectively
opposed the " liberator," and when hostilities were
ended found themselves in the possession of a great
part of Austrian Poland. In the peace negotia-

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY, 45
tions, conducted in Vienna, however, Napoleon was
actuated by the same motives as at Tilsit. The
Emperor Alexander, Napoleon's ally, at the time,
particularly feared the success of that ally, since he
had no wish to see Poland under the House of
Saxony. Finally an agreement was reached by the
two allies, under which the Duchy attached a part
of Austrian Poland. The Czar was compensated
by the cession to him of the Tarnopol district,
Napoleon promising that he would keep the Duchy,
to the limits described at the time. On their side,
the Poles hoped that the Franco -Russian Alliance
would prove transient, and meanwhile were busily
engaged on the internal organization. Very soon
their hopes were fulfilled1 by the crisis of 1812.
Both Alexander and Napoleon made handsome
promises, but the Roles were bound by treaty and
gratitude to France ; their forces joined Napoleon's
great army, and suffered defeat with it. Austria
and Prussia, the two other allies of Napoleon in
this adventure, turned round and joined the vic
torious Czar. Again offers and promises were made
to the Poles, but for them1 treaties were not mere
scraps of paper, and they stood to the last by
France. Perhaps they, would have profited more
by imitating Austria and Prussia. Be that as it may,
they honoured their bond.
So, having linked its fate with Napoleon's, the
Duchy of Warsaw was at the disposal of the Con
gress of Vienna. During the Congress the Polish
Question became a source of misunderstanding

46 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
between Russia, Prussia, and Austria. A European
war was imminent, but the return of Napoleon
forced the Powers to settle their differences. A
settlement was reached by, a new partition of
Poland. From a part of the Warsaw Duchy the
Grand Duchy of Posen was formed and given to
the King of Prussia, to whom1 also the free city of
Dantzig returned. Cracow and a small strip of
territory round it was declared a free Republic
under the protection of Russia, Austria, and Prussia.
Austria received again the Kingdom of Galicia and
Lodomeria. The remainder of the Duchy consti
tuted the Kingdom of Roland, and was given to the
Czar of Russia.

VI
THE STRUGGLE FOR LIBERTY
The Congress of Vienna laid down in a very vague
way the principle that all parts of Poland should
receive a Constitution compatible with a normal
national development.
In order to comply with this principle the
Emperor of Austria established, in the part of
Poland which came under his rule, a sham Parlia
ment, composed entirely of the clergy and the
wealthiest nobles. This body had no legislative
rights ; its only business was to apportion taxes and
write petitions asking the Sovereign to make laws.
Coincidently, the bureaucratic system in existence
before the loss of the Polish provinces (1809) was
reinforced ; its object was to set class against class
and so weaken national unity.
The Prussian Government, as usual, made no
pretence of discharging its obligations to the Con
gress. The treaty was ignored and a system of
bureaucratic persecutions begun without ceremony.
The Emperor Alexander alone acted in accord
ance with the intentions of the Congress, and
granted a fairly liberal Constitution. The King
dom of Poland was definitely bound to Russia by
47

48 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
the fact that the Czar Was the hereditary ruler,
but nevertheless it had its own Parliament and
Executive and a separate army and administration ;
its foreign policy alone was purely, Russian. The
Russian Government and military caste were very
dissatisfied with Alexander's liberalism1 towards a
conquered nation, an attitude hardly surprising
when it is considered that Russia did not enjoy the
same benefits. Pressure was brought to bear on
the Czar by his Court, and eventually this influence
told— partly, no doubt, because Alexander mean
while discovered that it was difficult for the auto
cratic Czar of Russia to submit to the limitations
of a constitutional Kingship in Poland. Like
others of his time, he found that liberal principles
were one thing, liberal practice another. Conse
quently a systematic infringement of the Polish
Constitution was permitted at the hands of his
brother, the Tsarevitch Constantine, the Viceroy
Prince Zajonczek, and the Imperial Commissioner
Novosiltzev. Little by little the legalized rights of
the people were annulled. Censorship of the Press
and other publications began. Secret police made
many arrests. Parliament was not convoked. And
all these reactionary measures were increased when
the Emperor Nicholas I succeeded to the throne.
The Poles, unable to retain the management of
State affairs by constitutional means, took to arms.
Revolution broke out on November 29, 1830. Not
feeling strong enough to sustain the Revolution
alone, the Poles sought in vain for foreign help ;

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 49
Austria, not satisfied to stand aside from the insur
rection, closed her frontiers and made communica
tion with the West difficult. Prussia entered into
treaty with Russia, promising to put sixty, thousand
troops at her disposal. The Revolution collapsed,
but not without having a great effect elsewhere.
Owing to the Polish rising the Czar could not go
to stamp out the Revolution in Relgium, as was
his intention. It may therefore be said that Poland
saved Belgium by her revolt.
After suppressing the Revolution, the Russian
Government's attitude towards Poland hardened.
The Constitution was suspended, the national Polish
army abolished, and the administration of the
country subjected to the central authorities at St.
Petersburg. Also State lands were distributed
amongst officers and officials in order to russify
the country. Many Poles were sent to Siberia.
The Uniat Church was abolished and its followers
forced to become Orthodox. The Polish Universi
ties at Warsaw and Vilna were closed and schools
reduced in number, with the apparent object of
minimizing Western influence.
To escape these conditions many Poles emigrated
to France and England, where they were sympa
thetically received. Still, the whole thought of the
people was centred in a single idea : the recon-
stitution of Poland. Whatever differences of
opinion existed on social problems were merged
in this common desire. A revolt was planned and
prepared in 1846. No outbreak took place in the

50 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
Duchy of Posen, because there the organizers were
already in the hands of Prussian gaolers, but
Cracow rose and Galicia made ready. The attempt,
however, ended disastrously, for the Galician
peasants were used by the Austrian Government
against the insurgents.
During the previous few decades the system of
the Austrian Government had been to demoralize
the peasants and awaken in them a hatred of their
landlords. The Austrian law maintained the right
of landlords to labour dues, forced on the squires
the duty of apportioning taxes, and made the latter
select recruits for the army and act as rural police.
No better means could have been employed to sap
the popularity of the landed classes among the
peasantry. On the other hand, the bureaucracy
took the peasants under their care, protecting
them whenever they were prosecuted by the land
lords for theft, and so forth. The ignorant poor
failed to realize the object of this system. To them
all oppression originated with landlords, while the
bureaucracy figured as defenders of the weak.
Hence, when the revolt against Austrian rule began,
nothing was easier than to persuade the peasant
that a victory of the insurgents would leave them
at the mercy of landlordism. Criminals were let
loose from prisons to start riots, and the peasantry
accepted the lead. Many nobles were massacred
with their wives and children, some two thousand
persons being killed. This ended the rising. The
Revolutionary authorities fled from Cracow, which

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 51
was occupied by a garrison composed of Austrians,
Prussians, and Russians. In all parts of Poland
the gaols were filled with prisoners suspected of
sympathizing with the insurgents. The free city
of Cracow, instituted at the Congress of Vienna,
was absorbed by Austria.
The severity of the measures directed against
the Galician rising left the Poles undaunted, as the
wider revolutionary movements of 1848 showed.
The Prussian revolutionists requested the Govern
ment to grant internal autonomy to the Duchy of
Posen, and having apparently obtained for them
selves a liberal Constitution, clamoured for war
with Russia as a means of extending this liberty.
Frederick William solemnly promised to fulfil their
wishes. The Poles were allowed to raise their own
army for service against Russia, and at once set to
work. But as soon as Berlin was in hand Frederick
availed himself of the privilege, always claimed by
the Prussian Kings, of breaking his word. He
ordered his troops to fall on the Polish camps and
to massacre the young men who were trained there
to fight in his name.
The revolution in Austria followed a similar
course, so far as the Poles were concerned.
Promises were lavishly made, reforms initiated ;
but when the position in Vienna became secure
Galicia was drowned in blood.
In this way all Poland suffered severe reprisals,
under which the nation seemed to be losing its iden
tity. But the quiet of that time covered a ceaseless

52 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
activity. Unobtrusive development took the place
of resistance ; science, literature, and art flourished ;
the people, unbroken, were preparing to assert
again their right to nationality. It was not, how
ever, until Napoleon III introduced the principle
of racial unity into European politics that the Poles
found an opportunity. An armed insurrection
started at Warsaw in 1863. The hopes of the
insurgents centred in Napoleon, who, after the
victories of Magenta and Solferino, was regarded
in Poland as the champion of the oppressed. But
Napoleon was absorbed in home affairs and, acting
with Great Britain and Austria!, limited his action
to the presentation of pacific notes to Russia. The
resulting diplomatic correspondence dragged on
while the insurrection was being stamped out by
force. A period of civil suppression followed.
What remained of self-government disappeared,
the Poles lost the right of entering the Civil Service,
and the Russian language was introduced into the
schools and courts. Everything Polish was pro
hibited, the very name of the country being changed
to " The District of the Vistula."
The Prussian Government took similar measures,
and enforced them1 with German ruthlessness. In
1886 a Colonization Commission was constituted
in Posen to push the purchase and settlement of
the land by Germans. A hundred million marks
were made over to the Commission by the Govern
ment for this purpose. In addition, in 1894,
Bismarck's influence led to the formation of a

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 53
Society for the Germanization of the Duchy, of
Posen. Three Prussians, Hennemann, Kenhemann,
and Tiedemann, organized this body, which, in
keeping with their initials, was called the Hakata.
It started work by fomenting German' national feel
ing in Prussia and Posen. Not content with the
fact that the Government deprived the Poles of
the right to enter the Civil Service— even, indeed,
to fill such a post as that of porter at a Government
railway-station— the Hakata began a boycott of
Polish merchants, artisans, doctors, lawyers, etc.
Some years later the Prussian Diet voted another
hundred million marks to the Colonization Com
mission for the acquisition of land. The Poles
were forbidden to build new premises of any kind
without a special permit. Many Polish towns and
villages received German names. Children in
schools were punished for speaking Polish. The
language was also forbidden at public meetings.
Finally, the Prussian Diet passed a law for de
priving Poles of their land if it were required for
German immigrants.
The Poles protested through their representatives
in the Prussian Diet and the Imperial Parliament,
but could make no headway ; most of the German
representatives replied in effect with Bismarck's
war cry, " Ausrotten."
Under Austrian rule the Poles fared differently.
The defeat of 1866 left the Austrian bureaucracy
bankrupt. The inefficiency of her administration
was obvious, and the oppressed nationalities of the

54 LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY
Empire regarded the central Government as too
weak to maintain its supremacy. So-called
Fundamental Statutes proclaimed by the Emperor
accorded a Constitution, based on the autonomy
of the divers countries and the equality of all
nationalities. Galicia received a separate Diet,
which decided matters of local importance. Polish
became the official language of the country, although
in Eastern Galicia Ruthenian was equally recog
nized. The usual constitutional liberties were
granted. There were two Polish Universities, in
Cracow and Lemberg, and an Academy of Science
was opened in the former city. Primary and
secondary education was entrusted to the Polish
authorities and Poles were admitted to all Govern
ment appointments.
Such is, in brief, the history of the rise and fall
of Poland. Her fate is , that of a nation who
attempted to practise democracy while the rest of
Europe was largely autocratic in Government and
had not entirely thrown' off the traditions of
feudalism. Much has been said of internal dissen
sions which shook Poland in her free days ; but
is it not a fact that even now advances in
democracy mean internal conflict? The democratic
system was persisted with and failed — because con
tinental Europe was not ripe for it. And so it
was that Poland paid very dearly for her love of
internal freedom. Surely it is a stain on the
world's history that this nation and its plight should

LANDMARKS OF POLISH HISTORY 55
have been forgotten for the best part of a century.
But Poland sees her opportunity at last and knows
that what is made of it depends largely on those
who will be called upon to settle the boundaries
of European States after the present tremendous
struggle. Unfortunately, she is hidden away — sur
rounded by great States. These States form a
barrier across which her voice does not easily
travel. The tragedy of war waged on her terri
tory has again brought the Polish Question to the
front. The Poles hope that from the tumult of
the world's struggle a united and independent
Poland will emerge.

POLAND'S STRUGGLE
FOR INDEPENDENCE BY
RAJMUND KUCHARSKI
With a Foreword by
LORD WEARDALE

\

FOREWORD
The history of Poland, during the last two centuries,
forms one of the saddest records of the gradual
disintegration, subjection, and humiliation of a
great and gifted people. The first half of that
period presents but a long chapter of foreign
intrigue and continued interference with the
domestic concerns of Poland and the persistent
aggression of jealous and powerful neighbours,
leading up to the flagitious partitions and eventual
complete destruction of its national existence.
The work of Mr. Rajmund Kucharski, upon
which I do not propose to offer either comment or
criticism, takes up the story at a point when hope
of emancipation from alien domination had once
more vainly revived in Polish hearts.
The Emperor Alexander I, during that short
spasm of liberal enthusiasm with which he
inaugurated his reign, had held out to the Poles
the promise of a renewed political existence, but
too soon, alas ! other counsels had prevailed, and
again the curtain descended upon all those fair
anticipations to which it had given birth. Recent
events have brought the Polish question into special
prominence. It has to-day become one of absorb-
59

60 FOREWORD
ing moment, and out of the embers of the present
worldwide conflagration the friends of freedom
will strive for that of Poland to be at length
restored. It is a strange reflection that Germany, who had
herself for centuries suffered from internal divisions,
and whose unity was only in 1870 finally accom
plished, should have been the most formidable
obstacle to the re-establishment of Polish indepen
dence. It was a dogma of Prince Bismarck that its
recognition was inconsistent with the safety of the
German Empire, and in the polemical discussion now
going on in the Teutonic Press there is apparently
a general agreement with this conclusion. In none
of the various proposals for the settlement of the
Polish question does German public opinion con
cede to twenty millions of Poles those national
and racial rights which they contend for with
undeniable justice for themselves.
And yet how strong everywhere has proved the
spirit of race and nationality ! Centuries of oppres
sion in all countries and in every, clime have ever
failed to destroy it. The German people are
themselves a striking illustration of its overpower
ing force, while Hungary, is a vivid illustration of
its undying potency. But Roland in the eyes of
these blind and wrangling disputants is to be ruled
altogether outside the scope of its operation. In
the multitude of schemes which have been pro
mulgated in German lands every variety of annexa
tion, redivision, and alien form: of government is

FOREWORD 61
suggested ; but nowhere is the claim of freedom
or the independence of Poland set forth by these
apostles of the new Kultur and the regeneration
of the world.
The Polish race has many gifts, but perhaps its
enduring faith is its most remarkable characteristic.
No oppression kills it at home, whatever the
weapons or the arts of the oppressor, while absence
from the Fatherland has not dimmed its courage
in the great Polish settlements in the United States
of America or elsewhere. It may be that its long
record of sorrows will have brought home to
Polish minds in all these years of tribulation and
exile some salutary warnings ; for it is unques
tionable that many of their misfortunes in the past
were due to, the cleavage which too long existed
between the Poles themselves and in the unhappy
feud between the owners and the tillers of the
soil, which was the certain parent of internal
strife and the specious excuse for repeated inter
vention. It is also true that conditions in Poland
have been greatly changed by recent developments,
and the enormous growth of the industrial towns
and districts has perhaps accentuated these tradi
tional difficulties and given greater prominence to
the demands of the proletariat. But the recon-
stitution of Poland, if it is to be successfully
attained, must be based upon a frank acceptance
of democratic ideals and the cordial co-operation
of all classes in the re-establishment of their
national life. Without complete unity of purpose

62 FOREWORD
the prospect of Poland's emancipation will be
small indeed, and in this supreme moment one
thought should dominate every, other : the call of
patriotism to every Pole to merge all differences
of opinion in the concerted effort to secure the
liberation of his country and the restoration of
his existence as a nation.
The Polish Information Committee have em
barked upon a most meritorious campaign of
popular enlightenment ; and I venture to affirm
that the more the history of their country is studied
and reflected upon the stronger will be the conclu
sion that the only final solution is to be found
in the recognition of the rights and aspirations
of Poland, and that the great empires in the
midst of which it is fated to remain geographically
embedded will sooner or later end by admitting
that in the freedom of Poland will reside their
own surest safeguard. WEARDALE.
May 5, 1916.

POLAND'S STRUGGLE FOR
INDEPENDENCE
The Poles will never allow themselves to be engulfed by
the foreigner so long as their memory remains faithful to
liberty and they accept the word in its widest sense ; so long
as they continue to seek knowledge and, by renouncing
frivolities and trifles, hold themselves in readiness for any
eventuality. They will not find their salvation in idle boasts
and thoughtless enthusiasms, nor in the hope that some one
will come to their aid. — Hugo Kollontay.
"The second partition of Poland," says Aibert
Sorel, "was contemporaneous with the first coali
tion formed against France ; indeed, it was almost
its necessary condition. The compact then concluded
between the Allies had as a secret corollary a plan
for the partition of France to their profit." Happily
this proved no more than an evil dream. Poland
alone became the victim. Poland alone was des
poiled, torn asunder, thrust from her place among
the nations of Europe. Yet her soul survived, and,
ever seeking the fulfilment of her aspirations,
found a fresh outlet for the enthusiasm of her sons.
Secretly escaping by way of the open frontiers on
the west, they enrolled themselves as volunteers
Under the leadership of Dombrowski. Fighting for
the glory of the French Republic, they dreamed
that out of the agonies of the battlefields of Italy
63

64 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
and Germany would be brought forth anew the
Kingdom of Poland. The star of France and of
Napoleon Was to guide them to their promised land.
Vain dreams ! Napoleon, engaged in a war
against Prussia and Austria, conceived the idea of
stirring up to revolt the newly made subjects of
these Powers. Under his orders Dombrowski and
Wybicki published a proclamation addressed to the
Poles, While he himself travelled through Posen
and entered Warsaw, where the French troops were
received with enthusiasm. When, however, the
Treaty of Tilsit came to be signed, the name of
Poland was not even mentioned. Napoleon believed
he had need of Alexander to make the success of
his schemes certain and feared to disclose plans
of so opposite a nature to one of the beneficiaries
in the partition. Yet he felt he owed some sort
of compensation to the deluded Poles, and founded
for them a little State— the Duchy of Warsaw.
They could but accept this as an earnest of their
great desire. What could their State do but give
all that was asked of her — recruits, and still more
recruits? Her army, was at first limited to 30,000
men, but the figure was doubled ; and later still,
taxing her strength to the utmost to support this
heavy burden, she gave, in January, 1812, 65,000
men ; in November 97,000. Joseph Poniatowski
linked his fate with that of the Emperor, becoming
a national hero and the idol of the Polish soldiers.
He perished with the remnant of the Polish army
in the battle of Leipsic— the last of Poland's knights.

FOR INDEPENDENCE 65
The Duchy received from Napoleon a Constitu
tion modelled on that of France and the Napoleonic
Code. De Montallivet in his " Expose de la situa
tion de l'Empire," on December 1, 1809, said:
" It would have been easy for the Emperor to
unite the whole of Galicia to, the Duchy of Warsaw.
He did not wish to do, anything, however, to, arouse
fears in the mind of his Ally, the Emperor of
Russia. . . . His Majesty had never contemplated
the re -establishment of the Kingdom1 of Poland."
On October 20, 1809, |M. de Champagny, the Minister
for Foreign Affairs, wrote in an official note :
" The Emperor not only, wishes to do nothing which
will encourage the idea of the rebirth of Poland,
but he is disposed to join with the Emperor
Alexander in doing everything tending to efface her
memory from the hearts of her aforetime subjects.
His Majesty wishes that the names ' Poland ' and
' Pole ' should disappear, not only from all political
transactions, but also from the pages of history."
Kosciuszko, the great hero of 1794, never had
any confidence in the promises made in Berlin in
1806. He remained quiescent during the whole
time the Duchy was in existence, hoping, longing,
watching for the ray, of light which would soon, he
believed, regild the ancient shield of national inde
pendence. He went to the Congress of Vienna;
he exhorted Alexander ; he reminded him of his
promises— and death spared him the bitter know
ledge of blasted hopes.
On February 18, 1813, the Russians entered

66 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
Warsaw in pursuit of the French army, and those
who had based their hopes on Alexander felt that
here was their opportunity. Prince Czartoryski,
friend and minister of the Emperor of Russia,
reopened the negotiations first set on foot in 1806,
to receive once more the assurance that the Tsar
had not abandoned his favourite scheme for the
restoration of Poland. Replying to a letter of
Kosciuszko, he said to that veteran : " I hope to
bring about the regeneration of your brave nation.
... To that end I have taken a solemn oath. . . .
Very soon the Poles will recover their fatherland
and their name." After reviewing the remnant of
the Polish army on the plain of St. Denis, he said
to the Polish officers : " Sirs, we have learnt to
admire you on the field of battle. That hostility
which has too long endured between the two nations
should sunder them no longer. I love and esteem
your country : you do well to recall her children
to her from among the nations. You deserve to
be happy. To attain that end I will employ all the
power that God has given me."
In December 1814 the Grand Duke Constantin
issued a proclamation to the Polish troops : " His
Majesty, the Emperor Alexander, calls you ! Arm
yourselves to defend your fatherland and to
maintain your political existence ! "
Frederic Gentz, one of the principal actors in
that Vanity Fair, the Congress of Vienna, said :
" Those who, at the time of the Congress, were
able to recognize the precise nature of its objects

FOR INDEPENDENCE 67
could have no illusions as to its result. The recon
struction of the social order, the regeneration of
the political system of Europe, the establishment
of a just and abiding peace— high-flown phrases
such as these were declaimed to satisfy the people's
ears, to give dignity, and grandeur to this solemn
assembly. The real result of the Congress, how
ever, was the distribution of the spoils among the
conquerors." The question of Poland was discussed among
others. Much was said. Poland had been seized —
the whole world wished to, see her free. Rut
Hardenberg (Prussia) asked for a part of the
Duchy on behalf of his master. Nesselrode, in his
turn, claimed the whole of it for Russia. Metter-
nich declared that the Duchy had not been
conquered by the Russians alone ; that the Austrian
armies had assisted in the struggle ; that they
could not concede the right to Russia to indemnify,
herself thus, especially in the face of the Tsar's
declaration that it should not be treated as a con
quered country. He asserted that he could not
give up the provinces which had formed a part of
Austria, and that in any case the revival of the name
of Poland would be a peril in itself and a direct
contravention of all the treaties. Hardenberg
vociferated that Prussia certainly would not consent
to the restoration of Poland. Castlereagh, on the
other hand, said that the restoration of the country,
would meet with the approval of the English
Parliament, but only on condition of its complete

68 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
independence. A Poland curbed and subordinated
to Russia, a vassal State, could not be tolerated.
In a celebrated conversation between Alexander
and Talleyrand, there was some interesting word
play between the two accomplished diplomatists.
" At Paris," began the Tsar, " you believe in a
Kingdom of Poland. How is it that you have
changed your mind?" "My, mind, sire," replied
Talleyrand, " is still the same. At Paris we only
thought of the restoration of the whole of Poland.
I believed then, as I believe now, in her independence
— but to-day you speak of quite a different question.
. . ." Then Alexander made answer : " I have two
hundred thousand men in the Duchy of Warsaw.
Would you take them away, from me? I have
nothing to do, with your international law. I don't
know what it means. What do you think I care for
all your parchments and all your treaties?"1
Once again the result for Poland was a partition.
Austria took districts of Eastern Galicia, ceded to
the Grand Duchy of Warsaw in 1809 and ,1810,
giving up Western Galicia, which she had possessed
from 1795 to 1809. Prussia gave up that part of
Poland constituted as the Duchy, of Warsaw in
1807, except those territories known henceforth
under the name of the Grand Duchy of Posen.
Prussia and Austria recognized the Constitution of
the Kingdom of Poland, having a distinct adminis
tration, but owning the Emperor of Russia as
Sovereign. Cracow became a free neutral town.
1 " Memoires de Talleyrand " (Broglie edition), vol. ii.
p. 392-3.

FOR INDEPENDENCE 69
Thus the new State of Poland was formed, under
the title of the Kingdom of the Congress. It
consisted of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, reft of
its provinces of Posen and Gniezno ; of the Gali
cian territories ; of the town of Cracow and its
environs— in short, it was a Poland shorn of two
and a half millions of Poles !
The related clauses contained in the Treaty
of Vienna are very interesting. They provided for
a free Constitution, a distinct administration, and an
" interior extension "—a phrase which has been
taken to mean the expansion of the autonomy of
Poland over the Lithuanian provinces ; among the
Poles it roused a feeling of gratitude so general and
deep that the veteran Kosciuszko wrote to the
Emperor dedicating the rest of his life to his service.
On November 27th Alexander signed the new
Constitution at Warsaw. Liberty seemed its key
note. Liberty of the press, liberty, for the individual,
liberties of all kinds were promised. All the Acts
passed were to be in Polish ; all the officials were
to be Poles ; so, too, should be the Council of
State, composed of all the ministers, assisted by,
an Imperial Commissioner, Novossiltzoff. The com
mand of the troops was to be entrusted to the
Grand Duke Constantin.
This man, one of the two Russians directly,
concerned in the administration of the country,
was moved by violent impulses, unreasoning and
brutal, often seemingly mad ; but at the same time
he was capable of noble sentiments and national

70 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
ideas. He hated the country, its inhabitants, and,
above all, its Constitution. Yet, running counter
to all the prejudices of such a nature as his, even
against his will, irresistible attractions drew him
to civilized Poland and its womenkind. He was
scarcely installed at Warsaw when Czartoryski
wrote to the Emperor : " He heaps ridicule on all
law and order. . . . He even wishes to rule the
army by the might of his arm." Before long the
soldiers began to desert ; many officers resigned
or committed suicide. But the gloomy Novossiltzoff,
the old friend of Alexander, was there to watch
over the kingdom, and once more the idea of
a Poland reunited to Russia came into existence
when he began to organize at Warsaw a secret
service police, and covered Poland and Lithuania
with a network of spies. The cost of this police
service reached 500,000 Polish florins yearly.
The Poles now demanded that the Constitution
to which they had sworn allegiance should be
faithfully carried out into practice. Deceived in
its legitimate hopes, the nation defended itself by
the creation of secret societies. These societies were
so little revolutionary that they included in their
membership many soldiers of high rank, such as
Lieutenant-Colonels Krzyzanovski and Pradzynski
and Major Walerian Lukasinski. At Vilna there
flourished a society called the " Philaretes," which
numbered among its members the future national
poet Adam Mickiewicz.
One of the most noble characters of this time,

FOR INDEPENDENCE 71
Lukasinski, a hero of Plutarch, represents the very
incarnation of Poland's soul. Thrown into the
dungeons of Warsaw by Novossiltzoff after the flight
of Constantin, he was a little later chained to a
cannon and dragged through the plains of Russia,
only to be thrust into the dark cave of Schlissel-
burg ; there he suffered for thirty-eight long years,
losing sight and hearing, and there he died.
At the opening of the first Diet of the kingdom
in 1818, Alexander, speaking in French, said : " You
have given me the opportunity of showing to
my country what I have long been preparing for
her. . . ." This was regarded as the forecast of
a Constitution for the Russian Empire, but the
hope was built on sand.
Soon the atmosphere of the Diet became insup
portable. Supporters of the Constitution were
subjected to persecution. Alexander, speaking
through his minister, made it known that, as the
author of the Constitution, he alone could interpret
it ; and having made his attitude on this point
clear, he did not again convene the Diet. In 1825
its proceedings were secret, except for the opening
and closing sittings. Then the brothers Niemo-
jowski, the principal constitutionalists of the
kingdom, were arrested and their election quashed,
the right of electing deputies for the palatinate of
Kalisz was suppressed, and the work of the Diet
became the business of the ministers alone.
After the death of Alexander a revolution under
the cegis of the " Decembrists " broke out in

72 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
Petersburg. The new Emperor, Nicolas, instituted
a Commission of Inquiry, and it was discovered
that the National Patriotic Society had been for
a short time in correspondence with visionaries
among the Russian nobles. Still, Novossiltzoff's
efforts were not very productive, since only, eight
persons appeared before the High Court ; and even
they were acquitted after long detention, except
one condemned to criminal punishment for his
refusal to reveal the Russian plot. Nicolas
" promised and swore before God " to observe the
Act of Constitution.
But after the death of the viceroy Zajaczek in
1826, against the letter of the Constitution he com
bined, in the person of his brother-in-law Constantin,
the two offices of Lieutenant of the Kingdom and
Commander-in-Chief of the Army. Constantin had
no use for the Diet. "The tongues will begin to
wag again," he said. " They shall be cut."
The Diet was summoned for May 20, 1830.
Nicolas, who, like his predecessor, disliked the
Napoleonic Code, looking on the conqueror himself
as the satanic offspring of the French Revolution,
opened it in person, but found the deputies opposed
to his schemes for its alteration. A breath of revo
lutionary patriotism passed through the country,
uniting Vilna and Warsaw and extending even to
Kalisz, where Wincenty Niemojowski, the constitu
tionalist, meditated in a dungeon upon the articles
granted by the Emperor of Russia to the Kingdom1
of Poland — articles countersigned by the Powers at

FOR INDEPENDENCE 73
the Congress of Vienna. Every class of society
acclaimed the wonderful poem of Adam Mickie-
wicz, "Konrad Wallenrod." This mighty song
made the hearts of the people beat as one :
especially did it strike a responsive chord in the
soul of youth. In every breath the cry of Alfieri
vibrated : " Siamo Schiavi ma schiavi sempre fre-
menti " (" We are slaves quivering under our
yoke"). At that moment the revolution of 1830
broke out in Paris, the whole world looking on
with breathless interest. The people who had been
subdued by the Treaty of Vienna trembled. The
sight of the tricolour floating over the French
Consulate in Warsaw made the heart of every Pole
beat high With hope— hope mingled with indigna
tion. Nicolas I, strong in the principle of legiti
macy, that rock on Which was built the fortress
of the Holy Alliance, and burning with a desire
to strike at the heart of the Revolution — following
the traditions of his grandmother Catherine, made
energetic preparations for war. He ordered that
the army of Poland should hold itself in readiness
to march, the van^guard against the French
Republic. On January 15, 1831, Lafayette, speaking
in the Chamber of Deputies, said : " Gentlemen,
war was prepared against us. Poland was to form
the advance guard : the advance guard has turned
against the army corps. Is any one astonished that
this advance guard should excite our loyalty, our
gratitude, our sympathy?"
The revolution broke out on the 29th of

74 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
November. It was demanded of Nicolas that he
should observe the Constitution, but his reply made
it clear that he placed under the ban of disgrace
those subjects who dared to propose conditions to
their legitimate sovereign. He himself made certain
the support of Prussia and Austria. The die was
cast — and the fortunes of war were against the
revolutionaries. England did not wish to embroil
herself with Russia ; opinion in France was divided.
Casimir Perier came into power on March 15, 1831,
and Nicolas, Who had reverted to his old prejudices
against the monarchy, made it known that he would
graciously receive Monsieur de Mortemart as
Ambassador at Petersburg.
After a war lasting nine months the Polish forces
were dispersed, and on September 8th the Russians
occupied Warsaw. Paskiewicz, the Russian general,
writing to the Tsar, said : " Sire, Warsaw is at our
feet." This message, so sorrow-laden for Polish
hearts, sent from the desolate banks of the Vistula,
found a mournful echo on the banks of the Seine,
in the stern words of the minister Sebastiani :
" Order reigns in Warsaw."
The insurrection of 1830-31 was crushed, and
the Polish" troopsTeft the kingdom, to be disarmed
in Prussian or Austrian territory ; and the capitula
tion of Warsaw was followed a month later by
the surrender of the fortresses of Modlin and
Zamosc. The Russian Government issued an
amnesty, which granted pardon to the Polish com
batants, but as soon as they began to return to their

FOR INDEPENDENCE 75
country there was a movement to incorporate them
in Russian regiments. "Those who were part of
the command," wrote Nicolas I to his lieutenant,
General Paskiewicz, "will be sent to Yaroslave. As
to the canaille, dispatch them to Vologda." Accord
ingly the ordinary, soldiers were sent to the distant
provinces of the East, to the Caucasus, among the
Tartars, towards the Chinese frontier. The High
Court condemned to death, on their non-appearance,
258 persons, refugees in France, Germany, and Eng
land ; but this sentence was afterwards commuted,
in 1834, to exile for life. The Tsar always paid
more attention to the future than to the past, to
means of prevention rather than of chastisement, and
this was evidenced by the stern measures which now
followed. The Constitution was suppressed ; one-
tenth of the property of the Polish landowners was
confiscated ; a state of war was declared, which
lasted for twenty -two years ; the Universities of
Vilna and Warsaw and the Scientific Society of the
latter city were closed, the same decree affecting
the College of Krzemieniec ; the libraries were sent
to Russia to be distributed among the provincial
universities ; the number of schools in Warsaw
dwindled between 1830 and 1847 to twenty-three,
in spite of the fact that the population numbered
over twenty thousand ; the reading of the works
of such authors as Mickiewicz, Slowacki, Krasinski,
and Lelewel was strictly proscribed — it was for
bidden even to mention their names in public. This
state of affairs existed for nearly seventy years..

76 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
Even as late as 1905 the theatre of Warsaw pro
duced " Mazepa," the beautiful tragedy of Slowacki,
as the work of an unknown "J. S." In 1900
authority had not been gained for the publication
of the biography of the great national historian
Lelewel. The Government ordered the state of the lesser
nobility to be reduced to that of peasants, and they
themselves deported into the Caucasus. The exe
cution of this order was begun with five thousand
families from Podolia, but the Tsar soon extended
it to forty thousand others from the north and south
west. Still, in the midst of repression, of suffer
ing, of trials innumerable, the spirit of Poland
remained undaunted. Reaten down, the fire of
freedom still glowed. Thousands of Roles had emi
grated : they drifted towards France and England.
Officers, soldiers, Government officials, members of
the Diet, aristocrats, people of the upper and middle
classes and peasants — there, in the land of France,
was a Polish nation in miniature. This pilgrimage
through Europe was no mournful journey to the
grave, but a triumphal march, for these enthusiastic
spirits, among whom was found the greatest poet
Who has ever adorned the pages of Polish literature,
drew the sympathies of the noblest intellects of
the age. Lafayette, Montalembert, and many others
in France gave them their protection. The greater
the misery in their own country grew, the sadder
life became in reality, the purer became the source
of their inspiration. Not only painters and poets,

FOR INDEPENDENCE 77
but men pf action felt this uplifting influence. The
old Poland was no more than a burying-ground :
they were now reconstructing a new Poland, a
fortress impregnable, a city of God. They had
kindled a new enthusiasm in the life of the soul,
a spirit of sacrifice and abnegation, and in its sacred
flame they would remould their poetical inspira
tion, and with its aid mount nearer to the lofty peaks
of immortal beauty. Their works were the heavenly
manna, the spiritual food of whole generations.
Documents are in existence which describe the way
in which the Poles deported to Siberia welcomed
the poems of the great national poet, Adam
Mickiewicz. His "Master Thaddeus" became a very
fount of life. " Improvization " was the vade
mecum of youth. It was circulated throughout the
country in the face of the gravest dangers ; it was
carried as a sacred relic ; it was copied and re-
copied thousands of times. Whole generations knew
it by heart ; it became part of their blood, and pulsed
like a living wave through the life of the nation.
In this miniature Poland, a political life, in which
every class and opinion were represented, became
very active, and separate parties emerged. The
aristocracy grouped themselves round Prince Czar-
toryski, the democracy round the historian Lelewel.
Contrary to the policy of the Prince, who en
deavoured to reach the Government, Lelewel sought
to solve the Polish question by a direct appeal to
the people. Prince Czartoryski conferred in Paris
with the representatives of the Powers, while

78 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
Lelewel sent forth appeals to the Italians, to the
Hungarians, to the Spaniards. Their efforts were
rewarded with no success. In 1832 the Democratic
Society was founded, which proclaimed that the
salvation of Poland would not be achieved by an
insurrection alone, but that side by side with it
must run a social revolution. At the very outset
this society was in radical opposition to the aris
tocracy, on whom the democrats cast the whole
responsibility for the partition. The freedom of the
country could come solely from the people ; the
revolution of 1830 had failed because the rural
population had participated only to a minor extent
— so they said in effect, and found themselves in
agreement with the French democrats of the day.
Indeed, the Poles took an active part in all the
democratic and socialistic organizations in France.
The teaching of Enfantin, Cabet, and Fourier found
ready acceptance on the part of this historic people,
who, ever thirsting after liberty, had sworn to find
the means of attaining it. Lifting their eyes from
reality, from the things about them, only so far as
to make an appeal to the principles of justice and
equality, those fighting in the cause of Poland drew
nearer to the star-like course they had envisioned
for humanity.
Yielding to the pressure exercised by the repre
sentative of Russia, the French Government dis
persed the emigrants throughout the country. In
the cemeteries of the centre and south are many
Polish graves ; in that of Montmartre there is even

FOR INDEPENDENCE 79
a Polish Avenue, and there rest Slowacki, Bohdan-
Zaleski, and Lelewel ; while at Auxerre lies Moch-
nacki, the eminent historian of the insurrection of
1830. Montmorency, Avignon, Poitiers, Besancon,
and many other towns in France shelter in death
those visionaries whose descendants repaid France
for her hospitality to their fathers, when in 1870
they poured out their blood for her, and when
again 1914, 1915, and 1916 found them ready.
Before, however, they found eternal rest in the
cemeteries of France, these combatants in the cause
of liberty made frequent incursions into Poland.
They met with ill success, although they roused
fresh enthusiasm and gained new adherents ; but
the flame of hope was not kept alive without danger
to themselves, for Konarski died on the gallows,
Zaliwski, taken prisoner in Galicia, suffered in the
dungeons of Kuf stein.
The party Of Czartoryski did not repel in principle
the scheme of an insurrection to regain national
independence. It was opposed from the first to
a premature rising unsupported by the Powers :
to a rising Which had not every class of Polish1
society grouped around its standard. It considered
the nobility to be the support of the nation, and
for the future organization of the country it called
for monarchical government, and proposed to under
take, little by little, the necessary social reforms.
The democrats could not limit themselves to the
mere propagation of theories : they desired to trans
late these into action. The revolution of 1816 had

80 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
been their work, and although they could not but re
gard it as in some degree premature, the active circles
of Cracow and Posen were, on the other hand, of
a different opinion. Composed of young and ardent
spirits, these latter called for the immediate realiza
tion of the social revolution by means of a national
rebellion. Louis Mieroslawski, who was accounted
in revolutionary circles a strategist of genius, re
ceived the order that February 21, 1846, was the
day chosen for the uprising. Military chiefs were
nominated, a national Government created — all that
lacked were arms and soldiers ! On February 12th
the Prussian authorities arrested at Posen Louis
Mieroslawski, Libelt, and others of the conspirators.
In Poland a certain number of young men were
executed, but affairs took a still more tragic turn
in Cracow, which had been set up as a republic
by the Treaty of Vienna. There a national Govern
ment had been created, which in its turn had trans
mitted its powers to a dictator. By a manifesto
land and liberty had been given to the peasants,
and the organization of armed detachments had
begun ; but now all this ended in a manner un
foreseen and tragic. The insurgents saw the
Galician peasants rise against them.
Faithful to their motto : Divide et impera
("Divide and conquer"), the Austrian Government
noised abroad by means of its officials the rumour
that the landowners were arming themselves to
snatch from the peasants their rights and liberties.
For Metternich was the decision— with what

FOR INDEPENDENCE 81
weapon should he crush the Polish revolution? A
new Feast of St. Rartholomew ! At Tarnow the
movement was under the direction of the prefect
Rreindl von WaUerstein, who paid ten florins for
the head of a dead insurgent, five for one taken
alive. A miserable peasant named Szela actually,
killed seventeen members of a family called
Bogusz. When a survivor of this butchery
addressed a petition to the Emperor the latter
replied by a decree dated August 5, 1847 :
" Desiring to show a special mark of our favour
for his proof of fidelity to our throne and wishing
to reward the loyal conduct of our trusty and well-
beloved Szela in the events which have taken place
in Galicia during the past year ... we grant him
the grand medal of honour in gold, bearing the
inscription Well deserved."
Austrian, German, Czech, and Hungarian
officials, disguised as peasants, took command of
the bands who attacked the manor-houses, and
killed with scythes unarmed men. No less than
two thousand perished in this terrible year at the
hands of the miserable Galician peasantry.
By the terms of a treaty, drawn up at Berlin,
between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, the Repub
lic of Cracow ceased to exist, and was incorporated
with Austria under the name of! the Grand Duchy
of Cracow.
The French Revolution of 1848 gave occasion
for a new effort on the part of Poland. The
civilized world shook to its foundations, and Polish

82 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
hearts beat the faster. For, allied with all
oppressed peoples, the Poles had never been satis
fied to fight only for themselves, but in all the
European revolutions they had taken an active part ;
and wherever despotism reared its head there were
they found in arms against it. They lent their
blood and their lives to the sacred cause of liberty,
confident that in the triumph of this ideal would
lie the resurrection of their country. When the
revolution broke out in 1848 at Milan, Adam
Mickiewicz, the great national poet, formed a Polish
legion, which fought for the independence of Italy,
feeling assured that this was but another step
towards clearing the way for the enfranchisement
of their own land. In the well-known picture at the
Sorbonne, where Michelet and Quinet occupy in
triumph the chairs which became theirs on the
retirement of the Government of July, a third chair
is empty : it was destined for Mickiewicz, then
fighting in Milan and Rome for the freedom of Italy.
The Russian Government was able to profit by
the experience of the revolution of Cracow, as it
did by the propaganda of the Abb6 Sciegienny.
It issued an edict assuring to peasants established
on a holding of more than three morgues the
ownership of that holding. An inventory was made
of all the taxes. The Government said to the
peasants : " I am your defender." It is at this
moment that the Russian official steps in between
the landed proprietor and the peasant.
The Crimean War made no great impression on

FOR INDEPENDENCE 83
the kingdom. The country was strangled, and its
revolutionary energy sensibly weakened.
After the death of the Emperor Nicolas, Russia,
as well as Poland, expected an era of reform, both
in political and social questions. This was evi
denced when, in the year 1856, Warsaw received
a visit from the Emperor Alexander II, who, while
cordially acclaimed, was at the same time shown
what high hopes rested on him. He can hardly
be said to have justified these hopes by his
announcement : " Gentlemen, no dreams ! Every
thing done by my father was well done." Yet
through all discouragement Poland persisted,
expectant of the new era.
The principle of nationality introduced into
politics by Napoleon III once more awakened in
the Poles their hope of independence. Portentous
struggles were in progress on the plains of Lom-
bardy, and the fire that had died down to no more
than glowing ashes revived. There was an out
burst of patriotism— the heart of youth was aroused !
Garibaldi was regarded almost as a national hero,
and to aid his gallant countrymen the young men
of the universities, especially the students at Kieff,
departed in a body by circuitous routes to the shores
of Italy to fight for her liberty and unity. Several
thousand Poles deserted the Russian universities
for the same purpose ; from Warsaw there went
the scholars of the higher grade schools, the Art
School, the Academy of Surgeons, and the Agro
nomic Institute. The tradition of Kilinski, that

84 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
heroic shoemaker who shared the destinies of
Kosciuszko, was still alive among the working-
classes of Poland.
The unity of Italy was achieved — what was there
to hinder the reconstitution of dismembered Poland ?
The battles of Magenta and Solferino were
celebrated in Warsaw: as if they had been
triumphs of Polish arms. France was relied
upon to give her aid ; and was not Napoleon the
dictator of European diplomacy? Patriotic demon
strations took place in the capital, and this
example was quickly followed in the provinces ;
people gathered in the churches to sing the national
hymns, which soon were on every tongue. The
Society of Agriculture, under the presidency, of
Count Andre Zamoyski, sought to bring about in
Poland what had just been achieved by the
Russian Government : if not the complete enfran
chisement of the peasants, free since 1807, at least
such an improvement in their lot as would knit
together the whole nation in the same patriotic
movement. In 1860 the Society determined to
study the ways in which the peasants could
become proprietors, but the Minister of the In
terior, Mouchanow, forbade them to carry, on the
work. In February 1861', at a patriotic mani
festation in Warsaw, an assembly of a thousand
declared unanimously, that serfdom must be
abolished. That this project should be entertained
proved the radical difference between the Polish
landowners and the corresponding class in Russia,

FOR INDEPENDENCE 85
who were represented on the Commission brought
together by the Government, but who did every
thing they could to counteract and paralyse the
humanitarian schemes of Alexander II.
The spirit of patriotism, an atmosphere charged
with emotion and the need for sacrifice— these
worked on the minds of the Polish landowners.1
On February 25th the demonstration left the
church, and flowed out into the street, there to be
met by an armed force ; and two days later a
crowd assembled for similar purposes was fired
upon by the military, five people being killed.
Indignation was general— indeed, several Russian
officers of the garrison in Warsaw raised a protest
against this massacre of a defenceless mob, against
a fire obviously directed on women and children
and on priests carrying the cross. One of them
went so far as to place himself in front of his
company, and, to give sufficient force to his protest,
actually committed suicide. Another went through
the town to obtain signatures to a petition to the
Emperor. " Our nation," so ran the address, " which
through centuries enjoyed liberal institutions,
for more than sixty years nowi has endured the
cruellest sufferings. No means exist by which
the story of these sufferings may, be brought to the
1 At this time there were active preparations in Russia for
the emancipation of the peasants. Alexander II, speaking to
the nobles of Lithuania on November 20, 1857, asked them
to consider a means for bettering the condition of the peasants.
The Lithuanian landowners, by a large majority, declared for
the abolition of serfdom.

86 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
steps of the Throne ; the bitter cry which goes up
may not make itself heard except through the
voice of the martyrs, a holocaust offered daily.
A country whose civilization is already on a par
with that of her Western neighbours should be
able to develop herself on a moral, not material,
basis ; to the end that her Church, her legislation,
her public instruction, and the whole of her social
organization should not be incapable of upholding
her national genius and the great historic traditions
of the past."
In reply to this address, which was supported
by Prince Gortschakoff, the Government of St.
Petersburg decided to grant Poland administrative
and scholastic reforms, the execution of which was
entrusted to one of the great Polish landlords, the
Marquis Wielopolski. A department of public in
struction was at once founded, and borough and
municipal councils were established. Wielopolski
longed for the powers of the 1815 Constitution.
He was not popular — he could not well be ! Of
an arbitrary nature, and lacking in tact, he believed
in the might of his own arm, and had never learned
to steer a safe course between the Russia who wished
to give as little as possible and that Poland who
demanded above all her liberty. Still, the Marquis
during the time he was in power did much. He
first created an educational system peculiarly Polish
by virtue of the spirit which animated it, and yet
entirely European in its pedagogic tendencies. A
special commission, composed of the most dis-

FOR INDEPENDENCE 87
tinguished Russian teachers, made it the subject
of a long discussion at St. Petersburg, and could
not withhold their admiration. On May 16, 1861,
Wielopolski also succeeded in obtaining a decree
regulating the repurchase of lands belonging to the
peasants. But the Poles, preoccupied by the idea of
European intervention, could hardly be content with
an educational system. They were all the more
determined since, not only was Wielopolski at
Warsaw, but associated with him was General
Suchozanet, who made no mention of educational
reform, and remained faithful to the policy of
reprisals. The revolutionary movement took firmer and
firmer hold on the people, and before long scenes
like those which had taken place in Warsaw were
enacted in Vilna. It was strangely ironic that, by
applying the same system of repression to all these
provinces, Russia should to some extent seal that
very unity of the Polish nation which she had set
herself to destroy. An official proclamation spoke
of Lithuania, the home of Kosciuszko and Mickie
wicz, as a province that had always belonged to
the Russian Empire and had been united to Poland
only for a short period.
In connection with the nomination of members
to the provincial and district councils at the end
of September, the electors made their wishes known
by signing two petitions, one demanding national
representation, the other, seeking equal rights for

88 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
the Jews. The two petitions should have reached
the Lieutenant of the Emperor on October 18th,
but on the 14th, rumours of this move having
reached official circles, and an agitation at the same
time manifesting itself in the Empire concerning
the Universities of St. Petersburg and Moscow, the
Lieutenant declared a state of siege.
On the 15th of October there was to have been
a demonstration in memory of Kosciuszko. The
population proceeded to the churches. The troops
did not prevent any one from entering. But once
the churches were filled, the army received the order
to surround them. The crowd refused to come out ;
they stayed in the churches the whole day and
part of th,e night, excited, hungry, but immovable.
When ordered to quit the house of God, they de
manded first of all the withdrawal of the troops.
At four o'clock in the morning, after a siege
of seventeen hours, the soldiers rushed into the
cathedral. More than two thousand people were
arrested and conducted to the citadel. In the
morning an incredible scene took place between
General Guerstenzweig, Military Commander of
Warsaw, and Count Lambert, the Emperor's Lieu
tenant. The former was responsible for the invasion
of the churches by the troops, the latter protested
against this measure, which would range all the
clergy, of the country in the ranks of the implacable
enemies of the Government. After a most exciting
scene, the General blew out his brains, and Count
Lambert left Warsaw, suddenly, never to return.

FOR INDEPENDENCE 89
Wielopolski immediately sent in his resignation,
not daring to carry through his reforms in face
of the prevailing conditions. In June 1862 a
National Central Committee, afterwards the National
Government, came into existence, receiving the name
of the Red Committee in opposition to the White
Committee. Both were faithful to the same ideal
and worked with the same aim in view — the re
constitution of Poland. They differed, however, in
mode of action ; for while the Red Committee held
that the only way of salvation was by the path of
rebellion, the White Committee wished above all
things to attain its end peacefully. The Red
Committee acted in conjunction with the Parisian
Committee, and through that body with the Military,
School of Cuneo, where officers became cognisant
of the next insurrectional movement.
During this time Wielopolski was trying at St.
Petersburg to bring home to the Emperor the only
means by which Poland could be pacificated : by
a radical reform in the method of administration,
Foreseeing the probability of an outbreak during
the spring of 1863, in which Poles and Russians
might join forces, the Russian Government resolved
to avert this potential uprising by promptly dealing
with Poland. A humbled Poland would make much
easier the path of repression in Russia, and the
first step should be a levy of Polish recruits.
Wielopolski became the instrument of this policy,
and decided that the levy should take place on
January. 22nd. But on learning the news the young

90 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
men fled with one accord to the forests. They
formed themselves into detachments, and the Central
Committee, without fixing the actual date of the
rising, on January 16th declared a state of rebellion.
The leaders of the insurrection, however, warned
the Committee on the 17th that they could not
long defer the date, for fear of a spontaneous but
premature outburst, which could only end in failure.
In accordance with this warning the Committee de
cided upon the night of January 22nd-23rd as the
moment for action.
There were at this time about 85,000 Russian
troops in Poland, yet the insurgents were able to
hold out against them for a year and a half —
in certain districts until 1865. During the eighteen
months the rebellion was in progress nearly a
thousand encounters took place between the Prosna
and the Dnieper ; at the end of the third month
the movement had extended to Lithuania, to White
Russia, and to the South-West Province. Many
of the detachments were commanded by officers
who, but a short time before, had been serving
in the ranks of the Russian Army ; such a Russian,
for instance, as Potebnia, the friend of Herzen ;
such a Frenchman as Rochebrun ; such an Italian
as Nullo. The insurgents, chiefly of the younger
generation (indeed, it may be said that the youth
of the schools without distinction of class enrolled
themselves under the banner of insurrection), were
drawn in the main from the lesser nobles and the
middle classes, but the movement attracted the

FOR INDEPENDENCE 91
artisans, the workers, many miners from the coal
fields of the south, and a fair number of peasants,
as those in the Lithuanian detachments of Siera-
kowski, though they were proportionally least
numerous. It has been maintained by many Russian
historians that the peasants were altogether opposed
to the insurrection ; as a matter of fact it could
never have lasted so long without their goodwill.
After the Central Committee had become the
National Government, it published a manifesto con
taining this declaration of faith : " All the sons
of Poland shall be free, all shall be equal, and the
land occupied by the peasants shall belong to them
henceforth without restrictions." Provision was
made, it may here be mentioned, for the compen
sation of the former owners.
The nature of this rebellion, its evolution, can
not be rightly understood by regarding it simply
from the standpoint either of Russia or of Poland.
A question of international politics was at stake —
a question which engaged the attention of the diplo
mats of Europe.
Prussia at that time was governed by Bismarck.
He realized that it was possible, and therefore to
him essential, to profit by the difficulties in which
Russia found herself engulfed. There was an
opportunity to further his own vast imperial
designs. To this end he made a private proposal to
the Russian Government, resulting in an agreement
which was concluded on February 8, 1863. The
object was to bring about the submission of Poland.

92 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
On February 11th he informed the British Ambas
sador, Sir Andrew, Buchanan, of the arrangement.
"What?" protested the latter. "Prussia co
operate with Russia to crush the Polish insurrec
tion? Will Prussian soldiers, then, be sent against
Poland?" " Yes," said Bismarck. " The resurrection of the
Kingdom of Poland is detrimental to Prussia. . . .
The insurrection will be promptly crushed in con
cert with Russia, or if the situation develops and
becomes more serious — well, say that the Russians
were driven out of Poland — then we should occupy
that kingdom to the advantage of Prussia."
" But," replied the British Ambassador, amused
at these confidences, " Europe would never allow it."
With a glacial calm the Prussian Minister asked,
"Who is 'Europe'?"
" The different great nations," replied Sir Andrew.
"Are they all of one mind? " retorted the other.
The Ambassador dared not reply positively, but
stated that France would never tolerate a new
annihilation of Poland.
" For us," replied Bismarck, " this annihilation
is a matter of life and death."
At this time Bismarck stood alone in his alliance
with Russia. The whole of Europe was against
him : even his own Prussian Chambers opposed
him. And France? France, who had made war
with Italy, who had snatched Milan from the Habs-
burgs, who had favoured the monarchy of Victor-
Emmanuel, who had upheld the cause of the

FOR INDEPENDENCE 93
people, and sounded the clarion note of deliverance
for the nations to the very confines of the Ottoman
Empire — was it not incumbent upon her to inter
fere for the welfare of Poland?
Napoleon III accordingly sent a personal letter
to Alexander II, in Which he counselled him to
make Poland an independent kingdom, with the
Grand Duke Constantin as king. Certain of the
support of Prussia, the Tsar scouted this proposal.
The Court of the Tuilleries, supported by the
opinion of the country, thereupon undertook a diplo
matic campaign on a larger scale. On April 10th
the three Powers, England, France, and Austria,
addressed diplomatic notes to St. Petersburg, asking
Russia to re-establish Poland on such a basis as
would ensure a lasting peace. Lord John Russell
said : " The question is whether the engagements
into which Russia entered, and to which she set her
hand in the Treaty, of Vienna, have been faithfully
carried out by her. Her Majesty's Government
feels obhged to demand a reply to this question." ,
This demonstration was further supported by
notes from all the Powers who had appended their
signatures to the Treaty of Vienna — Spain, Portugal,
Italy, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Turkey,
and Saint Siege. Such an important demonstra
tion should have made itself felt throughout the
Whole of Europe, but once more it proved to be
a Case of the mountain in labour. The diplomatic
campaign dragged on and resulted in nothing !
Unhappy Poland ! Never before had the solici-

94 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
tude of Europe been so fruitless, indeed, even
detrimental, as it was for this hapless nation.
The triumph of Bismarck was complete. Sir
Andrew Buchanan, writing on November 28, 1863,
to Lord John Russell, said : " The events which
have taken place in Poland, in spite of the reproof
of the three Great Powers, have led the Germans
to believe that no one will oppose their arms in
the work of the spoliation of Denmark." The
success of Bismarck's schemes certain, there
followed the wars of 1864, 1866, and 1870.
Poland still struggled on, but against immense
odds. Russia, with public opinion on the side of the
Government, had 120,000 soldiers in the country ;
Mouravieff was proclaimed an archangel Michael
of Holy Russia, and the war upon which he entered
was declared " Holy."
In the month of April Monseigneur Felinski,
Archbishop of Warsaw, addressed his celebrated
letter to the Emperor : " Blood is flowing in streams,
and affliction, instead of lowering the spirits of
the combatants, serves but to endue them with a
sterner resolve. I entreat your Majesty in the name
of Christian charity, in the interests of both coun
tries to put an end to this war of annihilation. The
institutions granted by your Majesty are not
sufficient to ensure the happiness of the country.
Poland will not be content with an administrative
autonomy ; she needs a political life of her own.
Sire, take up this cause with a strong hand. Make
of Poland an independent nation, united to Russia

FOR INDEPENDENCE 95
by the bond of your august family. It is the only
way to stop this shedding of blood, and to establish
an abiding peace. Time is pressing. Every day
the chasm between the Throne and the nation be
comes wider. Sire, do not wait for the end of the
struggle. There is a greater grandeur in clemency,
which recoils in the face of such carnage than
in a victory which wipes out the inhabitants of a
kingdom." But his was a voice crying in the wilderness.
Mouravieff was dictator of Lithuania, and at once
showed his hand. Insurgents who had been taken
prisoners were brought before him on his arrival
at the first town in his jurisdiction. " It is useless
to take prisoners," was his order. A few days
later he issued a circular which, in brief, declared :
All sympathy with the insurrection would be
punished in the same way as a direct participa
tion ; mourning was prohibited, and women who
wore black would be punished ; the names of the
insurgents, the composition of the bands, and the
name of their chief must all be revealed without
any consideration whatsoever of kinship ; if a
murder were committed, or the insurgents procured
provisions in any place, all its inhabitants would
be held responsible. Each of these offences was
punishable by death, exile to Siberia, confiscation
of property. To the peasants Mouravieff declared :
" Peasants, you are no longer obliged to work for
your lord — try to destroy the rebels' means of liveli
hood. If any passer-by seems to you a suspicious

96 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
character, have him arrested. Hitherto evil-inten-
tioned persons, either priests or landlords, have
obtained mastery over you ; now shake this off.
Do not permit a priest to profane his church by
reading proclamations subversive to law and order."
Mouravieff, utterly without pity towards priests
and nobles, gave orders that presbyteries and castles
should be given to the flames. To strike terror,
into all hearts he sent innocent people to the gallows,
filled the prisons with his victims, and dispatched
other unfortunates to the distant provinces of the
Empire. He had all the libraries kept in the
cloisters and in the colleges confiscated. The books
seized from twenty-six cloisters, twenty -two colleges,
twenty-six high-grade schools, and twelve libraries,
public and private, were brought to Vilna and de
posited in a Public Library, the Polish department
of which was not in use at all till 1905. At the
present time this library contains 125,000 Polish
volumes, 329 Slav manuscripts, 2,360 Polish manu
scripts, and 65,000 letters, altogether nearly 130,000
manuscript documents, 165 early printed books, and
583 books printed in the sixteenth century. Orders
were issued for the closing of the astronomical
observatory at Vilna, and the printing of books
was prohibited in Lithuania.
At Warsaw General Berg pursued similar tactics.
In June Wielopolski was dismissed and the Grand
Duke Constantin recalled. Then, following the
example of Mouravieff, who had ordered the public
execution of 200 prisoners, Berg executed the

FOR INDEPENDENCE 97
insurgents in the streets of Warsaw ; he imposed
a special fine upon the people for outrages against
the police ; he gave into the hands of the chiefs
of the district powers of life and death over the
nobles of the country. To put an end to the possi
bility of a new rising, it was decided to introduce
what has been called peasant reform. Previous
mention has been made of what had already been
attempted in this direction.
Katkoff maintained that the Polish question would
be solved in a manner favourable to Russia if once
the peasant population were won over to her side ;
that whoever brought about such a consummation
would be master of the country. Accordingly in
October 1863 the Government sent to Warsaw a
Commission, composed of such men as Milioutine,
Samarine, and Tscherkasski, charged to elaborate
a plan of reforms by which the peasants' support
should be gained.
Like all Slavophiles, they were under the impres
sion that the chief obstacle to an agreement between
the Poles and the Russians was the Latin culture
with which the ruling classes were deeply imbued.
To bring the mass of the people of Poland under
the spell of the so-called Slav tradition, the influence
of the ruling classes must be removed, and the
people emancipated both morally and materially.
The peasants were therefore made the owners of
the houses and lands which up to that time they
had held only as tenants, and this at the expense
of the landlords, except for the payment of a very
7

98 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
small indemnity, ground rents and forced labour
being abolished altogether. Thus it was intended
to remove the common people from the sphere of
influence of the priest and the lord. Not only this,
but the ancient rights were so arranged as to be
productive of discord between lord and peasant,
and in these disputes the Russian administration
invariably arbitrated. The peasants further re
tained the right of easements, this right being under
the care of eighty-five new officials called Rural
Commissioners, and the landlords received their
indemnification in the form of duties. Where the
expense of the reform fell heavily upon the peasants,
a land tax was forced upon them, which they had
paid for forty years without any modification.
The Abbe Lamennais, in his " Hymn to Poland,"
dated Rome, April 1832, uttered these words :
" Sleep on, O Poland, sleep ! That resting-place
they call thy tomb is but thy cradle ! " In keeping
with these prophetic words the struggle for liberty
raged in Poland throughout the nineteenth century,
to end invariably in defeat. In 1831, 1846, 1863,
and as late as 1906, the dreams of the nation soared
— borne upwards on the pinions of the mighty
victory of Marathon, only to be shattered in disaster
as at Cheronsea.
The rising of 1830 was a revolution of nobles,
of the army, of men of letters, and the same may
be said of 1846 ; but in 1863 a new element,
furnished by the towns, came into force, when the
lesser nobles, the middle classes, the younger gene-

FOR INDEPENDENCE 99
ration of both, and of the artisans of Warsaw, all
took their part. It was more than the blossoming
of the lilies placed on the tomb of 1830: out of
that sepulchre rose a presence new and strange —
democracy proclaiming the dawn of a new era.
It is true that many attempts were made to alienate
the peasant from the rest of the nation, to present
him to the civilized world as a disseminator of
discord, as a source of trouble and annoyance to
Europe. He was given a communal autonomy ;
officials were specially created to bring discord
between him and the rest of the nation ; schools
were founded for him, where the instruction was
given in Russian — and after forty years of this
regime 80 per cent, of the peasants could
neither read nor write ! In our epoch there has
emerged in every country a new social type, which
may be designated the proletariat of the towns.
Poland, in her development, reveals this trend, and
possesses great industrial centres ; but even in
them there is a dearth of schools. Indeed, only
59 per cent, of the inhabitants of Warsaw are
acquainted with the alphabet.
Yet something of a miracle has occurred. The
peasant on the land, the artisan in the town, de
manded the liberation of their country. In the
communal institutions (where their representatives
settled their affairs, and from which the great land
owners were excluded ), in rural communities, every
where the peasants tore the official writings into
pieces. These men, although ignorant themselves,

100 POLAND'S STRUGGLE
required that the Polish language should be heard
once more in the schools and in the administration
of the country ; and not content even with this,
they drove away the teachers who were alien to
them in birth and sympathy. They declared, in
fact, that they would pay no tax so long as the
justice of their claims remained unacknowledged.
As in France, so everywhere in Poland, while the
workers claimed the rights of their class, they de
sired above all to see Poland free and independent,
under one form or another living her own political
life. All their aspirations grouped themselves round
the one word " Poland ! " Sleep no more, then,
O Poland ! Thy resting-place is not a tomb, but
a cradle !
The problem of Poland in the last analysis is
as simple as any of the great world truths. In
feeling and in civilization England and Poland
find mutually, a bond of union. By a heavenly
rainbow, one end of which rests on this fair
land, the other on the shores of the Vistula,
Poland is joined to England. On the arch "is traced
in letters of fire the watchword for which hearts
have suffered in Poland as in England throughout
all generations, the watchword of liberty. England,
country of the free ! give help to Poland, that she
may gain that freedom which both countries love,
that freedom for which she herself has struggled so
long !

THE POPULATION of THE
POLISH COMMONWEALTH BY
ARTHUR E. GURNEY
With a Preface by
LUDWIK JANOWSKI, M.A., Ph.D.
Lecturer on Slavonic Literatures at the University of Cracow

PREFACE
It is with the greatest satisfaction that I take the
opportunity of writing a few words of introduction
to Mr. A. E. Gurney's pamphlet. The author has
given to the British public a most accurate and at
the same time a very vivid account of the popula
tion of the former Polish Commonwealth, a nation
which notwithstanding its indisputable right to
existence, the world at large appears to have
forgotten. What, then, was this Commonwealth, which 120
years ago had to yield to superior forces, whose
very name was struck out from the map of
Europe? It was a first-class political Power, extremely
original in its structure, and in respect of its con
stitutional arrangements and progressive policy
much ahead of the other continental States.
To Great Britain alone and to her constitutional
development Poland must yield a place ; but though
the Polish Commonwealth did not possess such a
well -organized State machinery as this country, yet
she herself worked out quite independently her
own Habeas Corpus Act, her limitations of the
royal prerogative, a scheme of popular legis
lation, etc.
The real greatness of the Commonwealth was not
in the extent of her territories, which nevertheless
103

104 PREFACE
occupied a great part of the Mid-European plain,
but it was to be found in the fact that the union
of the different nationalities incorporated on her
territory was a Voluntary one. Since the fourteenth
century Poland, which had no natural eastern
boundaries, grew, not by way of conquests and
annexations, but through federations and voluntary
unions. The rich and healthy Polish State attracted
other nationalities, Which desired the benefit of
constitutional liberties, and absorbed Western civili
zation, which again radiated in return from Poland
far beyond her own frontiers. In the fourteenth
century Red Ruthenia (part of Galicia and Volhynia
of to-day) and Lithuania joined Poland, in the
fifteenth century Ducal Prussia, and in the sixteenth
Masovia and Livland followed their example, while
Moldavia, Curland, and Brandenburg (later Kingdom
of Prussia) acknowledged her sovereignly. These
new provinces joined Poland as autonomous units,
but they soon fell under the influence of her higher
civilization. The inhabitants of the new territories
clamoured for the introduction " of the good
Christian and liberal laws of the Polish Kingdom."
Owing to the voluntary and complete adoption of
the Polish social structure by these other nation
alities, they all assumed a uniform character and
formed a single Res publica extending from1 the
Baltic to the shores of the Black Sea.
The Poles were the creators of this State and
cemented together its different parts. The other
nations, the Lithuanians, the Germans, and numer
ous Eastern Slavonic nationalities, the Armenians
and the Tartars, took up the Polish civilization with
its progressive ideas. They undertook along with

PREFACE 105
the Poles the great historical task of the Common
wealth—viz. the defence of the West against the
East. In this free and federal State everybody,
spoke and wrote in whatever language he wished.1
Education made great progress. Side by side with
this political process, another development of a
sociological character was going on also and was
amalgamating all the different racial elements of
the Commonwealth into one national whole. We
know of a similar process in history. The Romans
ruled in Gallia during five centuries and Gallia was
Romanized. But this was not the result of a policy
of forcible denationalization, as is so often the case.
It was due to the higher development of Roman
civilization. If we bear in mind that Rome was a
centralizing State, while the Polish Commonwealth
was highly decentralized, we shall appreciate still
more the value of this process of natural amalga
mation and of the ideas of equality, and justice on
which it was based. The results of the union far,
o/itgrew the hopes of its founders. The amalgama
tion was the result of the common sacrifices and
endeavours of the population of the Commonwealth,
and it was strengthened by the constant and un
shakable will Which such common sacrifices pro
duce. In this way there grew up the idea of
common citizenship in a common State. This can
be seen even in those who could have had the
support of another State, as was the case of the
German burgesses of Dantzig, who nevertheless
1 In the greater part of the Eastern territory White
Ruthenian was the official language, but in time its use was
given up quite naturally in favour of Polish without any
pressure from the Government.

106 PREFACE
remained faithful to the Commonwealth till the
very end.
This process of amalgamation would have been
carried on had it not been for the external pres
sure of enemies and for the internal dissensions
brought about by the general disintegration of
Europe. The love of the great Polish mother country
mingled with the very blood of her sons, and
remained equally strong after the fall of the
Commonwealth. We see the astonishing fact that
a desire for the reconstruction of their famous
State which had made the happiness of so many
previous generations never ceased in any of its
former territories. In 1794, 1806, 1812, 1831, 1846,
1848, and 1863 the struggle for liberty was carried
on within all these ancient boundaries. And to-day
the Poles Who are living in the midst of other
nationalities which have preserved their own lan
guages regard these other peoples as sons of the
same motherland. (
The last National Polish Government (1863-4),
which appeared at a time when in some parts a
feeling of ethnographic dissimilarity began to be
felt, solemnly proclaimed that the ancient prin
ciple of " freedom and equality " should be pre
served for ever, and should always be the basis of
the Polish State.
These high traditions still continue in the hearts
of all true sons of the Commonwealth. LUDWIK JANOWSKI.

THE POPULATION OF
THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH
The extensive territories which, up to the year
1772, constituted the Commonwealth of Poland are
inhabited by several distinct nationalities, the
majority of which belong to the Slavonic race.
Among them all the Poles are by far the most
numerous. The Poles are of medium height, and— especially
in the northern territories— of slighter build than
the members of other Slavonic nations, but they are
generally of more harmonious proportions. This
lends them an air of distinction which appears
to raise them above the other nations.
The majority, of the Poles are fair -haired, and
the predominating colour of the eyes is light blue
or grey. Most of the men, especially among the
upper classes, are handsome, and the women are
frequently of exceptional beauty.
The people are active, ardent, courageousi, and
chivalrous, and hospitality and charity are their
chief virtues.
Their disposition is gay and impulsive, and they
are inclined to be dreamers— these traits have found
expression in Polish poetry and art, as well as
in the music of the people.
The Poles are an exceptionally gifted people, and

108 THE POPULATION OF
the nation has produced men of genius in every
walk of life : Polish military leaders, statesmen,
scientists, poets, musicians, painters, etc., are among
the greatest the world has known.
The country watered by the Vistula and its
tributaries is the cradle of the Polish nation, which
spread thence in all directions, until its territories
extended from the Oder to the Dnieper, and from
the Baltic to Roumania, and it came to be one
of the most powerful and most highly civilized of
European nations.
The density of population varies very, consider
ably in different parts of the Polish territories.
It is highest in Galicia, where— in the districts
around Cracow — as many as 648 inhabitants to the
square mile are to be found, and lowest in
White Ruthenia, especially in Polesia, where their
numbers drop as low as 47 to the square mile.
It is very difficult to arrive at the actual numbers
of the various nationalities inhabiting the territories
of the former, Commonwealth, as the Powers by
which Poland was partitioned do not compile
impartial statistics on the matter. The difficulty
of obtaining reliable figures is increased by the
circumstance that the Russian, Austrian, and
Prussian authorities employ different methods
in the compilation of statistics. All three
classify the population according, to, their language,
but whereas the Austrian authorities consider the
language actually spoken by given persons, in their
daily intercourse, as deciding their nationality, the

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 109
Russian and Prussian authorities classify the
inhabitants according to their paternal language.
Furthermore, the Russian statistics have a separate
rubric for the Jews, but the Prussian and Austrian
have not.
Where the Poles are concerned the language
spoken by the people can, in most instances, be
taken as a reliable indication of their nationality ;
but this does not always apply. The historic
connection existing between the Polish nation and
the Roman Catholic Church has created a feeling
of " religious nationality " in some of the people.
Thus the Poles living in Ruthenia, for instance,
consider that even though they adopt the language
of the people among whom they live, they do not
lose their nationality as long as they retain their
"Polish" faith.
On the other hand, there are among the Poles
numerous Protestants, Uniats, Jews, and even
Mohammedans. The majority of these non-
Catholic Poles are of Polish origin, the others have
been assimilated, and although, in many cases, they
do not employ the Polish language in their daily
intercourse, they none the less consider themselves
Poles. It will be understood that under the circumstances
the figures given in the following pages cannot claim
to be absolutely accurate. Being the results of
patient researches and calculations carried out by
eminent Polish scientists, they can, however, be
safely accepted as in no way biased or exaggerated.

GERMAN POLAND
The Polish territories now forming parts of the
Kingdom of Prussia consist of the provinces of
Posen and West Prussia, and parts of East Prussia,
Pomerania, and Silesia.
In the Grandduchy of Posen a perpetual conflict
is going on between two nationalities — the
indigenous Polish and the immigrant German.
The Germans have been numerous in these parts
even before the partitions of Poland, and, under
the fostering care of the Government, they have
since then greatly increased, also becoming more
powerful and aggressive.
The Poles represent about 65 per cent, of the
entire population of the province, and, notwith
standing the efforts of the Prussian authorities to
the contrary, their relative numbers are not
diminishing anywhere, and in most districts are
steadily increasing.
The proportion of Germans (about 34 per cent.),
on the other hand, is declining in spite of all efforts
of the authorities to augment, or even only maintain,
their numbers by introducing German officials,
110

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 111
encouraging the immigration of settlers from the
interior of Germany, etc. There is a steady
outflow of Germans from this province to the
agriculturally less developed western portions of
the kingdom, which more than counterbalances
those endeavours.
The proportion of the Poles is highest in the
parts of the Duchy bordering on the Kingdom of
Poland, but the districts where they are in the
majority are constantly increasing. The best
illustration of their power of resisting the Prussian
policy of extermination is the fact that during the
term of twenty years— from 1890 to 1910 — the
territory with a Polish majority increased by about
850 square miles.
The majority of the Poles inhabiting this province
are Roman Catholics, while the Germans are— with
relatively few exceptions — Protestants. The Polish
Protestants inhabit the southern districts of the
province, and among them cases of Germanization
have, from time to time, occurred ; on the other
hand, considerable numbers of German Catholics
have become Polonized.
The Jews, who in 1831 represented 67 per cent.
of the entire population, are steadily decreasing,
their relative numbers having fallen to 13 per
cent. The Poles of the Duchy form a separate political
party, and in times of elections vote unanimously
for the Polish candidates, with the exception of
a small percentage who belong to the Socialists.

112 THE POPULATION OF
In East Prussia the southern districts were
occupied by the Poles from very early times, and
numerous Polish settlements were to be found
scattered about in a northerly direction right up
to the shores of the Baltic Sea.
Being unorganized they, in many cases, easily
fell under the influence of the German settlers, who
had the powerful organizations of German knights
at their backs. Their conversion to Protestantism,
at the time of the Reformation, helped still further
towards the denationalization of the Poles in East
Prussia, by bringing them under the Germanizing
influence of the Lutheran clergy. The Prussian
authorities, too, spare no pains in their endea
vours to erase the consciousness of their Polish
nationality from the minds of the people ; going
to such ridiculous extremes as officially calling
them " Masovians "—as if the tribal name pre
cluded the wider national one of " Poles " —
and calling the Polish language the " Masovian "
language. In these circumstances it is not astonishing that
in some districts of East Prussia the percentage
of the Polish population is decreasing. Rather is
it surprising that the Poles should still hold
extensive areas of the province, in spite of the
fact that they have no leaders, and that Church,
School, and Government combine in endeavouring
to denationalize them.
East Prussia contains besides Prussian Masovia,
the districts of Ermeland, taken from Poland

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 113
at the time of the first partition. The Poles
inhabit the southern parts of this territory, the
Germans the northern, and both nationalities
belong to the Roman Catholic Church.
The Poles represent a little over 47 per cent.
of the entire population of East Prussia, but it
must not be forgotten that— the province being
sparsely populated— the towns tend artificially to
lower their relative numbers. In the rural districts
the proportion of the Poles is nearly 62 per cent.,
but the towns, being only administrative centres,
have an almost entirely German population,
composed mainly of Government and railway
officials— with their families— the garrisons, etc.
West Prussia has retained its Polish character
in a much higher degree than the last-named
province, although here as elsewhere the Prussian
authorities have spared no effort to, weaken the
Polish element. Being organized, the Poles of this
province were, however, able to offer a stronger
resistance to Germanizing influences than in East
Prussia, and in spite of expropriations, German
colonization, Prussian school politics, prohibitions
against the use of the Polish language, etc., the
percentage of the Polish population is increasing.
The relative numbers of the Germans, on the
contrary, are declining, in consequence of the
emigration of large numbers to the industrial
western districts of Germany.
The Poles are most numerous in the districts
8

114 THE POPULATION OF
adjoining the Kingdom of Poland, where in some
parts they represent about 80 per cent, of the entire
population, but the territories with a Polish
majority (averaging 60 per cent.) stretch right up
to the Baltic Sea, thus linking up the main portion
of the Polish territories with the coast.
The proportion of the Polish inhabitants to the
entire population of West Prussia is 35£ per cent.
In this province the towns are again little more
than administrative centres, and as the Poles are
debarred from all appointments under the Govern
ment, on the railways, etc., their population is
almost entirely German.
In an agricultural country, like West Prussia the
factor deciding its national character is, however,
the rural population, and of this about 50 per cent.
is Polish.
The northern portion of the province, bordering
on the sea, is inhabited by the Cassovians, a sturdy
Polish tribe which also inhabits a portion of the
adjoining provinces of Pomerania. These speak a
dialect of their own which is, however, undoubtedly
of Polish origin, although some German scientists
have tried to prove the contrary. That the senti
ments of the Cassovians are entirely Polish is
proved by the fact that since 1871 they have never
returned any other than Polish deputies to the
German Parliament.
It may be mentioned here that, for the Poles,
the elections in these provinces mean a desperate
fight for self-preservation, as the governmental

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 115
parties employ all means in their power to
increase their own votes to the detriment of the
Poles. They do not recoil even from such
practices as omitting names from the lists of voters,
cancelling votes, hmdering electioneering, bringing
Government pressure to bear on the voters, etc.
For West Prussia its separation from the rest of
Poland has had most unfortunate results, for
whereas in former times all the extensive export
trade of the Commonwealth passed along its roads
and great waterway— the Vistula — the province now
is nothing more than a quiet, out-of-the-way corner
on the outskirts of Prussia. Danzig, too, once a
city of great importance as the granary of Europe,
has sunk to the level of a third-rate seaport
town. Silesia fell away from the Commonwealth as
early as the Middle Ages, when the upper classes
of its inhabitants became voluntarily Germanized.
At that time large numbers of German settlers took
up their abode in this province, and only the
population of the districts along the upper reaches
of the Oder — especially of Upper Silesia, as those
on its right bank are called — remained Polish. In
spite of its Polish population even this territory
was, however, not Polish from an intellectual point
of view, as both the towns and the seats of the
nobility diffused an alien civilization.
The development of the mining industry, and
introduction of compulsory education roused the

116 THE POPULATION OE
rural population of Upper Silesia, a national
revival was started, relations with the main body
of the Polish nation were re-established, and an
intellectual class evolved. At present, having
founded, besides, a national Press, the people
of Upper Silesia are developing on Polish
lines. The Poles represent 57 per cent, of the entire
population of Upper Silesia ; the remainder, with
the exception of an insignificant number of
Bohemians, being German. If, however, four
districts in the north-eastern portion of the regency
— which contain only isolated Polish parishes — are
left out of account, the proportion of the Poles
to the population of the remaining territories is
64 per cent. To counterbalance the four districts
alluded to, large numbers of Poles are to be
found in the regency of Breslau, in Central
Silesia. As the Polish population of Upper Silesia was
formerly in a considerably greater majority, it
might appear that its numbers are declining ; but
that is not the case. The relative decrease is due
to the influx of enormous numbers of Germans,
especially to the mining districts, and the
discouragement — by means of legislative restrictions
and petty molestations— of the immigration of Poles
from Galicia and the Kingdom of Poland.
Notwithstanding all this Upper Silesia has not
lost its Polish character, and the national move
ment has made such good progress that the regency

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 117
is now considered one of the most loyal of Polish
territories. With the exception of one small district, the
inhabitants of which are Protestants, the popula
tion of Upper Silesia— Polish and German alike —
belongs to the Roman Catholic Church.

AUSTRIAN POLAND
Bordering on the last-named Prussian province
are the Polish territories belonging, since 1815, to
Austria, which consist of Galicia and Austrian
Silesia. Austrian Silesia is one of the Austrian crown-
lands, which means that in all local matters it
is self-governing. This would be very advantageous
to the Poles if they constituted the entire population ;
but unfortunately they do not. The province is
inhabited by three different nationalities : Poles,
Germans, and Bohemians, and consists, ethno-
graphically, of two distinct parts— a Polish and a
German area.
The Poles represent 61 per cent, of the entire
population in the Polish, and f per cent, in the
German area ; the Germans and Bohemians 15 and
24 per cent, respectively in the Polish, 79 and
20 per cent, in the German area.
The prevailing religion in Austrian Silesia is the
Roman Catholic, the ProLestants amounting to only
about 23 per cent, of the entire population ; but
these are almost exclusively Poles— indeed the
118

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 119
Reformed Church in this province has never been
anything but Polish.
In consequence of the Polish territories being
united with the German, all questions concerning
them are decided by the German parliamentary
majority. The strength of the Germans is further
increased by the Austrian parliamentary system,
which is such that the Germans, who represent
•15 per cent, of the entire population, elect 80 per
cent, of the deputies representing that province in
the Austrian Parliament.
Appointments under the Government and local
authorities are, in this province, given almost
exclusively to Germans ; the greater part of the
land is owned by Germans ; and every effort is
made to oust the Poles.
Not only the Germans, but also the Bohemians
in the Polish districts of Austrian Silesia, wield
a power which is out of proportion to their
numbers. This is due to the fact that in the mining
districts — the richest and most densely populated
parts of the province — nearly all important posts
are held by Bohemians, who also almost exclusively
practise the learned professions. The Bohemians,
no less than the Germans, make every effort to
obtain control of the communal authorities, schools,
and other public institutions.
As the Poles in Austrian Silesia belong entirely
to the lower classes— the upper classes, here as in
Prussian Silesia, having become Germanized during
the Middle Ages — they have had a hard struggle to

120 THE POPULATION OF
resist the combined efforts of the Germans and
Bohemians to denationalize them. They have,
however, by now succeeded in overcoming all
difficulties placed in their way, and created a strong
national Press, legal self-defence organizations,
and an excellent educational system. The loss of
their national individuality is therefore no longer
to be feared.
By far the most extensive of the Polish territories
under Austrian domination, are those Which
constitute the province of Galicia'.
In this portion of Poland the Poles enjoy more
liberty than they are allowed in any other ; not
only have they here two Polish universities and
Polish schools, but all official appointments are
open to them, and Polish is the official language
of the province. The army also is Polish, up to a
certain point, as the Polish conscripts are not sent
to other provinces for the time of their military
service — as is the case in the Russian and Prussian
parts of Poland— but are allotted to, garrisons
in Galicia. The officers are, however, mostly
Austrians. Galicia can be divided into two areas — Western
Galicia, the population of which is almost entirely
Polish, and Eastern Galicia, where the Ruthenians
are in a majority.
Resides these two nationalities both divisions of
the province contain a considerable percentage of
Jews, who here, as in other parts of the former
Commonwealth, must be regarded as a separate

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 121
nationality. They speak, among themselves, a
language of their own,1 have their own schools,
and generally lead a life apart, taking no share
in Polish affairs except in so far as they touch
purely Jewish interests. The enormous numbers
of these poor Jews who, centuries ago, settled down
here when hunted out of other parts of Europe,
and have to this day retained many of their
mediaeval customs and superstitions, are a
peculiarity of Poland.
The majority of the educated Jews, however,
consider themselves Poles and take an active
share in all national affairs. Many of these
assimilated Jews have risen to the highest positions
in commercial, industrial, and professional life, and
their numbers are constantly increasing.
In Western Galicia the population is almost
entirely Polish, as the Poles, who have increased
by very nearly 2 per cent, during the last thirty
years, represent about 90 per cent, of the total
numbers. The Ruthenians amount to about 2|
per cent., and the rest of the population — after
deducting about 1 per cent, of Germans — consists
of unassimilated Jews (about 6J per cent.).
Whereas the percentage of the Ruthenians
remains stationary, and the Germans are decreas
ing—not only relatively but in actual numbers —
the Poles are increasing both numerically and
relatively.
1 " Yiddish," a sort of corrupt German mixed with Hebrew.

122 THE POPULATION OF
Most of the Ruthenians inhabit the eastern parts
of Western Galicia, and the mountainous districts
bordering on Hungary, where their numbers amount
in some parts to 25 per cent, of the entire popula
tion. The majority of the Jews inhabit the towns,
where also most of the German inhabitants of the
province are to be found.
In Eastern Galicia the nationalities are very
mixed, for although on the whole the Ruthenians
predominate, there are districts in which the Poles
are in a decided majority. Generally speaking the
western districts are more Polish and the eastern
more Ruthenian, but the latter nationality nowhere
represents more than 80 per cent, of the local
population. The Poles, on the other hand, whose
numbers amount to about 35 per cent, of the entire
population of Eastern Galicia, represent in some
parts of the western districts of the province as
much as 88 per cent. They are also very numerous
in the neighbourhood of Lemberg, where their
numbers amount to 85 per cent., and, still farther
east, in the exceedingly fertile districts of Galician
Podolia. Here, in the neighbourhood of Tarnopol,
Skalat, and Trembovla, the Poles represent 52 per
cent, of the entire population of these districts,
and the proportion is not much lower in other
parts of this territory.
The Jews are more numerous in Eastern Galicia
than in the western portion of the province,

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 123
representing about 12 per cent, of the entire
population ; but this figure includes the assimilated
minority who, from the point of view of nationality,
must be regarded as Poles.
The nineteenth century saw a revival of the
national spirit among the Ruthenians who had,
through the popularization of education, evolved
an intellectual class of their own.
Unfortunately the Ruthenian national movement
is too young for its adherents to have a well-
defined programme. One section claims Eastern
Galicia exclusively for the Ruthenians, and has
in some instances — encouraged by the Austrian
Government — taken up a hostile attitude towards
the Poles.
Another section of the Ruthenian population
desires union with Russia. This section has com
paratively very few adherents, and its ambition is
not likely to be realized, as the majority of the
Ruthenians are strongly opposed to the idea on
religious grounds.
The Ruthenians of Galicia are nearly all Uniats,
i.e. members of that portion of the Greek Church
which in 1595 became united with the See of Rome.
A very small proportion (003 per cent.) belong
to the independent Greek communion, or Eastern
Church, which must not be confounded with the
Russian Orthodox Church.
There is, from a national point of view, a certain
resemblance between Silesia and Eastern Galicia,
as the Ruthenians in the latter province— like the

124 THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH
Poles in the former— belong almost exclusively to
the rural, intellectually and materially less favoured
portion of the population.
The Ruthenians are of higher stature than the
Poles and have somewhat darker hair and eyes,
which does not mean, however, that they are dark-
complexioned1. On the contrary, the light type is
in a slight majority ; very dark people are rare
among both Poles and Ruthenians.

RUSSIAN POLAND
The Polish territories which form part of the
Russian Possessions consist of the Kingdom of
Poland (a name created in 1815), Lithuania,
Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraina.
In the Kingdom of Poland the majority of the
inhabitants are of Polish nationality ; but besides
this principal national group there are five
others, namely : the Lithuanian, Jewish, German,
Ruthenian, and Russian groups.
Classified according to; religion the population
falls into four groups : the great Roman Catholic
majority, the comparatively small Jewish group,
and the insignificant Protestant and Russian
Orthodox groups.
The majority of the Poles belong to the Roman
Catholic faith, as also do the Lithuanians— the latter
almost without exception, although a small number
are to this day Mohammedans.
To the Russian Orthodox faith belong the
Russians and Ruthenians ; the latter only since
1875 when the Uniat Church, of which they, were
members, was abolished by the Government, and its
adherents enrolled, against their will, as members
of the Orthodox Church. Since the publication,

126 THE POPULATION OF
in 1905, of the ukase granting religious freedom
to all Russian subjects, large numbers of the
Ruthenians have joined the Roman Catholic Church.
The Germans in the Kingdom are nearly all
Protestants, the Catholics among them forming a
small minority. Among the Protestants are also
to be found a good many Poles, and still more
among the Jews, of whom considerable numbers
have become assimilated— at least as far as language
is concerned. A small percentage of Poles is to
be found even among the members of the Russian
Orthodox Church.
The only census taken in the Kingdom of Poland
on modern lines was the census of 1897, and that,
being a first attempt, could not in any case have
given unassailable results. They were made the
more unreliable by the fact that the census was not
by any means carried out on impartial lines, the
tendency being, on the contrary, to make the
numbers of the Poles appear as small as possible.
A proof of the unreliability, of the figures
obtained, with regard to nationality, is the fact
that the numbers of the Roman Catholics coincide
with the total numbers of Poles and Lithuanians.
In reality, the Poles are much more numerous, as
large numbers are members of other religious
communities. These would, however, appear to
have been classified as Germans if they were
Protestants, Jews if they professed the Jewish faith,
and Ruthenians or Russians if they belonged to
the Russian Church. Even the Catholic Roles were

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 127
not all classified as such, a considerable proportion
appearing as Lithuanians.
Such a system of classification would naturally
tend to lower the Polish majority, which is still
further decreased by the inclusion of the military
population. As the garrisons are composed entirely
of men from non-Polish districts, whilst the Poles
are sent to Russia for the time of their military
service, the relative numbers of the Poles are thus
twice reduced.
The latest figures obtainable on the population
of the Kingdom of Poland are those issued by
the Warsaw Statistical Committee for 19133
according to which, after deducting the garrisons,
the proportions of the various religious communi
ties to the entire population were as follows :
Roman Catholics 76 per cent.^ Jews 15 per cent.,
Protestants 53 per cent., Orthodox 3 7 per cent.
These figures are, however, not quite reliable.
According to the calculations of the best
authorities, the various nationalities in the Kingdom
of Poland were in 1910 represented in the following
proportions : Poles 80 per cent., Jews 11 per cent.,
Germans 4 per cent., Lithuanians 23 per cent.,
Ruthenians 2 per cent., Russians 07 per cent.
The Ruthenian population of the Kingdom is to
be found mainly in the districts of the governments
of Lublin and Siedltse bordering on Volhynia.
These districts have of recent years been incor
porated in the newly, formed government of
Chelm.

128 THE POPULATION OF
The Lithuanians inhabit the northern portion of
the government of Suvalki— the north-eastern part
of the Kingdom. This territory stretches along the
left bank of the Niemen to, within no great distance
of the sea, and it may be mentioned that the
Prussian districts situated on that river are also
inhabited by, Lithuanians.
Considerable numbers of German settlers are to
be found in the governments of Suvalki and Chelm,
amounting in the former to about 5 J per cent, of
the entire population. In the government of Chelm
the Germans are, with few exceptions, all to be
found in the vicinity of the town of that name,
where they represent about 12^ per cent, of the
inhabitants. Besides in the governments mentioned,
considerable numbers of Germans are to be found
in those of Plotsk, Warsaw, Kalish, and Piotrkov.
In the district of Lodz (in the last-named govern
ment) the numbers of the Germans amount to as
much as 26 per cent, of the local population.
The Jews are most numerous in the city, of
Warsaw, where they represent nearly 37 per cent.
of the inhabitants, although their numbers for the
whole government of Warsaw do not amount to
more than IP 4 per cent. In proportion to the
population of the whole province the Jews are most
numerous in the governments of Lomza, Siedltse,
and Piotrkov, where they represent on an average
about 16 per cent, of the entire population. The
largest proportion of Jews is to be found in the
small provincial towns, where their numbers

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 129
amount to 45 per cent, of the total number of
inhabitants. The Jewish population of the Kingdom of Poland
—and more especially of Warsaw — has greatly
mcreased of recent years in consequence of the
expulsion of great numbers of Jews from Russia.
Besides this economic conditions have forced a great
many, Jews to emigrate from Lithuania, and the
majority of these too have settled down in Roland,
chiefly in Warsaw.
The influx of great numbers of a foreign element,
with alien sympathies and ideals, could not fail
to have unpleasant results, and has led to, Rolono-
Jewish conflicts.
The Russians in Poland are not only an
immigrant, but also, ibr the greater part, a
migratory population, consisting chiefly, of Govern
ment officials of all classes, with their families ; the
families of the military ; and representatives of
Russian business firms. For the higher officials
service in Poland is merely a step to, promotion
in the official hierarchy of the empire, but for all
it means a better income, as Government officials
" of Russian origin " receive, when serving in
Poland, comparatively large allowances in addition
to their salaries.
The population of Lithuania consists of
Poles, Lithuanians, Ruthenians, White -Ruthenians,
Russians, Letts, and Jews.
This province was among the first of the Polish
9

130 THE POPULATION OF
territories to be detached from the Commonwealth,
and it is here that the Polish nation has suffered
the greatest losses.
The civilization of Lithuania is Polish, and the
Poles formerly constituted a very large and impor
tant part of the population ; but their numbers
have been greatly reduced by. the abolition of the
Uniat Church, and in consequence of the deporta
tion of great numbers of Poles, and confiscation
of Polish territory, after the insurrection of 1863.
Everything Polish was then banned, Polish schools,
theatres, the Press, and even shop signs were
suppressed, and the use of the Polish language
prohibited. In Lithuania it is even more difficult than in
the Kingdom to obtain accurate statistical infor
mation regarding the nationalities of the population,
as even the official figures of the various
Government departments vary considerably. For
instance, whereas the Orthodox population of .Vilno,
according to the census returns, numbered 14,312
in 1897, the official figure for 1909 was 27,619,
by which it would appear that this section of the
population of Vilno had, in the short time of twelve
years, nearly doubled. The Consistory of the
Orthodox Church, on the other hand, which surely
is the best authority on the subject, gave the
numbers for 1909 as amounting to 6,522, including
361 members of the Old-Orthodox faith— an inde
pendent sect.
. Another illustration of the unreliability of official

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 131
figures is the district of Sokol, which borders on
the Kingdom and is undoubtedly, ethnographically,
Polish territory. According to the census of 1897
the Polish population of this district numbered,
at that time, 1,273 souls, and for 1909 the official
figure was 1,047, but a petition presented in 1905
to Count Witte by. the Polish inhabitants of the
district contained IT, 65 3 signatures.
The above example suffices to show that the
majority of the Poles must, in the official statistics,
have been classified among other nationalities, and
the statistics on religions give some indication where
to look for them'.
According to calculations based on information
drawn from various official sources, the proportion
of Poles to the entire population in the governments
of Lithuania was, in 1909, as follows : Kovno, 8
per cent., Vilno 47*1 per cent., Grodno 253 per
cent., Minsk 8-4 per cent., Vitebsk 79 per cent.,
Mohilev 33 per cent. These figures appear in
many instances to be considerably below the real
percentage ; according to the calculations of Polish
statisticians the Poles in the government of Kovno,
for instance, actually represented 11*4 per cent, of
the entire population.
In one-half the districts of Lithuania the Poles
are more numerous than any, of the other nation
alities inhabiting them — in a few cases representing
as much as 71 per cent, of the local population —
and in all portions of the territory they, constitute
an important section. , , . .

132 THE POPULATION OE
The Lithuanians represent above 46 per cent.
of the entire population of Lithuania, and are most
numerous in the government of Kovno where their
numbers amount to 66 per cent. Considerable
numbers of Lithuanians are also to be found in
the neighbouring province of Courland, and in East
Prussia. The majority of the White-Ruthenians inhabit the
governments of Minsk and Mohilev, and the eastern
part of the Vitebsk government, where they consti
tute about 66 per cent, of the population. These
districts are very thinly populated— especially
Polesia— the soil being poor, and the climatic condi
tions unfavourable to its cultivation on an extensive
scale. The inhabitants are in a very, backward
state of civilization, only, 17 per cent, being able
to read or write. The proportion of the White-
Ruthenians to the entire population of Lithuania is
43 per cent.
The Letts inhabit the western portion of the
government of Vitebsk (Polish Livonia) and the
eastern part of Courland. They differ from the
other Letts Who inhabit the rest of Courland and
the formerly Swedish part of Livonia (with whom
they have little intercourse) in that they are Roman
Catholics. These Lithuanian Letts call themselves
Lathgolians ; they have a local dialect, use Roman
characters in writing — whereas the other Letts,
having come completely, under German influence,
employ German characters— and make use of the
Polish language in their prayers. The Lathgolians

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 133
represent about 48 per cent, of the entire popula
tion of the districts they inhabit, and about 18 per
cent, of the population of the government of Vitebsk.
The Jews in Lithuania amount to about 14 per
cent, of the entire population, and are to be found
in all parts of the province, chiefly in the towns.
In consequence of unfavourable economic condi
tions large numbers of Jews emigrate, some to, the
Kingdom of Poland, the majority to America, and
the inhabitants of some of the small towns in
Lithuania maintain themselves almost entirely on
the money sent them by the emigrants.
The Mohammedans number altogether only, about
10,000, or 009 per cent, of the entire population of
Lithuania. They are descended from Tartars who,
invited in the Middle Ages by the Grand Duke) Witold
to assist him in his wars with the German knights,
afterwards settled down here. They, intermarried
with the local inhabitants, and the members of
the upper classes among them adopted the Polish
language and became loyal Roles. The others
adopted either the Lithuanian or Ruthenian tongue,
according to the district in which they settled down.
In physical proportions the Letts greatly,
resemble the Poles, but they have darker hair and
eyes— the latter frequently, being greenish in colour.
The Lithuanians are somewhat taller than the Letts,
and the majority are fair -haired and have light
blue or grey eyes, in which respect they resemble
the Poles. The Mohammedans are shorter and
of slighter build than the other inhabitants of

134 THE POPULATION OF
Lithuania, and they are also of a darker
complexion.

The inhabitants of the populous provinces of
Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraina— famous for
the fertility of their soil — are engaged mostly in
agricultural pursuits, three-fourthk of the population
being either landowners or peasants.
The majority of the inhabitants of these provinces
are Ruthenians, but they owe their development
in a great measure to the Poles. The latter have
here played a similar part to that of the Swedes
in Finland, having organized the country politically,
economically, and socially. The influence of the
Poles is therefore not in proportion to their
numbers, although these are by no means incon
siderable. The Ruthenians still apply the name " Poland "
to all the territories west of the Dnieper, and
consider the Poles as children of the soil equally
with themselves. Their favourite formula to define
their own nationality was " gente Ruthenus, natione
Polonus." Notwithstanding the length of time (120 years)
that Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraina have been
separated from Poland, all efforts to efface their
Polish character have been in vain. Even the
confiscation, on a large scale, of Polish property,
and deportation of great numbers of Poles after
the revolutions of 1831 and 1863, have not been
able to effect that aim.

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 135
The numbers of the Poles constitute about 1\
per cent, of the population of these provinces, and
they are most numerous in Volhynia, where they
represent 10J per cent. The majority are landed
proprietors, owning in some districts as much as
90 per cent, of the areas covered1 by the large
estates, and representing a very valuable element,
as they are very progressive, and introduce all the
latest agricultural improvements into the country.
Of the Whole area covered by the nine govern
ments of Lithuania and Ruthenia 47 per cent.
is in the hands of the Poles. A good many
Poles are to be found too among the peasantry,
especially in the districts bordering on Galicia (and
in northern Podolia generally) as well as in
Volhynia. Many of these Polish peasants are the
descendants of nobles who were degraded after the
revolution of 1831.
The Poles also form an important section of
the urban population of these provinces — as they
represent the intellectual element— but the bulk of
the inhabitants of the towns is composed of Jews,
who amount to nearly 13 per cent, of the popula
tion of Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraina.
The towns, being the administrative centres of
the Russian authorities, also contain the greater
part of the Russian population of these provinces —
consisting, again, mostly of Government officials.
As will be seen by the foregoing, the territories
formerly constituting the Commonwealth of Poland

136 THE POPULATION OE
—together with the Polish parts of Silesia, Prussia,
and Upper Hungary— possess many characteristic
features. The Poles are numerous in all parts
of these territories, in many, districts forming an
overwhelming majority. What is more, they have
everywhere left indelible marks of their civiliza
tion, which all the efforts of the ruling powers
have not been able to efface, even in the districts
where the Poles are least numerous.
So long as the territories belonged to Poland
harmony prevailed among all the nationalities
inhabiting them — complications have arisen only
since the partitions of Poland, which have
had nothing but painful consequences for the
country. It is to be hoped that the good relations between
all these nationalities, apart from small local
quarrels which are bound to arrive whenever two
or more nationalities inhabit the same territory,
(will be maintained and that they will all have an
opportunity of a free national development. There
is a community of interest between the Poles,
Lithuanians, and Ruthenians. They have been
bound together for centuries. Poland cannot look
indifferently on the fate of its neighbours. An
independent Poland would mean a free Lithuania
and a free Ruthenia.
A century and a half of oppression have not been
able to destroy the vitality or moral strength of the
Polish people. Every new endeavour to crush them
has only strengthened their determination and

THE POLISH COMMONWEALTH 137
power of endurance — and the country is as Polish
as ever.
That the present war can have only one result
for Poland is clear from1 Sir Edward Grey's words
in the Bechstein Hall, on March 22, 1915: "We
wish the nations of Europe to be free to live
their independent lives, working out their own
forms of government, for themselves and their own
development, whether they be great States or small
States, in full liberty— that is our ideal."
If Poland were not to regain its independence as a
result of this struggle, England would have failed in
her mission to vindicate the principle that oppressed
nationalities " are not to be crushed by the arbi
trary will of a strong and overmastering power,"
and " to help them in their struggle for freedom1,
whether as in the case of Belgium in maintaining
what they have won, or, as in the case of Poland
or the Balkan States, in regaining what they have
lost " (Mr. Asquith, October, 3, 1914, and August 6,
1915).

EXTENT AND POPULATION OF POLISH TEEEITOEIES
AND TOTAL NUMBER OF POLES.

Name of Territory.

I. Prussian Possessions
Grand Duchy of Posen
West Prussia
Regency of Olshtyn inE. Prussia
Upper Silesia
II. Austrian Possessions
Galicia ...
Dist. of Teschin, Austrian Silesia
Upper Hungary (Spiz)...
III. Russian Possessions
Kingdom of Poland
LithuaniaVolhynia Podolia ... 
Ukraina ...
Courland
IV. Other Parts of the World
America 
Other Countries 

Total...

Date.

191019101910
1910 1910
1900

1909
19091909
1909 1909

Extent in
square miles.

11,191 9,864 4,6435,107
30,300 881

49,003
117,281 27,691 16,21919,670

291,850

Total population.

2,099,8311,703,474 543,469
2,207,9818,029,387 361,015

11,935,318
11,442,311 3,367,300
3,394,654
4,429,542

49,514,282

Density of popu
lation per square
mile.

187-6172-8117-5
432-3
264-9
409-7

243-5 97.6
120
209-8
225-1

The Poles are the sixth nation in Europe as regards numbers, ranking next to the
' Last obtainable official figureB. For more accurate data see p. 127.

Number of
Poles.

1,291,153 602,234
267,831
1,258,138
4,675,612 218,869100,000
9,074,382 1,566,540 298,110262,738106,733 29,258
3,200,000
1,000,000

23,951,598

Italians.

Percentage of Poles.

61-5
35-449-357-058-660-9
80 76 *
13-6 8-88-734

POLAND AS AN INDEPENDENT
ECONOMIC UNIT
BEING a lecture delivered at the
" ECOLE DES HAUTES ETUDES SOCIALES,"
PARIS, JANUARY 29, 1916
BY
STANISLAW POSNER
With an Introduction by
SIDNEY WEBB

INTRODUCTION
I gladly comply with the invitation to contribute
a few words of preface to Mr. Stanislaw Posner's
impressive account of the material resources of Poland.
The series projected by the Polish Information Com
mittee is badly needed in this country. Fate has,
indeed, been hard on Poland. So far as the United
Kingdom is concerned, it has not only fallen out of the
maps from which we learn how Europe is made up —
it has fallen also out of our knowledge. We get, if
only through the Stock Exchange, some idea of the
industrial resources and economic exploitation of
Mexico and Persia ; but we read very little about the
enormous and astonishing material development be
tween the Oder and the Dwina, within a couple of
days' travel from London. We realize the rapid
groivth of Chicago and Winnipeg and Oklahoma ; but
forget that of Lodz, where a city which began to
grow only half a century ago now counts 800,000
inhabitants. How many Englishmen realize that
Lodz has become more populous than either Liverpool
or Manchester ? How many Scotchmen are prepared
to find it as a manufacturing centre vying with
Glasgow ? Bid the mineral resources of Poland are
greater even than its manufactures. The oil and salt
and coal and iron with which Poland now supplies
Europe constitute no small percentage of the total
world resources. After the war these will necessarily
play an important part in any rearrangement of
European trade. 141

142 INTRODUCTION
No one can pretend to foresee how the political
organization of this part of Europe is destined to be
affected during the rest of the century. Put the
economic student ivill find it difficult to resist the
conclusion that, in the ever-increasing industrialization
of the country, any attempt to maintain tariff walls
across the Polish plain — any seeking to set up in
dustrial frontiers between the Carpathians and the
Baltic, between the Oder and the Dwina — will be a
violation of what may be called social geography,
likely to lead to instability and disaster. Whether
economic geography will silently influence political
geography, or political geography once more coerce
economic, who can tell ? Perhaps our Kings and
Emperors, and their military and fiscal advisers, may
one day learn that there is no necessary identity
between unbroken customs areas and units of adminis
trative autonomy. The map of Europe may be
destined to become not less complex but more — may
come, in fact, in the distant future, to be painted not
with one series of colours denoting absolute and uni
versal sovereignties, but ivith different sets of colours,
designating simultaneously existing and often over
lapping units relating respectively to race, religion
and language, to fiscal administration, to local govern
ment, to systems of law, and to the administration of
transport and communications. Wliy should these
all be compelled to coincide ? Why should we go on
for all time assuming that Sovereignty must be one
and indivisible, and that Political Sovereignty must
necessarily be not only the dominant but also the only
controlling influence 1 SIDNEY WEBB.

POLAND AS AN INDEPENDENT
ECONOMIC UNIT
The history of a people is inseparable from
the country in which they. live. The Greeks are
for ever associated with the Hellenic seas, the
French with France, the English with their own
island. Has Poland a personality of her own? Has she
a personality in the profound sense employed by
Michelet, who spoke of the personality of his own
great country France?
A geographical individuality is not merely the
result of simple considerations of geology and
climate. It is not a thing given by nature from
the beginning. It is wrong, says M. Vidal de la
Blache, to regard :a country as a store-house in
which energy is stored, the germ of which has been
143

144 POLAND AS AN
placed there by nature, but the development of which
depends on man. It is man who, in moulding a
country to his use, places upon it the seal of his,
individuality ; it is in this way that a country
differentiates itself from others, and becomes finally,
as it were, as a medal struck with the effigy of
a people.
Geography determines the nature of a people's
activity and social life. The variety of the resources
which they have at their disposal, their food, their
dwellings, and tools, in short their economic
activity— all these are due to the geological con
stituents of the soil.
When the war broke out Poland was divided into
three parts. ; These three divisions of the old
Polish Republic were separated by customs duties ;
for two there was no access to the sea. Contact
and economic exchange with .Western Europe
were only possible by railway communications
and by the Vistula, the only waterway flowing
to the sea. In each of these three divisions there
was a different legislative and administrative
system. Nevertheless, we claim that Poland is still a
united nation. Her partition was not only a crime
against the people of Poland, but against the laws
of nature, of geology, and of geography. For
this very reason Lhe question has remained unsolved
for one hundred and fifty years. When the three
divisions are united once more, Poland will resume
her interrupted national life.

INDEPENDENT. ECONOMIC UNIT 145
The country is called "Poland," " Polonia,"
in Latin, in Polish " Polska," which means the
country of plains (pole = plain). This name
conveys the idea of limitless space. Poland has
a central position in Europe. If one line is
drawn from Portugal almost to the Ural Mountains
and another from the Island of Crete to the North
Cape, they will intersect in the plain of Poland.
Poland is the country of transition from the west
to the east, from the north to the south. From
the west to the east the Germanic plain extends
to that of Sarmatia ; this is analogous to the
situation of Belgium between France and Germany.
The geographical situation of both countries has
been responsible for similar historical phenomena ;
both have been the battlefield of the nations, as is
shown by Waterloo and Grunwald.
In the north the frontier of Poland is clearly
defined by the shores of the Baltic, in the south
by the granite walls of the Carpathians, while in
the west the country extends to the River Oder, of
which Frederick Barbarossa said, " Poloniam velut
murus ambit" (it flanks Pol,and like a wall). In
fact, the right bank of the Oder is called by the
riverside dwellers the Polish shore. ;
On the east the frontier is not so clearly defined,
at least not as regards the Black Sea, the Dnieper:,
which makes a bend there, and the Dwina— in short,
the very line which, according to a Ruthenian chron
icler, constituted " the great riverway leading from
the country of thie Varegues into, Greece. This line
10

146 POLAND AS AN
is not continuous, at least it is only made so by
the canal system of Beresina.
This, then, is the frame which encloses the
country. As the poet said : " The Polish eagle
has her resting-place on the peaks of the
Carpathians, and stretches forth her wings, one to
the Baltic, the other to the Black Sea."
From these geographical facts one could almost
deduce, a priori, the history of the country.
Situated on the borders of the East, Poland
defends Western Europe .- she is like the Wall of
China or the rampart of Trajan. She is, as it
were, a political isthmus, a dyke upon which the
peoples of the Orient beat like waves, in their
endeavours to flow westward ; on the other side she
stemmed the tide of the Germanic peoples from
the shores of the Atlantic. The defence of these
two fronts was such a serious drain on the strength
of the nation that she could not protect her
maritime boundaries to the south and north from
the encroachments of nature. On the north access
to the sea was made difficult by a line of lakes,
bordered by a wooded and marshy country in
habited by a warlike Lithuanian tribe. (It was
this obstacle that induced her to seek the help
of the Teutonic Knights.) Germanic pressure made
itself more felt here ; the left wing of the invader
was protected by the Baltic ; his communications
with the sea were ensured. Moreover, from this
coast the country was equally menaced by the
Swede. On the southern maritime boundary vast

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 147
desolate plains hindered Poland from guarding her
seaboard, and on these shores wandering tribes
from Asia took up their abode, Turks and Tartars.
In the sixteenth century a Polish author asserted :
" On all sides of the country an easy means of
ingress is afforded to our enemies. The Turkish
cavalry manoeuvre as they will. They advance,
retreat, dash forward, take prisoners, and secure
a huge booty. As for us, our only defence lies in
our strength and valour. These take the place of
mountains, rivers, castles, and ramparts."
The south-west part of Poland is very rich in
coal of an excellent quality, in iron, in steel, in
zinc ; lead is found in all the three divisions of
Poland. Coal is found in one large field, which is
split up beltween the three States, each of which
exploits it in a different manner. The area of
this field is estimated by geologists at about 2,316
square miles, half of which belongs to Prussia.
The seams are 327 yards thick, and can be worked
to a depth of 185 yards. In ,1908 the reserve of
coal in Poland was estimated at 110,000,000,000
tons. Upper Silesia possesses 56 mines employing
90,000 men. These mines belong to the Germans.
In the Kingdom of Poland the mines are for the
most part the property of joint-stock companies
run by foreign capital— French, American, German,
Russian, but also Polish. The net profit of these
mines, 26 in number, employing 20,000 workmen,
for the last eight years ,:has been £5,000,000.
The amount of coal produced in Poland is sufficient

148 POLAND AS AN
to supply, all France with her, 40,000,000 in
habitants arid the large fuel consumption of her
industries. The industrial development of a country, may be
measured by its iron industry. The reserve of iron
of the Kingdom is valued at £1,000,000,000. In
1909, 1,228,500 tons of iron -ore were extracted
and 4,258,800 smelted. The Polish iron-works deal
with a great quantity of iron-ore from Southern
Russia. On the other hand, Poland provides Russia
with sufficient zinc for all her requirements. The
zinc mines of Olkusz were being worked as early
as the sixteenth1 century. Polish calamine was
known in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
in every market of the world. The yearly pro
duction is 100,000 tons. In the same district
there are lead mines. Until recently the largest
quantity of zinc came from Upper Silesia. Her
output was 208,000 tons— as much as all the other
countries of Europe added together. The pro
duction of the United States alone— 226,000 tons—
is in excess of this.
A new industry is that of petrol, exploited by,
foreign syndicates. In addition to oil for lighting
purposes, raw petrol furnishes benzine, paraffin,
and vaseline. It is equally in use as a combustible
by mines and railways. The Polish petrol wells
are situated in Galicia : the first experiments with
petrol were made in 1810. At Lwow (Lemberg)
in 1853, two chemists discovered a process by
which carburet could be obtained from petrol, and

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 149
in 1856 it was used for the first time for lighting
the municipal hospital of the capital of Galicia.;
Eminent Polish scientists, Zuber, Grzybowski,
Szajnocha, Dunikowski, all professors of the
Universities of Cracow and Lwow, have made them
selves known throughout the world by their works
dealing with the petrol industry. In Galicia the
petrol fields extend from' the valley of the Dounayetz
as far as the Bukovina — a distance of 248
miles. In 1912, petrol was being1 exploited in
389 places. Professor Zuber has calculated that
petrol-bearing land in Galicia extends for a
distance of 19,760 acres, and contains at least
470,000 tons of raw petrol.
Salt is among the mineral products which received
a great deal of attention in the country in days
gone by. There are references to the salt mines
of Bochnia and Wieliczka as early as the middle
of the twelfth century ; mention is made of them
among the royal privileges granted to the Bene
dictine and Cistercian monasteries in 1105 and
1136. These mines stretch from the Silesian
frontier throughout Galicia iand Bukovina to
Roumania. After the partition of the country they became,
the property of the Austrian State, and were
worked— very inefficiently — by, a State monopoly.
At the time of the existence of the Duchy of
Warsaw, the output of salt reached 2,000 tons
per annum. It is only 1,000 now, although the
consumption of salt has increased everywhere in

150 POLAND AS AN
the feeding of men and animals, as well as in
chemical industries. The mines of Wieliczka are
very interesting to visit ; they have fascinated many
a foreign visitor by their lighting a giorno, and
by the singing of the miners. Western Galicia also
possesses rich stores of potash, a chemical manure
of inestimable value in modern agriculture, above
all in the production of beetroot. But the mines
of Galicia are also administered by the Austrian
State, and instead of selling chemical manures,
Galicia imports 5,000 wagons every year, and salt
is dearer there than in Switzerland, who has to
import all her supply.
Knowing the riches of the Polish soil, more than
one French chemist has insisted that the chemical
industries of Poland should develop to an extra
ordinary extent, especially in Galicia, Where salt,
petrol, coal, and wood are so plentiful. Industries for
the production of glass, soap, perfumes, and phar
maceutical requirements should be set up ; yet all
these industries still await a creator. This
stagnation may be ascribed to political causes, jto
the exploitation of the country by Germany and
Austria. The mineral springs must also be counted
among the mineral riches of Poland. They abound
in great numbers. There are the sulpho -chlorine
springs of Busk, chloro-soda of Ciechocinek, and of
Druskienniki in Lithuania, ; iodo-bromide ferru
ginous alkaline springs are found all along the
Carpathians. Statistics of brine-baths mention 39
thermal institutions, four of which are by the sea.

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 151
Hundreds of climacteric establishments swarm in
the villages on the mountain sides, great sanatoria
for tuberculosis, rivalling those of Switzerland, and
lastly the treatment by " Koumys " at Slawuta in
Volhynia should not be forgotten.
In enumerating the natural riches of the country,
certain facts have been introduced concerning the
coal, petrol, salt, and zinc industries. In Silesia
the industries of the greatest importance are those
of mining and iron-founding. The number of
workmen employed in the latter in Prussian Silesia
is reckoned at 500,000. The textile industry and
the spinning mills employ 54,000. In the Duchy
of Posen industrial development met with many
obstacles. German competition holds the whole
province as in a vice. The authorities support
German industry in the struggle against the new
born Polish activity ; the Polish business man is boy
cotted as much as the artisan ; and German banks
refuse to give them credit. In spite of all these
obstacles, the makers of agricultural machinery
compete with German manufacturers, and succeed
in gaining the first prize at international exhibi
tions. Industrial beginnings in the kingdom of Poland
are very early. There are proofs of their existence
at the time of the Jagellons. The storms which
have swept the country, the Swedish invasions and
the rule of the Saxon kings, have by degrees
brought them to a standstill. But towards the end
of the eighteenth century a new spirit manifested

152 POLAND AS AN
itself in Poland, an initiative springing from the
desire to reconstruct the country, and to save it
from final dissolution. In her search after the
means of salvation Poland endeavoured to resusci
tate her once flourishing industries.
In 1786 the "Journal of Commerce," published
at Warsaw, wrote : " Look at any Polish lord or
lady ; everything they, wear is of foreign manu
facture." Nobles such as the Malachowski, the
Radziwill, the Tyzenhaus, began to start industries.
The English traveller Coxe, who visited them,
wrote in this connection : " The principal manu
factures are those of cloths, stuffs, linen, cotton,
silk, embroideries, silk stockings, hats, lace, fire
arms, needles, and playing cards."
Before the third partition there were in Poland
255 factories, not counting saw-mills, tan-yards
and distilleries. Political tempests, which had
annihilated Polish independence, did not succeed
in destroying the spirit of initiative. It still
existed under the ashes, and before life again
resumed its normal course, before a single ray had
illuminated the country, lighting up the hope of
ultimate self-government, endeavours were being
made to create a new industrial system. The
Kingdom of the Congress had only to carry forward
the work commenced at the close of the eighteenth
century. All serfs were made free by the Code
Napoleon. The proletariat had been enfranchised
and workmen were to be had in abundance. Jt
was necessary, to make sure of the capital required

INDEPENDENT. ECONOMIC UNIT 153
and to find a market for the goods. In 1805 a
new scale of tariffs was introduced, which raised
the price of imported articl.es. Immigrants were
attracted by privileges, such as freedom from
military service and the non-payment of taxes for
six years. All necessary materials were given them
for the construction of their factories. In 1820
a commission noted the towns and boroughs which
appeared suitable for the erection of factories. A
long-term-loan fund was established for industrial
enterprises (starting in 1824 at £12,000 per
annum). The institution of this fund was the work
of the Polish Minister of Finance, Prince Lubecki.,
In this way the celebrated cloth of Coqueril saw,
the light of day ; it was produced in the cotton
factory of a French engineer named Girard, whose
memory is immortalized by the place bearing his
name — Zyrardow. Lubecki grasped the fact that
industrial life is impossible without credit, and he
therefore founded the Bank of Poland. Agriculture,
ruined by the fatal intrigues of the Prussian rule,
was also in need of help ; the Prussians had been
masters of the country from 1796 to 1807. In 1825
the Polish Land Bank was founded. Two years
later Lubecki put up for sale the mortgages on
land issued by the Land Bank on national property.
These duties brought in 3,000,000 Polish florins,
and with this money Lubecki set up the Bank of
Poland, whose aim was the development of com
merce, credit, and industry. The normal causes
of this extraordinary, revival were found above all

151 POLAND AS AN
in the enterprise of the people, and in the political
liberty arising from self-government, which had been
given to the country by the Congress of Vienna of
1815. The Bank of Poland was more than ia
powerful institution for credit. After the disasters
of the revolution it was owing to this bank that
national industry, still in its infancy, did not dis
appear for ever ; it restored enterprises which were
sinking, and put them on their feet again. It was
the first great organizer of national industry. The
Land Bank of Poland has been mentioned, but
it should be added that this institution was the
father of the Land Bank of France, which was
not only set up on the same lines, but was founded
by a Pole, M. Louis Wolowski, who became, in
1830, a professor at the " Conservatoire des Arts et
Metiers." He had seen in his own country the work
of the Land Bank and was astonished not to see
a similar institution in France ; he worked for
many years (from 1835) to convince the French
economists and financiers of the necessity of setting
up a similar institution. After years of laborious
propaganda in the Press and at the Constituent
Assembly of 1848, the Land Bank of France was
finally set up in 1852. l
Attracted by the freedom accorded to immigrants,
ten thousand colonists with their families, artisans
and spinners, installed themselves at Lodz, at
Zgierz, at Pabianice, Zyrardow; and Ozorkow. They,
brought with them a perfection of technique, the
1 A. Rouillet, " L. Wolowski." Paris, 1881.

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 155
product of assiduous toil. They became a great
factor in the economic and social development of
the country. The favourable condition of the
tariffs also materially contributed to the industrial
prosperity of the country. The Congress of Vienna
had guaranteed absolute freedom of commerce
between the Kingdom of Poland and the Polish
provinces of Prussia and Austria. Commerce was
equally unrestricted (up to 1882) between Poland
and Lithuania, Volhynia, Podolia, and the Ukraine.
Polish merchants travelled freely through Russia.
After 1830 self-government was suppressed. A new
system was established which was very unfavour
able to Polish industry. Here it was that the Bank
of Poland intervened. In Lodz, industry made
great strides. In 1835 machines worked by steam
were introduced, railways in 1848. Russia did
awa}' with the tariff as regards Poland in 1859,
and so opened a way for Polish commerce into
Russia and Asia. The peasant reform threw an
abundance of labour on the market ; not all the
peasants had been endowed with land, and so
thousands drifted into the towns. From 1850 to
1870 the value of Polish manufactures has increased
sixfold. In 1877 Russia abandoned her old system of
tariffs. Under the protectionist regime Lodz had
succeeded wonderfully. The well-known English
economist Hobson calculated (in 1894) the pro
portion in which the towns of Europe had increased
in size. In the case of Glasgow this increase

156 POLAND AS AN
amounted to 970 per cent., of Berlin 660 per cent.,
of Lodz 1,361' per cent. Foreign capital, French,
English, and above all German, flowed in abundance
into the country. In the district of Sosnowice, and
in Czestochowa, which even up to the middle of
the nineteenth century was merely a hunting
ground, the resort of Silesian magnates, on account
of its richness in game, industry made a tremendous
advance in a very short time. Great industrial
towns arose where, hitherto, there had been only
pine forests and desolate sand-dunes. Such towns
are found in America ; their sole monument is
a factory chimney, they are without traditions.
Sumptuous palaces set at defiance the misery that
exists around them. These are the towns which
suck into their whirlpool millions of souls, and
bring forth millionaires with the multitude of their
riches. Lodz is an enormous city, whose sole claim to
beauty lies in the dignity of immense industrial
undertakings. Day and night there is ceaseless
activity. Masters and men alike bow before the
implacable rod of labour, in this city of 800,000
working population. The strident call of the siren
awakes the people from sleep and calls them to'
rest. It is also the passing bell of the dead, the
regulator of the whole life of the community. In
the streets, dragging huge trucks laden with cotton
or wool, surges a vast throng. Every race, language,
and religion is represented here. In 1895, out of
every hundred only forty -two were natives of Lodz.

INDEPENDENT. ECONOMIC UNIT 157
In 1900 Lodz contained a population of 227,000
workmen. She was the new Colchis -, towards her
the Argonauts of the world set sail. The fame of
this wonder-city was noised abroad, in which " the
possibilities were unlimited." Towards the land
of promise turned beggars, capitalists, manufac
turers, German merchants, peasants, Jews, im
poverished noblemen of Russia. In the infernal
struggle round the Golden Fleece many made their
fortunes, many more died in the attempt.
The whole country stretching to the German
frontier became one vast factory. From Nowo-
Radomsk and Czestochowa, which is famous
throughout the Catholic world for the miraculous
image of Our Lady, and is at the same time a
great industrial centre ; from these towns to the
frontier there is nothing but a forest of immense
chimneys. Nowo-Radomsk has a furniture factory,
whose products are called in Paris " Viennese "
furniture ; Rudniki, lime and cement works ; Czesto
chowa, great factories for textile and metal goods.
The metal trade is predominant in Myszkow, textiles
in Zawiercie. Then comes the mining industry of
Sosnowice and Dombrowa. This land of factories
is only divided by the German, Austrian, and
Russian frontiers, across which numberless wagons
pass daily. Thousands of artisans cross during
the fete-day from Sosnowice, which is in Russia,
to Katowice, which is in Germany. On both sides
of the frontier there is the same race. They ;are
all Poles by the great universal law of assimilation,

158 POLAND AS AN
split up by artificial means, waiting only for
liberty to weld themselves again into a composite
whole. For thirty years the language of commerce
was German. Only German was heard in the
streets. The workers spoke German, read books
in the same tongue. The papers were published
in German. Master and man alike were in the
pay of foreigners, for the most part Germans.
Gradually there appeared Polish engineers, doctors,
and lawyers ; Polish capital made its first halting
attempts to finance industrial enterprises. This was
the commencement of the nationalization of the
towns of Lodz, Sosnowice, and Dambrowa. This
movement was not encouraged by the Government ;
and it had many difficulties to surmount before
the path was clear. Before a corrupt administra
tion, the alliance of the bureaucracy and German
capital, it was almost powerless.
Polish products had been available for a long time
in the markets of the interior — Polish, Lithuanian,
and Podolian. After Russia became linked to
Poland by railways, Lodz commenced to export
to the markets of the East (about 1880). Her
exports penetrated southward to the Caucasus, and
into Transcaucasia. They invaded Central Russia
and the country of the Volga. In 1895 Polish
products reached as far as Omsk in Siberia, China,
Central Asia, Persia, and Asia Minor. In the
Constantinople market they were faced with German
competition, and on the Balcanic market with that
of Austria. In the course of a few years com-

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 159
mercial travellers from Lodz were to be met in
Spain and in South Africa. Since 1870 the textile
industries of Poland have increased 700 per cent.
There are 3,000 factories in existence, large and
small, employing 289,000 workmen.
Two words concerning the metal industry— in
1814 there were 46 furnaces for casting iron. The
Polish minister Lubecki set up the first metal works
in Warsaw. The Bank of Poland founded another
at Dombrowa, which is now the property of French
capitalists, having its office in Paris. The pro
hibitive tariff (1868) led a large number of
foreign metallurgists to build great furnaces all
along the frontier. The iron and steel output in
1911 was 3,704,000 tons ; this represented the out
put of 18,000 workers.
The question is often asked : If Poland were
free, how could she hope successfully to organize
her economic life without support from the markets
of the East? Her industry, it is affirmed, produces
for foreign consumption. What would become of
the great factories bristling with chimneys, what
would become of the legions of workmen, genera
tions of whom have followed the same trade, if a
world-wide upheaval rendered Poland independent?
The reply to these fears lies in the great law of
adaptation. The desire to live will always surmount
these difficulties. Alsace-Lorraine is a case in
point. Alsace was an ancient centre of the textile
industry. In the fourteenth century linen and
wool workers were spread all through Alsace, and

160 POLAND AS AN
in 1743 the first experiments were made in printing
cloth. The great pioneer of cotton was named
Koechlin, and in a short time the great Alsatian
industry had sprung into existence. The cotton
industry embraced almost the whole of Alsace. All
buyers of printed calico went to Alsace to make
their purchases. From the time when Mulhausen,1
a free town, was annexed at her own request ,'by
France in 1798, there was nothing to impede her.
industries, which had been cramped until then by
the duties levied by France on all manufactured
goods. The vast conquests of the Empire opened
for her a huge field for commerce. Coloured cloths',
spinning, weaving, engineering, chemical products
(industries which bear a striking analogy to those
of Lodz), made of Mulhausen a great industrial
centre. This town became (and remained so until
1870) the industrial capital, not only of Alsace,
but of the six departments, the Upper and Lower
Rhone, the Vosges, the Doubs, the Upper Saone,
and the Meurthe. " Mulhausen," said King
Charles X in 1828, " is the capital of French
industry." But disaster came. The annexation of Alsace
had the effect of a blow from a club ,- the country
was stunned by it. The reign of terror to which
she was subjected gave her a feeling of impotence.
Like a man disarmed, she was face to face with
an inexorable power. What would be the fate of
1 R. Levy, " Histoire Economique de l'lndustrie cotoniere
en Alsace " (1912).

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 161
unhappy Alsace, the limb cut from the bleeding body,
of France? She was one of the most prosperous
countries in Europe. What would be the economic
consequences of her separation from France and
her amalgamation with Germany? She was shut
out from the market for which her products were
intended. She was forced to turn to Germany,
and make a new market there, struggling against
other methods of commerce, and in the face of
enmity. What was the outcome of this period?
The manufacturers were faced by many problems.
Ruin seemed to be before them. But the men of
eminence did not give up hope. They made
numberless attempts, and at last succeeded in
gaining approval at the peace preliminaries for the
export of goods into France on a graduated scale.
A description of this method is found in the
" Souvenirs " of Monsieur Dollfus, a great manu
facturer of Alsace. He was the salvation of Alsace,
by, gaining permission to export into France
about £14,000,000 of merchandise ; this was
towards the end of 1872, so that industry had had
one and a half years to adapt itself to the new
order of things. This it accomplished by taking
the bull by the horns. Behind was a glorious
past : industrial traditions, a unique staff, and work
people of the first class. Victory was the outcome
of perseverance. Into her factories were introduced
all the improvements that had been invented during
forty years of sorrow. This example of Alsatian
perseverance is a good augury perhaps for the
11

162 POLAND AS AN
friends of Polish industry. She can accommodate
herself to all conditions. She will never give way
to despair. In the first place the market nearest
to hand will be restocked, that is, the Polish market,
which is so much the firmer. The treaties of
Vienna, of 1815, drawn up by the participating
Powers — between Russia and Austria, Russia and
Prussia, Prussia and Austria — still considered that
as far as tariffs were concerned the whole country
inhabited by Poles was one territory. Navigation
on all the rivers and canals of Poland was to be
free for all the inhabitants. The Powers declared
k(Art. 28) that all the products of the Polish
provinces, considered as such before the first
partition, might be exchanged free of duty. This
included the land between the Dwina, the Dnieper,
the Dniester, the Oder, and the sea, together with
Western Prussia.
Soon the dust of time covered the leaves of the
treaties, and when in the Prussian Chamber
Deputy Niegolewski, in 1861 (22nd April), implored
the Government to uphold the stipulations of the
Congress of Vienna, he was greeted by the smiles
of his colleagues and indescribable amazement on
the part of the ministers. The Treaty of Vienna
was regarded then as a " scrap of paper." The
same fate was reserved for the Polish claims in
1879, during the discussion of the question of tariffs.
The Poles asked the German Government to take
into consideration, at the time of the conclusion
of the commercial treaties with Russia and Austria,

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 163
the rights guaranteed to Poland by the Treaty of
Vienna relating to the political and commercial
unity of all the Polish provinces included within
her territories before 1772. The imperturbable
serenity with which Bismarck brushed aside these
claims can be imagined.
A home market supplying 20,000,000 inhabitants,
who up to that time had bought from other
markets, German or Austrian, would prove a
compensation for the " Paradise Lost " in the
markets of the East. This market was, however,
far from being a Paradise, and for one simple
reason, the competition with so-called Muscovite
productions. A desperate struggle raged between
these two centres, and every order possible was
obtained to the detriment of Polish commerce. As
early as 1826, the merchants of Moscow complained
of Polish competition, and recrimination became
continuous from the time of the introduction of
the protectionist regime.
During the year 1886, a commission, presided
over by the celebrated Russian economist Professor
Janchulle (Janzul), declared, in drawing a com
parison between Poland and Russia, that in Poland
fuel is cheaper, capital firmer, and the rate for
lending money lower than in Russia, and lastly
the relations between capital and labour were on
a better footing than in the Empire. In Russia
wages were lower, the markets dearer, and the
expenses for works of public utility more reduced.
The observations of Professor Janchulle have been

164 POLAND AS AN
endorsed many times since, both by foreign and
Polish economists. How then does Lodz come to
outdistance Moscow? A German professor, G. von
Schultze-Gavernitz of Freiburg, laid stress on the
qualities of the Polish workmen. He approaches
nearer than his Russian comrade to the type created
by the great industries of the West. He is altogether
more European. He eats better and works better ;
he is more prudent, better instructed in his trade,
more highly specialized. He does not require such
a close watch kept over him ; he is anxious to
win respect. Corporal punishment at Lodz is un
known, and fines are rare. According to Janchulle,
certain Moscow manufacturers had profited largely
by their system of fines. At Moscow a day's work
consists of from fourteen to sixteen hours, an
average day being twelve and a half hours. At
Lodz it never exceeds eleven hours, and yet work
is cheaper there. At Lodz, also, the workman
benefits by different social organizations, which
Janchulle recommended to the manufacturers of
Moscow. Whereas these organizations exist in
every Polish factory, out of 158 in Moscow only
10 possess them. These remarks, however, it must
be remembered, were made thirty, years ago.1
1 Maxime Kovalevsky, " La Russie Sociale " (Conferences
faites au College de France, Jan. 1914), says : " The intense
nature of the labour agitation which took place during the
last years of the last century, and the first years of this, forced
the Government to inquire into the conditions of the town
workers. A law had been passed creating a factory inspector,
and forbidding women and children to work full time. The

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 165
What were these organizations? A pharmacy,
a restaurant, schools, a co-operative society in
premises given by the manufacturer, dwellings for
the employees, a home for the aged and infirm, a
savings bank, and a superannuation fund— all of
these were to be found.
In the struggle between Lodz and Moscow, the
manufacturers of Moscow had a very great advan
tage. The cost of transport for merchandise sent
to the Eastern markets was much more costly from
Lodz, namely an increase of 45 per cent, on goods
sent to Wladikawkaz, and 180 per cent, on those
to Koursk, while a freight of cotton, in its raw, state,
sent from the shores of the Caspian reached Moscow
for 12d., and Lodz for !7d. per 36 lb. (pood).
Yet in spite of all these disabilities, Lodz remained
working day was declared to be limited to llf hours ; and in
1906 to 10 hours ; the actual hours of work were not to exceed
9 hours. But this law, as Professor Ozerow showed in his
" La Politique Ouvriere en Russie " (Moscow, 1905), has
remained a dead letter. At the same time the Government
issued orders to the inspectors of factories to do all in their
power to avert strikes. Nevertheless, if this was impossible
they were to make the workers understand that no concession
might be made to them, on the part of their employers, until
they had resumed work. Where the directors agreed to the
demands of the workers, they ran the risk of incurring grave
penalties by order of the State. Workers who would not listen
to reason were deported to their native towns. It was not
until 1912 that the Government laid down that it was the
duty of employers to look after the workers in cases of sick
ness and accidents. Not until then was a law passed
enforcing the insurance of workmen against sickness and
accidents.

166 POLAND AS AN
victorious. Workmen of a superior class were an
enormous asset in such a struggle, and Professor
Janchulle in his report has shown this to be the case.
Lodz, generally speaking, is better supplied with
capital than Moscow. Every invention, be it English,
French, or American, is immediately adopted.
English, Alsatian, and German engineers have been
there with their brains, and Lodz has benefited
thereby. The town is situated in the country of
the- Napoleonic Code, and is in the enjoyment of
the mortgage system, which has existed in Poland
for three hundred years, but which is not found
in Russia to this day.
Ten years after Professor Janchulle, a French
man had occasion to investigate the economic
struggle between Lodz and Moscow. A French
consul, M. Verstraete, said in his voluminous report
on the exhibition at Nijni -Novgorod : " The
Moscovite centre, the sanctuary of national industry,
always following the traditions and the footsteps
of the past, is the incarnation of the ancient spirit,
and this is personified in her manufacturers, the
majority of whom are Russians of the old stock.
Many of them still wear the boots, caftan, and cap,
cross themselves with two fingers, and have
luxurious abodes where they keep to their old
customs. Other customs come from' Poland.
Poland was represented at the exhibition, not so
much by tools and stock in trade, as by a great
richness of inspiration, a real superiority in manu
facture, a style so modern that it must show home

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 167
manufacturers the desirability of altering their
productions, of bringing them up to date, and
making them to please the taste of their well-to-do
customers. Polish industry is beginning to raise
a more formidable barrier against foreign imports
than the tariffs themselves. She is beginning to
manufacture Parisian productions. She represents
the new spirit. The district round Moscow is
jealous of Poland. A little before 1897, the manu
facturers of Moscow addressed a petition to the
Government asking them to prohibit the importation
of Polish wool stuffs into Russia, except on the
payment of a tariff. " This," says the French
Consul in conclusion, " betrayed the state of
mind, and the antipathy, of the Moscovite centre
to any competition emanating from' the West."1
To learn what Poland has been in the past, and
what she is in the present, it is only necessary to
study with more precision her most important
river, the Vistula. The history of the Vistula sheds
light upon the ancient condition of Poland, and
on her condition to-day. The basin of the Vistula
is like the throbbing heart of the country, and the
story, of the role she has played in the evolution
of the country is to a certain extent emblematic
of Poland's historic destinies. Her past, like that of
the Vistula, is more brilliant than her present.
Through a line of marshes extending towards the
west, where the Bydgoszcz (Bromberg) canal has
been constructed, the river formerly pointed a way,
1 M. Verstraete, " La Russie Industrielle " (1897), pp. 155-7.

168 POLAND AS AN
towards the Oder by the Notec. To the east the
Narew joined up the Bug and the Dnieper. Her
extensive domain in this way formed the ancient
Kingdom of Poland. The Vistula then was the
main national artery of Poland. Her importance
as a means of communication is testified to by
the ruined granaries at Kazimierz, the imposing
walls of which have resisted the tempests which
swept over the country from time to time, and the
still more ancient ruins of Wloclawek, which ante
date them by two hundred years. The commercial
value of the river declined with the fall of Poland ;
the partition of the country meant that of the
river. As far as Zawichost and Sandomierz it was
Austrian, to Nieszawa Russian, and German to
Gdansk (Danzig). At these places along the frontier
were customs houses, which contributed, together
with the creation of new means of communication,
to decrease German traffic to a great extent. To
bring it back again would have meant the expending
of both time and money, which was never available
for such a use. Plans had been on foot to connect
the Vistula to the Dniester by means of a canal,
a distance of not more than 40 miles. This
question was raised in Poland as early as the
sixteenth century. These [40 miles would have
established a line of communication of 730
miles. The construction of this canal involved
work on the San, the Vistula, and on the Dniester
in the borders of Galicia, and Austria never had
the money to undertake such an important enter-

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 169
prise. Prussia alone had the money. The
Vistula occupies an area of 60,200 square miles,
16,600 of which are in Silesia and Galicia,
41,300 in the Kingdom of Poland, the Provinces
of Volhynia and Grodno, and 11,900 in West and
East Prussia. With her 21 tributaries, she has
a total length of 4,800 miles, nearly 3,100 of which
are navigable. But the employment of the river
as a means of transport is not practicable yet ; no
canals have been cut, nor anything done to improve
it for navigation, except on a very short portion
of the Prussian section. Prussia alone has
spent £3,600,000 in carrying out the necessary
works. In Galicia fifty years have only brought
about the making of canals a few miles in
length. In the Kingdom of Poland nothing has
been done except in the vicinity of Warsaw. One
of the most fatal consequences of this neglect is
the huge havoc caused in Galicia and in Poland by
the annual floods ; another is the rudimentary state
of navigation. Steam-boats on the Vistula only
number 135, 75 belonging to Prussia, 55 to Poland,
and 5 to Galicia. As mentioned above, the political
redistribution allotted only a minor share to Prussia
compared with that enjoyed by the other partici
pants, in fact, one-fifth of the area of the basin. But
it was the best part, for it comprised the mouth
of the river. Prussia looked after her share,
but the others made nothing of theirs. " And the
Vistula was condemned to the humiliating role of
general uselessness. She. also," as the Dean of

170 POLAND AS AN
Nancy, M. Bertrand Auerbach,1 declared, "is a
victim of the partition of Poland."
At the estuary is the town called Gdansk
(Gedanum), in German Danzig, a beautiful old
city, the Venice of the North, with a history
full of the wonders of the past. On a wall
of the Town Hall is inscribed " Exsuperans
Gedanum " ; it is a town famous in the twelfth
century for her commerce, under Teutonic rule
from 1308 to ,1454, reunited to Poland from the
fifteenth century up to 1793, and from 1807 to 1813
occupied by Napoleon. Since then it has been
incorporated in the State of Prussia. Danzig is
also a city full of pride ; on one occasion, rather
than acknowledge the King, Stephan Batory, it
endured a siege of several months ; on another
it withstood Prussian domination for twenty years,
although blockaded on the continent and menaced
by the foundation of other commercial centres.
The merchant vessels of Danzig visited Portugal
in the sixteenth century, and voyaged as far as
Brazil in search of sugar. The Dutch found Danzig
agreeable ; they set up factories and mills ; they
introduced new methods of breeding cattle, and
the ceramic treasures of Delft. A distillery for
liqueurs was established by the Dutch in 1598,
and is still in existence ; the founder was called
Ambrose Vermollen, and was the inventor of Danzig
brandy, which has always been held in high esteem
in Poland.
1 ".Annales de Geographie," xii. 234.

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 171
Towards the end of the sixteenth century Italians
made their appearance in the markets of Danzig.
Duke Vicenzo Gonzaga of Mantua did business
there, and the Pope bought corn there at a time
of dearth. A whole fleet of boats full of Polish
corn was sent to Rome, where Pope Gregory XIV
greeted them as though they were salvation sent
by Heaven.
To-day Danzig is a flourishing town. The Vistula
brings to her the riches of many mines, Russian
salt, Polish wood, Lithuanian corn. The Vistula
is not looked after as a waterway, but the force
of circumstance is too strong. Where there are
several means of communication it is well known
that the heavier commodities, such as coal, iron, and
salt, are always transported, where possible, by
water. At Nieszawa, on the Prussian frontier, a
few years ago, 1,840 boats were counted carry
ing commodities to the value of £500,000.
Venerable oaks from the forests of Lithuania,
Podolia, Volhynia, and Russia, pines and birches
were carried to Danzig, from Danzig to Kiel,
Hamburg, Havre, and Bordeaux. Besides steam
boats, rafts pass to and fro. Although these have
fallen into disuse on the rivers of the West, they.
are still highly esteemed in Poland, where a simple,
sympathetic people, the raftsmen and bargees, spend
their life on the water. Of these 2,000 rafts, 200
come from Galicia, 850 from Poland, 700 from
Podolia ; in this way all Poland is as one on the
frontier under the same grey-blue skies, and on

172 POLAND AS AN .'
the majestic waves of the Vistula all the provinces
of Poland carry the products of her soil to the sea.
But Gdansk is a German town ! Only for the
time being, perhaps ! The Czech capital, the
magnificent town of Prague — Zlata Praha — was also
absolutely German scarcely fifty years ago. The
great Russian Slavist Pypin tells us in his
"Memoirs" that when he visited Prague in 1859
he was stupefied at finding himself in a German
town, where it was a matter of searching to find
a Czech speaking his own language. " Only
German is heard in the streets ; all the flags are
German, the inhabitants are scarcely of the Slav
type." At a restaurant he addressed a waiter :
"Are you Czech?" "Heaven preserve me," he
replied. And Pypin concluded : " An ordinary
tourist going to Prague for several days would
leave the town with the conviction that he had
visited a beautiful German city, where there were
some Czechs."
A German born at Prague, the celebrated
musician Edward Hanslick, notes in his " Memoirs,"
published twenty years later, his astonishment at
seeing Prague ceasing to be a German town and
becoming Czech. This metamorphosis is not too
difficult to understand. The upper classes in
Bohemia were germanized, and also the town, but
the people remained Czech. And it is the people
who have brought about this miracle, who have
reconquered their capital which their fathers
abandoned to the victors of the " White Mountain."

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 173
Statistics are the most eloquent witnesses. In 1848
the population numbered 120,000, more than half
of whom were German. In 1900, out of 394,000
inhabitants only 24,000 were German. The entire
Municipal Council is Czech. " Prague has torn aside
the German envelope in which she was wrapped."
In the same way the people of Danzig are not
Germans. If you talk to the fishermen on the
quay-side, to the women of the people, or with
the peasants who come into the town on market
days, it is clear that they are not German. But
what are they then?
By the shores of the sea which ought to be
called, and which will be called one day, the Polish
Sea, in Kachoubian Switzerland, in the midst of
the plains marked with sand-dunes among smiling
lakes, there dwells a people numbering some
hundreds of thousands, a joyous, healthy people:
the Kachoubes. Polish grammarians do not agree
on the subject of their language. Some consider
it as a Polish dialect, others as having its origin
in the Slav tongue, a third, the younger school
(and these are perhaps right), see in it the remains
of an ancient language, " Lechite," which has been
extinct since the commencement of the eighteenth
century. The actual language of the Kachoubes
is a compromise between this ancient tongue and
the Polish language. The upper classes of the
Kachoubes have been germanized for some
centuries ; they have yielded to the attraction of
Prussian culture. On the other hand, the German

174 POLAND AS AN
colonies established some centuries ago with
Teutonic thoroughness have tended to become
Polish in their characteristics. One influence strove
with the other, and the colonists were in the
ascendant. The Polish Republic was so tolerant
that she addressed messages to them in German.1
To-day all these colonists have become Ka
choubes. The Polish element has disappeared from
castle and town, but the peasants have remained
Poles. All the learned classes arising from the
people, the young doctors, lawyers, and priests, are
Kachoubes, and have retained the civilization of
Poland. Following Dr. Maykowski, their intel
lectual leader, the younger generation consider
Poland as their fatherland. This is the reason
why Gdansk will one day become a Polish town.
In days to come the Vistula, once more the river
of Poland, will see the mounting waves of the
Kachoubian sea submerge the present town, and,
following the example of Prague, Gdansk will
become a Polish port.
The chroniclers of the town of Danzig record
that in the year 1392, 300 English, Dutch, and
1 M. Welschinger, in the Revue Hebdomadaire, 1907, iv. 5,
quoted a German Socialist paper appearing in Alsace, the
Volksfreund : " For two hundred years we have belonged
to France, and that country has never thought it necessary to
Bteal our language from us, or to impose the French tongue
on us by force. During the whole time France made no
endeavours to conquer the country, only to win it over.
King Charles X, when travelling in Alsace in 1828, apologized
to the principal personages for speaking French."

INDEPENDENT ECONOMIC UNIT 175
French vessels entered the port, and in 1490, 790.
In the fourteenth century there were bonds uniting
the commerce of Western Europe and Poland.,
Sundered by the partition of Poland, these ties
will be knit up anew. It is a necessity for such a
country to have an outlet to the sea. The Vistula
is such a natural outlet. This great river, the
mainspring of the country's economic life, will open
up vast horizons ; it will bring the Latin races
into close communication with the shores of Poland.
The central idea emerging from all these facts is
this : that there is a natural necessity for the unity
of Poland, of Poland's personality. The eminent
French Slavist, M. Paul Boyer, has spoken of the
individuality of the Polish language.1 Submerged
by the Germanic wave on the west, and by the
Russian and Byzantine waves on the east, it
has nevertheless guarded its individuality intact.
Centuries have passed, centuries of grandeur, a
century and a half of misery, of abandonment,
and finally a century, of attempts on the part of the
oppressors to cut down the national tree of Poland.,
The trunk has been rent into three. Yet the time
for its reuniting is coming. A consideration of
the material facts of the life of the Polish provinces,
united in their mineral wealth, in their economic
structure, and by the great artery of the Vistula,
forces one to believe in the possibility of so simple
an idea as that of a free and independent existence.
1 In a lecture given at the " Ecole des Hautes Etudes
Sociales" (1915-16).

176 POLAND AS AN. ECONOMIC UNIT
Surely the prophetic words that Strabo applied to
France may apply here : " This land is one and
undividable, not by Chance, but by the action of
some great far-seeing mind."
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Kelties. The Statesman's Year Book (1915).
Kbzyzanowski, A., & Kumaniecki, K. Statistical Tables of the Kingdom of
Poland. Cracow, 1915 (in Polish).
Zaleski. Comparative Statistics of the Kingdom of Poland, 1876, 1901, 1913
(in Polish).
Statistical Annual of the Kingdom of Poland. Warsaw, 1914 (in Polish).
Vidal de la Blache. Tableau de la Geographie de la France. Paris, 1903, p. 7 ff.
Polish Geographical Dictionary, Vol. VIII, p. 601 ff. ; article " Poland," by
the eminent geographer, W. Nalkowski (in Polish).
Bujak. Galicia, 2 vols. Cracow, 1908-10 (in Polish).
Caspabi. Miscellaneous articles in the Polish economic review Ekonomista,
1908-12. Warsaw.
Daszynska-Golinska. Economic Independence of Poland. Warsaw, 1915
(in Polish).
Szczepanski, A. State of the Industrial Production of Galicia in 1910. Lwow,
1912 (in Polish) ; the same in the Revue Politique et Parlementaire,
Vol. LXXX, pp. 509-22 (1914).
Woycioki. Les Classes ouvrieres dans le Boyaume de Pologne. Louvain, 1909.
Zukowski. Commercial Balance of the Kingdom of Poland. Warsaw, 1901-04
(in Polish).
Bielschowsky, F. Textilindustrie des Lodzer Rayons (in Professor Sohmoller's
Staats und Sozialwissensclmftliche Forschungen, Band 160). Leipsic, 1912.
Von Schultzb-Gavebnitz. Volkswirtsohaf tliche Studien aus Russland. Leipsic,
1899.
Tanschul. Beport on Exploration of Industry in the Kingdom of Poland (in
Bussian). Petrograd, 1888; the same in the Bussian review Vyestnik
Jewropy. Petrograd, 1890.
Hobson, J. A. The Evolution of Modern Capitalism. London, 1898.
Kosziitski, St. The Great Industry in the Kingdom of Poland (in Polish).
Warsaw, 1901.
Wittschevsky, V. Russlands Handels- Zoll- und Industrie-Politik. Berlin, 1905.
Vebstbaete, M. La Russie Industrielle, £tude sur l'Exposition de Nijni-
Novgorod. Paris, 1897.
Die wirtschaftliche Lage Galiziens. (Six leotures by Professors Bujak, Buzek,
Stefczyk, Twardowski, and Zaranski.) Leipsic, 1913.
Bymab. Oil Industry of Galicia (in Polish). Cracow, 1914.
Zabanski. On the Oil Industry (in Vienna Parliamentary Beports for the
year 1910, No. 903).
Piechowski. Vistula as a Commercial Eoad (in the Polish economic review
Ekonomista, 1905).
Keller, H. Memel- Pregel- und Weichselstrom, Vol. Ill, p. 248 ff. Berlin, 1899.
Auerbaoh in the Annates de Oiographie, Vol. XIII, p. 234 ff. Paris.
Romeb. Vistula (in the Polish review Kosmos, 1902, pp. 61-120).
Sawioki, L. Hydrography of Poland (in the great Polish Enoyolopedia published
by the Polish Academy of Cracow, 1913, p. 266 ff.).
Pawinski, A. E. Batory and Gdansk (in Polish). Warsaw, 1877.
Ropell. Gesohichte Polens, Vol. I, p. 8 ff. 1840.

AN OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY
OF POLISH LITERATURE

BY
JAN de HOLEWINSKI
With a Preface by
G. P. GOOCH

12

PREFACE
It is better for a nation to lose its body than its
soul. If the soul dies, it cannot be restored ; but if
it endures, a new body will be created for it in the
fullness of time. The Polish State ceased to exist
over a century ago. Yet her bitterest enemy would
not dare to contend that Poland is dead. Her sons
are compelled by a cruel fate to slay each other in
the armies of Germany, Austria, and Russia; but
they never forget that they are brothers. They cling
tenaciously to the hope that the colossal crime of
Partition will be undone, and they are resolved that
their nation, which played an honourable part in
building up the civilization of Christendom, shall
once again raise its head and be numbered among
the States of Europe. They know that even after
a total eclipse the sun shines forth again as brightly
as ever.
Since 1795 the soul of Poland has been kept alive
and nourished by its literature, its language, and its
religion. This little book explains with admirable
clearness and brevity the part which literature has
played in the life of the race. For many centuries
Poland was one of the largest countries in Europe,
and she has never cut herself off from the movements
which make up its intellectual history. Cracow
179

180 PREFACE
University was founded in 1400, and the fifteenth
century brought with it the invigorating influence
of humanism. The first blossoming period of Polish
letters was the century of the Reformation, when
Kochanowski, the contemporary and friend of Ronsard,
presented his countrymen with their first poetical
masterpieces. The sterility of the seventeenth century
is attributed by our author to the paralysing influences
of Jesuitism; but the closing years of the Polish
State witnessed a marked revival of taste and pro
duction, due to French classicism and owing much
to the fostering care of Stanislas Poniatowski, the
last King of Poland.
The best evidence of the vitality and virility of
the Polish nation is that its finest literary achieve
ments are subsequent to the period when its body
was torn asunder. The greatest name in Polish
literature is that of Mickiewicz, the leader of the
romantic movement, who found a welcome and a
chair in Paris when he was exiled from his native
Lithuania. His most famous ivork, " Pan Tadeusz,"
has appeared in English dress, and his national
ballads are sung by Poles throughout the Old World
and the New. Long after his death his remains
were brought to the Cathedral of Cracow, the resting-
place of Kosciuszko and many another hero.
Next to 1795 the year 1863 is the saddest date in
Polish history ; for in that year the few privileges
which Russian Poland had retained were swept away.
Our author tells its that it closed the romantic age
of literature and ushered in a period of positivism
and utilitarianism. But as the luminous star of

PREFACE 181
Mickiewicz rose in the generation that followed the
Partition, so the robust personality of Sienkiewicz
brought comfort and stimulus in the dark years
which followed the great revolt. " Quo Yadis," that
picture of the glory and shame of Imperial Rome,
is knoivn all over the world, for it has been translated
into more than thirty languages ; but for Poles the
significance of their great compatriot lies above all
in his Polish historical novels, "Fire and Sword" and
its successors, the famous trilogy which makes the
seventeenth century, with its fierce passions and
desperate struggles, live again.
England has always felt a sympathetic interest
in the Polish race, though she has never been able
to render it much assistance. But to-day our fortunes
are more closely united. From the welter of blood
and tears we look for the emergence of a new Polish
State, purified and strengthened in the fires of
adversity. If our dream is realized, a new chapter
will speedily be added to the History of Polish
Literature. G. P. GOOCH.

AN OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY
OF POLISH LITERATURE
The outward signs of the life of nations do not
consist alone in the national institutions pertain
ing to political independence, therefore the nation
which has ceased to be politically must not entertain
a doubt of its existence : verily, if a nation has
developed its spiritual powers and its national genius
to the highest measure, and if its spiritual achieve
ments contain the elements of and contribute to the
universal culture and civilization, that nation can
always say with hope and pride : " I create, so
I am." '

For the first few centuries after Poland asserted
herself, in 964, as an organized State, the low level
of culture and the rule of the sword, necessitated
by the constant warfare on the eastern frontier
and the bitter struggle against the German preda
tory instincts in the west, created an atmosphere
in which literary propensities met with little en
couragement. The spiritual nourishment of the
people was myth and legend, born of old ; some
1 Paraphrased quotation from A. Swietochowski : " Political
Indications " (1883). 183

184 AN OUTLINE OE THE
of these, of great beauty, have come down the
ages and still live among us.
It is only in the twelfth century that we meet
with more extensive works than manuscripts con
sisting of a few leaves. The Polish language had
no existence in the writings of these times ; the
chronicles of Gall (Gallus) and of Kadlubek, called
Magister Vincent, dating from the second half of
the twelfth century, were written in Latin, the lan
guage brought in the tenth century to Poland by
the priests. In Latin also were written all the
liturgic books and official documents.
About the year 1400 the nobility began to rebel
against the predominance of the caste of priests,
who, being the only educated element, used all
their influence to direct the destinies of the country.
The current of humanism, which about that time
began to filter into Poland, broadened the minds of
the nobility, and helped them to understand the
power of knowledge as a weapon in their struggle
against the priesthood. Humanism came to them
before it reached Germany, which country in the
fifteenth century was intellectually much inferior
to Poland. The nobles began to strive for educa
tion, and great was their enthusiasm for the Greco-
Roman culture. The 22nd of July, 1400, is the
date of the inauguration of the University of
Cracow, then the capital of Poland. This Univer
sity had four faculties : medicine, law, philosophy
and theology — this last, the oldest, existing since
1367, gave the tone to the University. Among

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 185
the most eminent representatives of Polish
humanism are Celtes, Kallimach, and Gregory of
Sanok, all of whom lived in the beginning of the
fifteenth century. One of the best writers of this
epoch was Erasmus Ciolek, called in Latin Vittelus,
or Vitelinus, Canon of Cracow and Bishop of
Plock, born 1460 ; a diplomatist, scientist, patron
of the arts, and King Alexander's secretary he
was often sent on political missions to Italy,
where he was well received at the Court of
Julius II, the patron of Michael Angelo. To
Ciolek, in a measure, may be ascribed the influence
which Italian culture now began to exercise upon
Polish poetry, ; leonines, Latin rhymed verses
obtained an equal right of citizenship with the
usual hexameters and distichs. Latin was still the
only literary language. Jan Dlugosz, born 1415,
the first Polish historian, as compared with others,
who were merely chroniclers, wrote his history
in Latin. Only the Rector of the Cracow Univer
sity, Jakob Parkosz of Zorawica, who died in 1455,
left a Latin treatise in which he tried to
formulate a method of writing the Polish language.
The fifteenth century produced in Poland not
only great writers but also great scientists. The
coming of Mikolaj Kopernik (Nicblaus Copernicus),
the greatest astronomer and mathematician of the
age, revolutionized science. The first Polish printed
works belong to the same century, as witness the
Paternoster, Ave Maria, and Credo to be found in
the 1475 Synodial Statutes of Konrad, Bishop of

186 AN OUTLINE OF, THE
Wroclaw. Lay prose now came to the fore, and,
although the imagination of (these times did not make
for refinement, it must be remembered that England,
even in the sixteenth century, was not shocked by
Shakespeare's gross humour. II
The Reformation, instead of provoking long and
bloody disturbances, like the Hussite wars in the
neighbouring Bohemia, only widened the horizon
of the Polish mind. Its coming coincides with the
renaissance of thought in Roland, known as the
"Golden Age" of Polish art and literature. This
name is more befitting to another — later — period,
although the epoch which lasted from 1500 to 1632
is worthy of admiration, not only for its political
splendour, but for the spontaneity of the develop
ment of its literature, the only one in the history
of the world which sprang into being, perfect and
in full armour, like Minerva from the head of
Jupiter. Protestantism was too deep a philosophy for
the masses to understand. A portion of the Polish
nobility, who embraced Protestantism and rejected
the morality of the Catholic Church for themselves,
still needled it for the commoners to keep them
in check ; besides, they coufd not afford to allow
the privileges of their caste to become subject to
the principle of free investigation preached by
Protestantism. The Catholic reaction came soon,

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 187
and the great Protestant writers of the epoch too
quickly dropped into oblivion, to be rediscovered
and appreciated according to their great merits
in a much later time.
Such was the fate of Mikolaj Rej of Naglowice,
an eminent writer and wholesome philosopher
(1505-69). The true picture of the manners and
customs of his time, with all their defects and
beauties, together with the strikingly plastic sil
houettes of his contemporaries, seasoned with an
inimitable humour, have come down to us in his
works. His incomparable " Zwierzyniec," a col
lection of humorous anecdotes, reflected a fashion
of the time which fostered two styles of writing
—the satire and the idyll ; his " Warwas," his
dialogues of " The Cat with the Lion," his " Com
plaint of the Republic " hold a prominent place in
Polish literature, but his masterpieces are the poem
" Postyla " and " Zywot Czlowieka Poczciwego "
("The Life of an Honest Man"). His language
in richness and flexibility is equal to that of Orze-
chowski and Skarga.
The greatest figure of this age, however, wyas
Jan Kochanowski (1530-84), the contemporary and
friend of Ronsard. His early poems were all in
Latin, but he soon abandoned this tongue for Polish,
over which he obtained great mastery. He was a
true son of the Renaissance, a pagan theist, in
different to the Church, imbued with republican
ideas, broad- and liberal-minded. His works up
to the present are considered as a model of highly,

188 AN OUTLINE OE THE
cultured language, which, though magnificent in
" Fraszki " (" Trifles " ), only reached its zenith in
the elegies, " Treny," he wrote upon the death of1
his beloved daughter Ursula.
History also had its representative in the person
of Marcin Bielski, famous for his chronicles.
The Catholic reaction, from among the clergy
and aristocracy, brought to light oratorical geniuses,
who condemned the disintegration of morals and
preached the return to the bosom of the Church.
The year 1543 was the turning-point in the need
of the Polish population for literature. The works
of the preacher Orzechowski (1515-66) were in
enormous demand!. A still more celebrated orator
was a Jesuit, Peter Skarga (1536-1612); the
extreme strength and purity of his language render
him comparable to the greatest orators of the
world, and in one of the fiery forecasts lie unrolled
before the Diet (his third sermon) he foretold the
partition of Poland, which took place two hundred
years later.
After this Jesuitism seized upon Poland, and held
her in its grip till the middle of the eighteenth
century. The influence of the Jesuits was enor
mous ; they ruled the minds, the schools were in
their hands, and they lowered the intellectual level
so that the literary field became almost sterile,
except, perhaps, for the traditional eloquence ; even
this became infected with ecclesiastical Latin, and
resulted in a macaronic medley, without value either
as Latin or as Polish.

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 189
The most commendable literary production of
these times is "Recollections, 1658-1659," by Chry-
zostom Pasek, a good soldier, who wrote the his
tory of his Danish expedition. He died in 1700,
but his memoirs were found and published only in
1836. Ill
The depressing influence of Jesuitism in Poland
lasted till the same classicism, which in the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries as humanism and renais
sance 'regenerated the literature of all nations, re
appeared again, somewhat modified, as French
classicism, in the shape of a fully developed, ready-
made system of ideas. In Roland the influence of
the new current made itself felt as far back as
the reign of the Saxon dynasty (August III). It
found the ground prepared for its reception by the
connections between the Polish and French Courts,
but it was the ascent to the throne of King Stanislaw
August Poniatowski (1764) — himself brought up in
France— that definitely paved the way for this
classicism, which had two< stages of development,
and may be divided into two periods : the period
of the reign of King Stanislaw (1764-95) and the
after-partition period (1795-1815). In the first
period the special care which the King bestowed
upon poetry favoured the development of this art.
Famous were the King's Thursday Dinners in the
small palace of Lazienki, at which the painters of
the day, were welcome guests and poets had the

190 AN OUTLINE OF THE
opportunity of reading their verses. This even gave
some of the works the character of Court poetry ;
but French classicism was then a new current
full of force and vitality, it uplifted new banners,
it spread new movement and new life, and begat
legions of clever and even eminent writers.
Of undeniable literary value are the lyrics and
epics, odes, idylls and satires of the King's favourite
Naruszewicz, the songs of F. Karpinski, the
erotics and fables of F. Kniaznin, the reformatory
efforts of Konarski, the writings of the . Jesuit
Albertrandi, of the priests Bohomolec, Staszyc, and
the famous Kollataj ; but the best exponent of all
the tendencies of the epoch was I. Krasicki, Bishop
of Warmia, who succeeded Naruszewicz in the
favour of the King. He was born on February 3,
1745, in the castle of Dubiecko in Ruthenia. His
first "Chats" appeared in 1765 in the Warsaw
Monitor, edited by Bohomolec, but his talent only
reached its apogee between 1773 and 1780 ; his
humorous epos " Myszeidos Songs X," his " Mona-
chomachia," his serious heroic epic poem " Wojna
Chocimska" ("War of Chotim"), his "Pan Pod-
stoli," his satires, fables and parables won him
homage on his arrival in Warsaw in 1782. He
it was who led French classicism to its highest
degree of development and ennobled it with his
talent. It is interesting to note that this classical
writer's translations of the " Song of Ossian " and
Percy's popular ballads were the precursors of the
future developments of Polish literature.

HISTORY OF, POLISH LITERATURE 191
The revolutionary hurricane that swept over
France at the end of the eighteenth century, and
provoked the shattering and violent change of
religious creeds there, had its repercussion in the
Polish atmosphere, but cleansed it only and
brought to it new ideas. The younger generation
especially was in constant communication with the
best minds of France, seeking advice and moral
guidance. Rousseau gave this often, and his in
fluence makes itself felt even in the writings .of
Staszyc, though the latter clamours for the con
solidation of the governmental power, shaken by
the institutions of the noble -republican regime and
the Liberum Veto. Voltaire had his followers :
Trembecki, Krasicki's contemporary and perhaps
his equal in talent, though of inferior moral
value, and his spiritual brother in Voltaire, Kajetan
Wegierski, the less talented of the two.
Sad was then the fate of the theatre, for scenic
art was homeless in Poland. An advantageous
change came in 1779, when, by the King's order,
began the erection of a special building in Warsaw.
In 1781 the management of this theatre was placed
in the hands of the actors, whence it passed in
1783 to Prince Marcin Lubomirski, who, after a
few months, was succeeded by W. Boguslawski,
whose merit in putting this institution on a proper
footing won for him the name of the " Father of
the Polish Theatre." In 1814 Boguslawski ceded
the directorship to his son-in-law Ludwik Osinski,
retired to his country seat, and died in 1829.

192 AN OUTLINE OE THE
The most popular playwright of this epoch was
Zablocki, a writer of comedy and satire ; his
"Zabobonnik" ("A Man of Superstition"),
"Fircyk w Zalotach " ("The Fop's Courtship"),
"Zolta Szlafmyca" ("The Yellow Nightcap"),
" Malzonkowie pojednani przez swoje Zony "
("Husbands Reconciled by their Wives"), in
part bear traces of German influence and in part
are modelled on Moliere ; they still appear, from
time to time, on the stage, as does also the comedy
with songs, " Krakowiacy i Gorale " (" Cracovians
and Mountaineers") of Boguslawski, who was a
better theatre-manager than a playwright.
F. Xav. Dmbchowski was one of the last
writers having all the characteristics of the first
period. Apart from his own works, he is known
by his translations of Young's " Night " and Milton's
"Paradise Lost."
Juljan Ursyn Niemcewicz, born in Lithuania in
1758, author of " Historical Songs," by the whole
weight of his literary activity belongs rather to
the second after-partition period of the reign of
classicism, although he was already known as a
poet and playwright in the time of Stanislaw
August. He introduced into poetry the neglected
historical tragedy, which was later much in favour
with the writers of the Duchy of Warsaw epoch.
The last Partition of Poland in 1795 had for
result a complete change in the political and social
life of the country, but did not effect any radical
change in the literature, except, perhaps, for the

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 193
depression caused by the religious reaction follow
ing on the bankruptcy of the extreme tendencies
of rationalism, and for the tinge given to it by
the same national patriotic ideas which impreg
nated the leaning towards social reforms. Classic
ism continued its reign as the universally accepted
principle, but lost its vitality ; its defects became
painfully apparent ; the striving after refinement
of form which rendered verses gem-like, thanks
to the too -uncritical application of Boileau's for
mula (" Vingt fois sur le nietier remettez votre
ouvrage, polissez le sans cesse et le repolissez,
ajoutez quelquefois et souvent effacez " ), led to
mechanical versification and conventionality, result
ing in the lack of sincerity and the loss of indi
viduality. In his essay on critics and reviewers
the immortal Mickiewicz gives an excellent account
of this epoch : " The verses of the classics," he
says, " by reason of the extraordinary similitude
of the flow of the verse, of the style, almost of the
rhyme, seem to be wrought from the same metal,
to come from the same mint."
Thus French classicism neared the end of its
days. Extraordinarily sterile poets laboriously
carved their rhymes ; they toiled over worthless
poems for whole decades. Kajetan Kozmian wrote
his ' Ziemianstwo " (" Landed Nobility " ) for
twenty years ; Wezyk translated the " ^Eneid " for
thirteen years ; and Ludwik Osinski, who made
good verses and translations of Corneille, lost
eleven years over his poem " Okolice Krakowa "
(" Environs of Cracow " ).
13

194 AN OUTLINE OE THE
This epoch also produced a species of poetry
which for its character should not be overlooked.
The failure of Kosciuszko's insurrection was fol
lowed by the emigration of great numbers of the
proscribed, and the afflux of volunteers enabled
General Dabrowski, with the authorization of the
French Government, to create Polish Legions in
Lombardy with the object of combating Austria^
and the further aim of reconquering the independ
ence of Poland. The patriotic enthusiasm gave
birth to a spontaneous " Poetry of Legions." The
chief representative of this kind of patriotic poetry
was a legionary, Cypryan Godebski. It was on
Italian soil that Wybicki composed, in 1797, the
" Mazurek of Dabrowski," set to music by Prince
Michal Oginski— the famous " Jeszcze Polska nie
zginela . . ." (" Poland is not yet Lost " ) — which
was the beloved song of the Legions, and in 1831]
was raised to the dignity of, and has since re
mained, the Polish National Anthem.
In the time of the Duchy of Warsaw steadily
went on the process of the undermining of classicism
by new elements, which bore the seeds of future
change. The imminent reaction had its forerunners
in poets like Wincenty Reklewski and Tymon
Zaborowski, still classical, but imbued already, with
the new propensities, which began to permeate the
European, and especially the German, literature.
The most talented of these forerunners was
undoubtedly Andrzej Brodzinski, who played the
same role towards the Polish intellectual revo-

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 195
lution as Herder towards the German. He
was born in Galicia in 1791 ; he took part in
Napoleon's Russian campaign, and about 1820
settled in Warsaw, where his lectures at the
University on Polish literature, Shakespeare, Goethe,
Schiller, and others, were greatly appreciated. His
chef d'ozuvre is " Wieslaw," an idyllic poem in
which traces of Goethe's " Herman and Dorothea "
can be detected.

IV
Transformations in literature are due to the
influence of great and powerful mental currents,
which are not confined to one nation alone, but
embrace the larger part of the civilized countries.
The new tendencies percolated into Poland from
Germany, which country was already, under the
English influence. It is true that German litera
ture in the last quarter of the eighteenth century
had followed new paths*— it was not yet romanticism,
but a movement that contained many of its elements.
After the theories of French classicism had been
repudiated, new aesthetic and literary principles
were created, which required that the imitation
of famous authors should be abandoned, and that
the substance and the form should be drawn from
life and reality, and be bound up with the national
spirit. This path was followed by Herder, Buerger,
Lessing, Schiller, and Goethe, all men of the epoch
of the highest flight of German poetry.

196 AN OUTLINE OF THE
In France romanticism was accepted much later,
although the classic Rousseau introduced into the
literature a fresh element opposed to the dry
rationalism, namely, sentimentalism. Chateau
briand, classic too, adopted the fantastic, and
showed symptoms of rebellion against Voltairian
ism. The lyric poet Lamartine's activity has the
same tinge, but the first decisive break with the
old tradition dates only from the coming of Victor
Hugo, who . in 1822 and 1824 threw down the
gauntlet to classicism.
In England at a much earlier date had been pub
lished collections of popular poetry ; the " Song of
Ossian " (" Remains of Ancient Poetry," collected
in the Highlands of Scotland, and translated from
the Gaelic or Erse language. 1760) ; in 1762
appeared " Fingal," in 1763 " Temora," and a col
lection of old English and Scotch songs and ballads
(" Reliques of Ancient English Poetry " ), published
by Thomas Percy in 1765. These works opened
up the heretofore unknown worlds of popular
imagination, and of the chivalrous glory of knight
hood, and carried with them another element of
regeneration— fantasy. They made a deep impres
sion not only in Germany but in the whole of
Western Europe. Then, after Robert Burns (1786)
and the Lake Poets, began a distinct drifting to
wards romanticism. The watchword was — truth
and simplicity. Then appeared Wordsworth and
Coleridge ; but the true romanticism came only
with Sir Walter Scott. Thomas Moore followed in

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 197
his footsteps, and the lyrical Percy Bysshe Shelley
added to the laurels of English poetry ; but the
pillar of the romantic edifice, and the main repre
sentative of the new poetry was George Noel
Gordon, Lord Byron, a poet of genius, endowed
with a marvellous power of fantasy and feeling,
a passionate and stormy temperament, independent
and full of noble impulses. It is scarcely neces
sary to insist upon his extraordinary influence on
the literature of the world.
Literary epochs throughout all ages are con
nected like the links of a chain and represent
an unbroken whole. In Poland the eighteenth
century, by raising the educational level and the
aesthetic standards lowered in the seventeenth cen
tury, and cleansing the polluted language, gradu
ally prepared the way for the nineteenth century,
which alone merits the name of " The Golden Age
of Polish Literature "—the age which, by the far-
reaching radiation of its influence, by the noble
character of its ideas, by the supreme value of
its creations, banishes all former epochs to the
shadow, and shines with such effulgence that it
need fear no eclipse from the suns that blaze in
other literary firmaments.
In Poland the romantic epoch lasted almost fifty
years, and may be divided into three periods : the
stage of its initial evolution commencing in 1815
and ending with the outbreak of the November
revolution in 1830 ; its highest flight between that
date and 1848 ; its decline down to 1863.

198 AN OUTLINE OE THE
If one wished to give the fundamental char
acteristic of this new literary tendency, one would
have to say that the source from which it sprang
was the unusually powerful development of indi
vidualism as a factor in the cultural evolution of
civilized humanity ; the individual apprehends his
rights, breaks his fetters, and begins to display
his power in all fields of mental, social, and political
life ; in literature individualism gives scope for
independence in creation ; the works of the epoch
bear the stamp of idealism, sentimentality, and fan
tasy sometimes carried to exaltation ; poetry has
absorbed not only the folk-lore and mediaeval
legends, but everywhere has acquired a nationalist
bias. This happened especially in Poland, where the
national misfortune, so strongly felt by the whole
nation, was bound to find its expression in the
poetry. Romanticism here did not provoke the
isolation of souls as in Germany, nor did it render
them wildly independent as in England ; on the
contrary, it drew them closer together in an exalted
feeling of compatriotism. Polish romantic litera
ture would have a much greater universal signi
ficance were it not for the European ignorance of
the language in which it is written ; yet the direct
influence of the great Polish masters may be ex
emplified in the power of Mickiewicz over the
minds of Pushkin and Lamennais ; the latter copied
Mickiewicz's " Book of Pilgrimage " in his " Word
of a Believer." Before the national ballads in-

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 199
spired the greatest poet of Poland, the way was
prepared for him by the three immediate followers
of Brodzinski — by Malczewski, Zaleski, and Gosz-
czynski ; these form what is called to-day the
Ukrainian group.
Antoni Malczewski was born in Wolyn in 1793,
and died when only thirty -three, unknown and un
recognized. He was the son of a Polish general,
and, as the fashion then was, received the French
culture of his sphere. In his travels he encoun
tered Byron in Venice. Both belonged to the same
social rank, both were melancholy and sensual,
and soon became friends. There Malczewski gave
Byron the idea for his poem " Mazeppa." Mal-
czewski's reputation rests on one poem, " Marja,
an Ukrainian Tale," now one of the most celebrated
in Polish literature. It recalls in style Byron's early
epics, though it is considerably deeper in sentiment.
Bogdan Zaleski, born in 1802, is the next of the
same group. He sang the beauty of his beloved
steppes of the Dnieperland, and, somewhat mildly
and elegiacally, the dangerous life and solitary
death of the Kozak (Cossack). One of his best-
known poems, however, is " The Holy Family," a
slightly bloodless Christian idyll. After the col
lapse of the revolution in 1831 he emigrated to
Paris, and, with the great Polish masters Mickie
wicz and Slowacki, fell under the influence of
Towianski, a Polish mystic philosopher, who exer
cised an extraordinary power over much greater
minds than his own.

200 AN OUTLINE OF THE
The third of this group, Severyn Goszczynski,
was born in the neighbourhood of Kief in 1801.
He was endowed with great dramatic talent ; his
poems, in which love takes only a secondary place,
sound like a battle-trumpet or the howling of the
tempest. His principal poem is the " Castle of
Kaniow," and treats of a sanguinary peasant revolt
at the end of the eighteenth century.
Above all other poets of the epoch stand, like
giant oaks amid saplings, Mickiewicz, Slowacki, and
Krasinski, the Polish national prophets. Of the
three Adam Mickiewicz exerted the greatest in
fluence upon the masses. He was born on
December 24, 1798, near the town of Nowogrodek,
at Zaosie, a village inhabited by a small-holding
nobility — a frequent phenomenon in Lithuania.
While still a child he, of course, came much in
contact with the villagers, who stored his mind
with tales and legends, which, as his ballads show,
were not stifled by his education at the Dominican
monastery in Wilno, where he was sent in 1808.
A particular feature of these monastic schools was
a tendency to develop subtlety of feeling as much
as the mental powers of the pupils. Mickiewicz
studied at the Wilno University from 1815 to 1819.
He was a member of both the student societies,
Philaretans and Philomatians, the latter consisting
of only twelve members selected from the best
minds among the students. " Country, Science, and
Virtue " was the watchword of these societies.
While still at the University he published his

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 201
first works in the T.ygodnik Wilenski in 1818, and
already the unguis leonis reveals itself in these
youthful attempts. In 1820 and 1821 he wrote
all the ballads in which we find the reflection of
the tales he listened to in childhood : " Lilje "
(" Lilies "), " Ucieczka " (" The Fugue "), " Tukaj,"
" Switezianka " ("Lady of the Switez Lake"), and
" Romantycznosc " ("Romanticism"), noteworthy
for its expression of the tendency of the epoch,
declaring a preference for the poet's clairvoyance
as against the dry investigating mind of the
scientist. Then he wrote the " Song of the Phila-
retans," " Ode to Youth," several short poems, and
the fourth part of his " Dziady," the first poem
of betrayed love occurring in Polish literature.
After this came an innovation in the shape of
" Grazyna," a romance in verse.
Then the poet was confronted by the grim realities
of life. Against the Society of Philaretans (founded
in 1820 by Tomasz Zan) proceedings were taken
in 1823 by the senator Nicholas Novosiltzev.
Although these societies only aimed at the intel
lectual and moral development of the students, they
could not escape the persecuting fury of the Russian
authorities ; they were dissolved, and Mickiewicz,
together with the other members, was imprisoned
and exiled to Russia. He quitted for ever Wilno
and his beloved Lithuania on October 24, 1824.
After a stay in Odessa he went to Moscow, and
there wrote his " Crimean Sonnets," notable for
their marvellous force of expression and their novel

202 AN OUTLINE OF THE
style, scintillating with all the colours of the East.
They were published in 1826. Although written in
Polish, these sonnets made a great impression in
Moscow. Poets began to gather round Mickiewicz.
At the house of N. Polevoi, editor of the Moscow
Telegrams, he met Pushkin, and a friendship sprang
up between the two young men. His growing fame
opened to him the house of Princess Zeneida
Volkonskaia. To his Russian confreres gathered
there he read fragments of " Konrad Wallenrod,"
published in Moscow in 1828, the poem in which
the sentiment of patriotism finds its best expres
sion. It is superior to " Grazyna " chiefly owing
to the greater profoundity of sentiment, the beauty
and picturesqueness of description, and the ravish
ing versification. In 1828 he moved to St. Peters
burg. There he wrote two of his best ballads,
already free from any agency, of the supernatural,
"Trzech Budrysow " ("The Three Budrys") and
" Czaty " (" Ambuscade " ), and one of his master
pieces, the poem " Farys."
In 1829 he received a passport for Europe.
Through Berlin and Dresden he arrived at Weimar,
where he made the acquaintance of the octogenarian
Goethe, the Belgian savant Quetelet, and the famous
French sculptor David d'Angers. Thence he jour
neyed to Rome, which he left in 1831 for Paris,
where he came in contact with the colony of Polish
exiles driven thither by the collapse of the Novem
ber revolution. Paris depressed him greatly, and
nostalgia overwhelmed him. He made a desperate

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 203
-effort to return to her country, but permission
^was refused him by the Russian Government.
1831 finds him in Dresden, where the third
part of " Dziady " was finished. This third
part, which in logical sequence ought to follow
the fourth, is remarkable for its lofty ideas
and its graphic representation of detail. In the
same year he returns to Paris. Here, from his
gifted pen, flow the " Books of the Nation " and
the " Books of the Polish Pilgrimage," from which
the quotation, " Inasmuch as you broaden and im-
¦prove your souls, so much do you improve your
rights and widen your frontiers," the best explains
its leading idea. Haunted by the memories of his
country and his longing for it, in 1833 he writes
the best poem known in the annals of literature,
the famous " Pan Tadeusz," which he himself calls
the " Poem of the Nobility," the most powerful
•epopceia of the age, a genre picture of the life of
the Lithuanian country nobility, in which the love
and passionate yearning for his country breathes
in every line and in every syllable. European
literature knows nQ other poetical work equal to
this ; it is unrivalled as an account of the beauties
of the Polish land which " he saw and described,
ior he longed for it."
In 1839 the Chair of Latin Literatures at the
Lausanne University was offered to him. It was
in this period that George Sand, through an essay
published in the Revue des deux Mondes, comparing
tiim to Byron and Goethe, made him known to the

204 AN OUTLINE OF THE
world. In 1840, after much pressing, he accepted
the Chair of Slavonic Literatures at the Paris Sor-
bonne, where in his lectures he proved to be the
possessor of a wonderful gift of improvisation. His
sharp criticism of the unjust French governmental
policy was rewarded by the offer of a long leave
of absence from his post, and his resignation
followed in 1844, but in 1852, in view of his great
merits and his contributions to the store of French
knowledge, he was offered the directorship of the
Arsenal Library. In 1855 he went to Constanti
nople with the idea of forming Polish Legions to
redeem his country from servitude. He succeeded,
but his hopes were destroyed by the illness which
ended in his death on November 26, 1855. His
embalmed body was transported on January 21,
1856, to the cemetery of Montmorency, near
Paris, and on July 4, 1890, to Cracow, where
with royal honours, it was laid to rest in the
Royal Crypt of Wawel Cathedral, close to Kos-
ciuszko's tomb. The nation paid this tribute to its
greatest poet.
There is no other poetic genius of such luxuriant,
luminous, ethereally light fantasy, and yet so deeply
and charmingly melancholy withal, as Juljusz
Slowacki, no other who disposes of a wider range
of sentiment. He is the poet of great hearts, capable
not only of feeling deeply but of analysing their
feelings ; in this respect he is nearer our own times
than is Mickiewicz. His imagination is volatile as
thought, flexible, darting, rich as Nature herself ;

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 205
his is the poetry of deep thought and brilliant
form. He was born on August 23, 1809, at Krzemieniec,
in Wolyn. He came of a cultured family, his father
being a poet, and later, in 1811, professor of poetry
and oratory at the University of Wilno, where
Slowacki was admitted to the public school, through
which he passed in six years, having always been
a remarkably good pupil. In 1825 he entered the
faculty of law at the Wilno University. After having
finished his studies he went in 1829 to Warsaw,
where he wrote and published his first poem,
" Hugo," in which his untried wings are still
fettered by classicism. Soon, however, he shook
himself free, and his " Kulig," written shortly after
wards, already shows unmistakable traces of his
imaginative genius.
The outbreak of the Revolution of 1830 was to
him, as to many, a surprise. He left Warsaw in
March 1831 for Dresden, where a mission was
confided to him together with a letter to General
Grouchy, who was then in London. Slowacki liked
England, where he greatly enjoyed his short stay,
hut September 9th found him already in Paris.
There he published two small volumes of poetry,
which were received with an indifference painful to
the young poet. Publishing the third volume in
1833, he wrote in the preface : " Neither encouraged
by praise, nor killed as yet by criticism, I throw this
third volume into the gulf of silence which has
.swallowed the other two." Recognition came to

206 AN OUTLINE OE THE
him later. His Byronism at this time was extreme
All six of his romances in verse, " Hugo," " Arab,"7
"Mnich," "Jan Bielecki," "Zmija," " Lambro,"
and both his dramas, " Mindowe " and " Marja,
Stuart," have in common the same, sometimes
insufficiently justified, violence of feeling and
intentional complication of action.
In 1834 in Geneva he wrote and published
anonymously " Kordjan," a drama, the hero of
which is the embodiment of the Polish national
spirit. This was the work in which his genius
fully revealed itself. Fragments of " Kordjan " can
bear comparison with the best passages from the
works of Shakespeare and Schiller. In the same
period he wrote his drama, " Balladyna," which is
slightly akin to " King Lear," but the combination
of divers elements of tragedy which, with a char
acteristic contempt of rules, he succeeds in har
monizing, confers upon it the stamp of originality ~
About the same time he wrote the tragedy " Horsz-
tynski," of which only a few fragments have
reached us. Some innocent love entanglements
drove him to Veytoux, and there, in 1835, he com
posed the superb lyrics, " Rozlaczenie " (" [Part
ing"), " Przeklenstwo " ("The Malediction"),
"Stokrotki" ("Daisies"), and "The Last Adieu
to Laure."
A journey to Egypt and Palestine contributed
not a little to the enrichment of his imagination,
and resulted in his writing " The Voyage to the
Holy Land," the " Hymn at Sunset on the Sea,'"

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 207
" To Teofil Januszewski," " Letter to Alexander
H.," "Pyramids," and "The Father of the Plague-
stricken," a short poem descriptive of the despair
of a father imprisoned in quarantine and unable to
save the lives of his children, who die one by one.
This is perhaps the best poem of the series from a
structural point of view. In 1837 he returned to
Florence, bringing with him one of his most
original works, the prose poem " Anhelli," written
in the calm of the Betheshban Monastery at the
foot of Mount Lebanon. In this poem he leads
us among the exiles in Siberia, and shows us their
sufferings and his visions of the restoration of
Poland. One does not know which to admire the
most, his unbounded imagination or his prose, to
which, disdaining the use of pathos, he gives the im-
pressiveness and voluminousness of flowing music.
In Florence, surrounded by souvenirs of Dante, he
wrote two poems, " Piast Dantyszek, Herbu
Leliwa " and " Waclaw," neither of which belong
to his best works, in contrast to his next poem, " In
Switzerland," which is one of his chef d'ceuvres.
He spent the remainder of his days in Paris,
where he returned in December 1838. From 1839
to 1841 he wrote two groups of works, with dis
tinct traces of Byronism in the first, and with the
criticism of Byronism resounding loudly in the
second. To the first group belong the dramas
" Lilla Weneda " and " Mazepa," and a tragedy
"Beatrix Cenci " ; to the second his incomparable
" Voyage to the Holy, Land," " Incorrigibles," and)

208 AN OUTLINE OE THE
" Beniowski." In the latter poem, in spite of his
abjuration of Byronism, Byron was his leader. In
this, the ripest of his masterpieces, sound faint
echoes of " Don Juan," just as much as of Ariosto's
" Orlando Furioso." His heroes are merely a pre
text, a peg on which to hang the digressions which
are continually either making incursions into the
realm of his personal emotions or fulminating
against the critics, or sending sword-thrusts into
the domain of religion, society, and politics, and
are ever ranging from frivolity and gaiety, tender
ness and melancholy, to irony, satire, and biting
sarcasm. Although his uncontrollable genius some
times overthrows the propriety of form, it is done
in such brilliant fashion, and in such vibrant lan
guage, that one waits with impatience for the
thrilling pleasure of a recurrent occasion. Later
he published the mystic dramas " Ksiadz Marek "
("Priest Marek"), 1843; " Sen Srebrny Salomei "
("The Silver Dream of Salomea"), 1844; and
"Krol Duch" ("King Spirit"), unfortunately left
unfinished. The basic idea of this last poem is
the transmigration of the soul, which, through in
describable sufferings, triumphs over evil and
reaches perfection. Slowacki died in Paris on
April 4, 1848. His body was transported to the
church St. Philippe du Roule and buried at the
cemetery of Montmartre, where it still remains.
Although Count Zygmunt Krasinski was not the
creator of the Polish philosophic-political poetry—
in this he had been forestalled by the prematurely

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 209
deceased Stefan Garczynski — he it was who brought
it to the highest pitch of perfection. He voiced
noble and lofty principles, strove for the har
monious co-operation of all social classes, stirred
universal problems, made extensive philosophical
generalizations, and so linked Polish poetry to the
poetry of other civilized nations.
No one of the great Polish poets developed in
such early youth as Krasinski. He was born in
Paris, in an aristocratic sphere, on February 19,
1812. Baroness de la Haye superintended his up
bringing, and her grateful nursling, at the age of
six years, wrote for her stories under the title of
" La Bonne Fee Marie." When only fifteen years
of age he wrote a fair-sized historical novel, natur
ally full of heartrending tragedies, entitled " The
Tomb of the Family of Reichstal," published in
1828. A certain routine can be discerned in his
next historical novel, " Wladyslaw Herman and his
Court." This was published in 1830, when he
was already abroad. He visited Switzerland and
Italy, and from this period dates the short fragment
" Exile," which he wrote, together with a number
of other works, all unfortunately lost except " Agaj
Han " (published in 1834), an historical novel, the
heroine of which was the Tsaritsa Maryna after the
assassination of the false Dmitry. In this youthful
novel, where the outline of the principal characters
is not yet sufficiently firm, he makes a tentative
effort to impress by a pathetic and sonorous
language. 14

210 AN OUTLINE OE THE
The democratic movement of these times (Louis
Philippe) in France directed his mind towards
more general problems and towards poetry, " which'
gathers eternity and the infinite under its wings."
He found himself confronted with the problem :
what is to be the result of the war declared by
the French Revolution on the ideals of the past?
In 1833, at the age of twenty-one, he wrote his
" Godless Comedy," a fantastic drama. He intended
it to be " the defence of what is attacked by the
rabble : religion and the glory of the past " ; but
inspiration carried the poet away — it did not
permit him to become an upholder of the interests
of one class, but gave him a deep insight into
the social and political movement in its entirety.
The impressive close of this dramatic poem
cries that not the fratricidal struggle, but love
alone, will lead humanity to true liberty and
happiness. The winter of 1834 Krasinski spent in Rome,
where he wrote his second fantastic drama
" Irydion," which, although placed in an imaginary
epoch, testifies to the poet's profound eruditeness
in the matter of Roman customs of the third cen
tury. From 1836 he published nothing till 1841,
then appeared the short prose poem " Temptation "
and " A Summer Night " ; these were followed by
" Three Thoughts remaining after the late Henryk
Ligeza," " Legend," " The Son of Darkness," " The
Dream of Cesara," a small treatise " The Trinity
and the Incarnation," and another " On the Eternal

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 211
Life." In 1845 he published " The Psalms of the
Future " (Faith, Hope, and Love ), in which he is
rather a publicist than a poet, and several short
lyric poems.
He died in Paris on February 23, 1859.
Sprinkled among the great stars of the literary
firmament were many minor poets, often friends
and followers of the illustrious masters. Ballads
wrere in favour with A. E. Odyniec (1804-84) and
Al. Chodzko (1804-91). Juljan Korsak (died 1855),
although a worshipper of the great poets, did not
succumb to the prevailing balladomania. The
secret of the widespread popularity of some of
these minor poets was that they so well formulated
the views and catered for the sentimental needs
of the epoch. The best known are Konstanty
Gaszynski and Wincenty Pol, a man of real
talent. Of course the critics waged a bitter war against
the new romantic tendencies. The most talented
of them, Maurycy Mochnacki (1804-34), in his
essay on the Polish literature of the nineteenth cen
tury, was unable to reconcile his German aesthetic
rules with the all-invading romanticism, which,
however, conquered him later. F. S. Dmo-
chowski's rage drove him to write a good deal of
nonsense on the subject, and only a wide know
ledge of European literature led the incisive
critic, F. Morawski, to stand by the new
ideas. The field of philosophy yielded a rich harvest.

212 AN OUTLINE OF THE
Jozef Kremer was the first to acquaint Poland with
Hegel's system. More independent than the former
was F. B. Trentowski, whose writings made a deep
impression on Mickiewicz. A characteristic sign
of the. times was that Karol Libelt desired to base
his philosophical system on the popular creeds,
and to construct a philosophy of imagination, un
like his contemporary, Count August Cieszkowski,
who endeavoured to create a philosophy of will ;
but the most gigantic mentality among the Polish
philosophers of the period was that of Jozef Hoene-
Wronski (1778-1853). There was no field of
science that this marvellous mind did not make
its own.
The fertile soil of this epoch also produced
novels in the modern sense of the word, as, for
instance, " Unwise Vows " by Felix Bernatowicz.
The historical novel had its representative in Count
Fryderyk Skarbek, Professor of Political Economy,
at the Warsaw University. The theatre was sup
plied with drama by J6zef Korzeniowski and with
comedy by Count Alexander Fredro, a man of
hearty jovial laughter, whose works have not
escaped the romantic contagion.
Romanticism is immortal ; it has outlived forms
of art and schools of art. The succeeding epoch
of positivism could do no more than cover it with
a layer of ashes, and we inevitably return to it in
the present day ; but none of our present creative
spirits is fantastic or mystic : positivism has
stamped them with its brand. The new romanti-

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 213
cism is a healthy enthusiasm that quickens to
ecstasy our feelings for Nature, love, friendship,
common memories. In few literatures this abiding
romanticism has attained to an expression of such
beauty as in the Polish.

In 1848 the world-wide outburst of national
feeling disturbed the atmosphere in Poland. It
had not for result any important political change
in Europe, nor did it lessen the Polish attachment
to romanticism, which, although it sank nearer to
earth after the great national poets became silent,
still upheld in Polish souls the hope of the speedy
restoration of independence. It was only the catas
trophic failure of the 1863 insurrection that lore
the rosy bandage of illusion from the eyes of the
people and showed them the stark reality. This
catastrophe did not kill the national spirit, but
the rivers of blood shed for the motherland, the
absence of her best sons, rotting in prisons or
exiled in long, winding processions to Siberia,
weakened the nation's physical force. Several years
of prostration and much-needed recuperation had
to elapse before the country could return to work,
under a new watchword, however, lent by Auguste
Comte's positivism, which found a ready echo in
the wearied minds of the Polish people. Romanti
cism was pushed on one side by the might of

214 AN OUTLINE OF, THE
practical reason ; science became utilitarian and
politics sober under the influence of the categorical
imperative, " Be positive ! " and all became positive^
even poetry.
The most prominent representative of this epoch
—still living to-day — is Alexander Swietochowski,
the champion of reason and the rights of man.
He was a good author but a better publicist, and
his influence upon the Polish mind was very deep.
His generation, however, cannot boast a single
genius, a single hero. It was several years before
the national pulse quickened and the literature
gathered force and once more spread its mighty
branches abroad in the face of the sun. Meanwhile
the prevailing positivism directed the minds towards
scientific research ; historical studies undertaken
in Lwow and Cracow gave important results. In
the domain of belles-lettres about 1880 Jozef
Ignacy Kraszewski still held undisputed sway.
This exceedingly prolific author was not of the
race of eagles, but, had he no other merits, we
should be indebted to him for the staunching of
the flood of cheap French novels and their replace
ment by his own works, imbued with a warm love
of the nation and its history, in which subject he
was profoundly versed.
Positivism found its best exponent in the person
of Eliza Orzeszko (Orzeszkowa). Her novels are
hymns of praise to the ideals of progress, know
ledge, duty. She has shown great intuition in
grasping the character of the then nascent social-

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 215
ism in Poland. ¦, Her " Meir Ezofowicz " is the
defence of the man in the Jew.
The novelist J. Zacharjasiewicz gave us pseudo-
progressive novels confined to a narrow circle of
domestic virtues. One of the very few writers of
this epoch to fight against Philistine tendencies and
resignation to fate was T. T. Jez, who died in
1915, as an exile in Switzerland. Of his numerous
works the novels dealing with the Southern Slavs
are especially attractive. Among the Galician pro
gressists the most popular was M. Balucki, a faith
ful henchman of the lower middle-class as of a
free and conquering social element. A defender
of the ideals of the same class, but with a much
greater breadth of understanding, was the satiric
and witty Jan Lam.
The " Magnus Parens " of modern Polish poetry
was Adam Asnyk, a man of delicacy of sentiment
rather than any robuster qualities. In his younger
days he had dreamed a dream of souls who feel
their power, but after the collapse of the last Polish
insurrection, in which he took part, a deep change
came to the poet's mind. He then gave his country
in beautiful crystalline musical lyrics the result of
his long logical meditations. But it was left to
Marja Konopnicka, the greatest of Poland's
women-poets, to add a new string to the poet's
lyre : the people, in the modern acceptance of the
word. To her powerful talent are due many
literary achievements of rich and varied form ; one
of the latest is " Mister Balcer in Brazil," the

216 AN OUTLINE OE THE
people's epopee, as " Pan Tadeusz " of Mickiewicz
is the epopee of the nobility. It stands out not
only as a literary landmark, but as a frontier post
in the culture of the people ; it signifies that the
nation has risen above the class spirit, and has
admitted the people to its Pantheon.
Other poets of this epoch of the disintegration
and failure of positivism were W. Gomulicki, a
son of rationalism, the first prominent and the
most refined representative of what is called " The
School of Parnassus",; Cz. Jankowski, an excel
lent lyric poet and a brother spirit of Baumbach
and Heine, without the poison of Heine's sting ;
A. Urbanski, K. Brzozowski, both singers of hero
ism and martyrdom, and W. Stebelski, noteworthy
only for the fact that in his works sound the first
strains of a further stage of development in the
evolution of literature— of decadence.
The plays of the epoch do not testify to the
existence of any great talent among the playwrights.
There was, however, Jozef Szujski, historian, author
of several important works, whose occupation as a
professor of the University did not estrange him
from literature, and who wrote historical dramas
full of hopeless bitterness. Other theatrical fields
were taken possession of by the mediocrity.
Musical comedy (operette) and farce had a French
flavour, and comedy, deep in the grey realities of
life, did not dazzle by the radiance of the authors'
talent. During the chilly era of positivism the mass of

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 217
country gentry, stranded on the pavements of the
town by the economic crisis due to the policy of
the Russian Government, were forced to change
their skins, but in the new envelope of an employe
or an engineer still dwelt the soul of the nobleman
of yesterday, with all its wealth of instincts and
traditions ; their adoration of the past and love
for the national distinctiveness were bound to burst
the crust of self-criticism and utilitarianism. The
inevitable reaction came, and created the atmo
sphere necessary to Henryk Sienkiewicz for the
full development of his potent individuality. The
democratic and progressive was his preferred type
in his early novels, but the moment the first pro
test against positivism became audible, Sienkiewicz
turned towards the past and spread its treasures
magnificently before the nation. His trilogy
" Ogniem i Mieczem " (" By Fire and Sword " ),
" Potop " (" The Deluge " ), and " Pan Wolody-
jowski " are not books, but great deeds. The nation
was yearning for a stimulus, was panting for fuller
breath, and it received a whirlwind of memories
and enthusiastic visions. Although his heroes are
average men, not of the race of philosophers, this
incomparable artist has made them so extraordi
narily plastic that they live to-day among the people
as indubitable historical truths. He is a master in
the art of stirring the deepest emotions, as may
be found by the readers of his short stories and
his less voluminous works, but he is too great
a plastic artist to be quite fortunate in his search

218 AN OUTLINE OE THE
for ideas in the modern whirlpool of psychological
conflicts. The intrinsic value of his novels, " With
out Dogma" and "The Family of Polanieckis," is
due alone to his immense talent, which made
" Without Dogma " a masterpiece of descriptive
psychology, though, against his intention, it is
rather a tragedy of love than of faith, just as " The
Family of Polanieckis " is an attempted synthesis
of all the spiritual elements of the epoch, for which
he tried to discover a formula. The moment he
returned to the domain of history he created two
chefs d'ceuvre, the world-famed " Quo Vadis " and
" Cruciferi," both planned on an heroic scale, and
studded with gems of untold beauty. " Cruciferi "
is a story of love, masterfully embroidered on the
background of the historic struggle of Poland
against Germanism. It is very characteristic of
Sienkiewicz that, having brought the language to
the acme of vigour and purity, he uses it as a
painter uses the colours of his palette. He acts
upon the mind through the eyes ; one could almost
say that he writes with as potent a brush as that
of Matejko, and his strokes are as powerful as
those of Michael Angelo's chisel. The Nobel prize
and the national gift of a piece of land in token
of admiration were but a feeble expression of the
universal appreciation of his talent.
From 1883 Warsaw was ruled by his Excellency
General Hurko and his wife Maria Andreievna.
Jankulio raged then at the head of the Board of
Censors, and Apuchtin as the Curator of the Polish

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 219
Educational District. Then began the extermina
tion of all that was Polish— the bleeding of Lithu
ania, the strangling of Podlasie. To heap up the
measure, in 1885, Bismarck, in his anti-Polish
madness, raised the cry of " Ausrotten." This
stirred the Polish national spirit to its depths.
The country people, on whom the brunt of the
persecution fell, became an object of purely social
sympathy and caxe. A movement was started, and
in it Jan Kasprowicz found his inspiration, and
gave to literature the real peasant, heavy but strong,
his broad bosom filled with the love of his land, to
which he is bound by every fibre of his being.
This epoch fostered a hardy and warlike gene
ration, straining its force to the greatness of its
task, and not choosing the task commensurate with
its strength. There is Napierski, the analyst of
his reflections ; there are the youthfully fiery tem
peramental poets, Nowicki and Andrzej Niemo-
jewski ; there is Adam Szymanski, whose prose
" Sketches " have the melancholy of a song of
Siberian exiles ; there is the optimistic Boleslaw
Prus (Alexander Glowacki), a powerful plastic
talent, the disciple of positivism, the bonds of which
he breaks, however, when it proves too narrow
for him, an adept in accurate science and a writer
of strong, manly sentiment. His " Placowka "
[("The Sentinel") and " Powracajaca Fala " ("The
Returning Wave " ) are synthesis of feeling ; the
same synthesis runs through the novels " Lalka "
,(" The Doll ") and " Faraon " (" Pharaoh "), which

220 AN OUTLINE OF THE
tells of the young ruler's vain efforts to apply his
noble ideas of justice to the accepted order of
things. In this work, which is translated into all
European languages, Prus reaches complete inward
harmony. The eminent painter and writer, Stanislaw Wit-
kiewicz's vigorous study, " Our Art and Criticism,"
violently polemical in tone, burst open the door
for the friends of naturalism, carrying the banners
of Stendhal, Balzac, Zola, Daudet, and Maupassant.
The ideas of naturalism attracted men of great
talent, such as Adolf Dygasinski, in whose novels
and stories the lead is taken by Nature, and who
proves to possess the brain of a scientist and the
heart of a poet. Naturalistic too is Mme. Gabryela
Zapolska in her descriptions of the neurosis of
great cities. Until the neo -romantic current carried
him with it Ant. Sygietynski's objectivism and
anatomical methods linked him to the same school,
to which belong also the resigned and melancholy
Ostoja and Z. Niedzwiedzki, a misanthropic denun
ciator of the beast in man.
The last echoes of the war against positivism
sound, meanwhile, in the novels of T. Jeske-
Choinski, A. Krechowiecki, and Marja Rodziewicz,
and in the stories of Cecylja Walewska and W.
Kosiakiewicz, but the realism of the last-named
becomes dull and commonplace.
Naturalism had the merit of imposing upon
writers the obligation of absolute sincerity and of
a thorough knowledge of the subject treated, but

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 221
it was too narrow a doctrine to encompass the
heights and depths of the human soul ; it could
not last long in its initial stage, and from imper
sonal objectivism in its evolution passed into im
pressionistic subjectivism. In this form it was
adopted by the most talented masters of the craft.
Sever, in a great variety of themes and ideas,
gives a remarkably subtle feeling of the beauty
of the Polish countryside.
W. St. Reymont, a powerfully expansive
elemental nature, feels the best the characteristic
phenomena, and loves the best the unmixed poetry
of the elements. The drawing of his intellectual
types is not always flawless, but in " Chlopi " (" The
Peasants " ) his forceful picturing of the souls of
the Polish peasants and their patriotism, spring
ing from the love of their land, has something of
the grandeur and indomitableness of the elements
among which they live. This work has been trans
lated into English, French, and German. The
present war stopped the publication of his last
creation, "The Year of 1794," in which in glowing
words he paints the epoch of the last Partition
of Poland.
Stefan Zeromski, a gigantic talent, has absorbed
the elements both of romantic heroism and of the
strong faith of positivism. Throughout his works
vibrates the note of pain and bitter suffering of
his generation ; for his subtle yet keen feelings
evil is the substance of the universe, and Ahriman
always triumphant ; for him the instinct of duty

222 AN OUTLINE OE THE
is heroism. It is difficult to imagine a better har
monized compound of lofty ideals, volcanic tem
perament, and close study of the epoch than is
contained in his " Popioly " ("Ashes").
W. Sieroszewski is a man concentrated, crys
tallized, and strong. His types are inspired with
his faith in nature and man, and have the strength
and calm of statues. His exile provided him with
rich material for those delicately carved gems, his
stories from Siberia. His "Flight from Siberia"
is translated into English. In his " Beniowski "
he emphasizes the power of human genius over
the wild forces of the Kamtchatkan nature, and the
horrors of its eighteenth-century exile settlements.
While the activity of these impressionist prose-
writers was throbbing with life, the need of new
ideas, the longing for great art, made itself felt
in poetry. It could not be satisfied by the gifted
poets then straying through this realm. S. Ros-
sowski, Or-ot (Artur Oppman), the painter of the
vanishing world of Napoleonic worshippers, St.
Wierzbicki, and K. Glinski, the epigons of
romanticism, and the exquisite and refined Adam
M . . . ski, possess pleasant sounding but one-
chord ed lutes.
At the same time there now strikes as in France
for many -stringed poetic souls the hour of
decadence ; they look for inspiration in every
domain of the external world instead of seeking
it within their own breasts, and become, like
Antoni Lange, virtuosos of form but lacking in

HISTORY OE POLISH LITERATURE 223
substance. Some writers, like Belmont, Mankowski,
and Ig. Dabrowski may be defined as men " with
out dogma."
Through the melancholy of the exhaustion of
the fin de siecle the outlines of a new culture
become perceptible in the propaganda of the
poet Miriam (Zenon Przesmycki), an aesthetic
thinker, a mystic monist basing his art on the
ideas of Maeterlinck and du Prel ; but the most
arresting and dolorous expression of the modern
longings for unattainable happiness has been found
by Kazimierz Tetmajer, the poet of the Tatra
Mountains, who has asserted himself as a great
talent not only in poetry but also in his Tatra
stories, and has, perhaps, reached his full develop
ment in his latest novel, " Napoleon's Epopee," in
which he throws an entirely new light on the
famous Moscow expedition.
In its turn Cracow rears a young generation
that throws down the gauntlet to the " ancients."
Modernism is their watchword, but the substance
of the new tendency, the leading idea, is to express
with sincerity the true emotions of the moment. The
advance guard in Warsaw of this new movement
were W. Lieder, Mme. M. Komornicka, and C.
Jellenta. The Cracow group passed from impres
sionistic to individualistic modernism, and soon the
young band grew so numerous, and so strongly
felt the need of drawing more closely together, that
when, in 1897, Ludwik Szczepanski founded the
weekly Zycie (Life), all the modernists met under

224 AN OUTLINE OE THE
its banner. This weekly— a sort of continuation
of Miriam's Zgcie, which appeared some ten years
previously in Warsaw — undertook " the disinfection
of the musty literary atmosphere." All the men of
aspirations were to be found there : Miriam, Tet
majer, Kasprowicz, Jellenta, Komornicka, and the
still more recent Zulawski, Rydel, Wyrzykowski,
Perzynski, St. Pienkowski, Orkan, Mirandolla, and
Lada. These were soon joined by Stanislaw
Przybyszewski, till then resident in Germany,
where he won laurels and wide renown for his
writings in German.
The editorship of Zgcie passed into the hands
of Sever, after whom Przybyszewski, the most
talented, the most influential, and the strongest
representative of young Poland, took the direction
of the paper. This keenly intellectual, spiritually
minded man gave precedence to the soul over the
brain. For the brain things exist in time and
in space ; for the soul exist only, non-limited by
space and time, the ideas of things. It was this
soul of things he endeavoured to reach and to
sound. The spiritual force of his works has exer
cised a strong influence on the development of
Polish literature. This author has become silent ;
over his standard Time has passed a softening
hand, slightly effacing its colours, but Przyby
szewski 's influence brought to literature an element
of such depth of thought that since his time the
Ivory Gate of Poetry is closed to intellectual
mediocrities.

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 225
The modernist movement in Polish literature
coincides with the important internal social
changes. The caste of nobility lost its prestige,
and the town element, the middle-class,1 became
preponderant, consequently a genre that played a
certain role in literature— the tale of the country
nobility, with its broad gesture and its old-style
Polish humour— became extinct. The last to cul
tivate this genre were K. Laskowski, S. Kondra-
towicz, and Abgar Soltan. Artur Gruszecki's talent
is above the level of this group, although his world
of nobility is too corrupt to be true to reality.
Jozef Weyssenhoff lives in an entirely different
world—a world well born and well brought up,
a world of refined nerves and subtle aesthetic
culture. He himself is a nature of extreme refine
ment, and his tact, incomparable artistic measure,
and apparent reserve, mask a heart pulsing strongly
with the love of the land and its people. In beau
tifully chiselled language he stirs a wide range
of emotions. His novels, " Sprawa Dolegi "
(" Dolega's Case " ) and " Pamietniki Podfilip-
1 The Polish middle-class is still in process of formation.
It is true that in Poland of old there was a class of burgesses,
but, in spite of their wealth and numbers, their influence was
strictly limited by a nobility jealous of its privileges. The
constitution of May 3, 1791, gave to the burgesses equal rights
with all classes. The later influx of dispossessed country
gentry to the towns, bringing with them refinement and
culture, gave an intellectual bias to the growing middle-class,
so that now the patent to it is given not by wealth or social
standing, but by the degree of intellectual development. The
name of the middle-class in Polish is " Intelligentsia."
15

226 AN OUTLINE OF THE
skiego" (" Podfilipski's Memoirs"), are genuinely
fine, but the flower of his talent blossoms fully
in one of his latest achievements, " Sobol i Panna "
("A Sable and a Maid"), in which, together with
the poetic side of sport, he displays his deep ad
miration of the landscape and his wise compre
hension of youthful feelings and the noble impulses
in human nature. Through all his works runs a
thread of gentle satire, as subtle as the author
himself. He might be compared to Anatole France,
had the latter Weyssenhoff's depth of feeling.
The influence of Przybyszewski and his band
would have been more durable had not their indi
vidualism so completely severed art from life,
before they became aware of the asthenia result
ing from this estrangement. The most gifted of
this group of poets, W. Perzynski, complains—
With no young faith into the world I go,
No suns of hope suffuse my soul with light,
The years have rolled — so many and so slow,
Through my dark room at night.
The decadent works of K. Lewandowski, St.
Brzozowski, and even the exquisite artificiality of
E. Leszczynski bear the same stamp; Jerzy
Zulawski alone seeks a new synthesis. About this
time Jan Kasprowicz's talent returns to earth, and,
like Antasus, from its contact his poetic person
ality gains in strength.
In the bitter times that followed the instinct
of self-preservation drove the Poles again to seek

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 227
salvation in the national ideas. The bowing down
to foreign gods did not satisfy the poets. An
attempt was made by Lucjan Rydel to nationalize
the stage by the introduction of the Polish fable,
but his high artistic culture was not adequately
supported by a creative imagination. Tetmajer on
analyzing his soul discovered there the need of
" Polish Saints " ; Zeromski, Reymont, and Kas
prowicz had felt this intuitively, attaching them
selves to the landscape, the people, and the
sufferings of Poland. Stanislaw Szczepanowski
having, in 1897, sacrificed his parliamentary career
and come to Cracow to better serve the national
cause, gave expression to the national feelings in
his work " The Polish Idea and Internationalism."
His fiery appeals aroused the romanticism lying
dormant at the bottom of everyone's soul. Then
came Stanislaw Wyspianski, the man who was a
national revelation. He chose the stage as the
medium through which Polish neo-romantic poetry
should be heard again, and in soul-stirring tones
give voice to the deepest national emotions. The
national myth Was his substance, which, with all the
force of his genius, he incarnated in tragedy. The
synthesis of the yearning of the Polish nation for
might he gave in his " Legion," the antithesis in
"Wesele" ("The Marriage Feast"). In all re
spects he was an exceptional phenomenon. He
came from the world of pictorial art, in which
his labours were of short duration, but his achieve
ments testified again to the immensity of his talent.

228 AN OUTLINE OF THE
He was an artist to the marrow of his bones, a
lover of beauty, a lover of purity, and yet the
extent of his talent was such that it enabled him
to descend deep into naturalism and from thence
rise to the summit of the sublimest symbolism.
With the same force he depicts realistic scenes
and visions of the World beyond. The works
of Wyspianski, conceived in a lightning-flash of
inspiration, he chisels and elaborates, constantly
testing them with the touchstone of his high
critical standard. Death bereaved Polish litera
ture of him all too soon, but his spirit still stands,
and will ever stand, like a pillar of fire for the
enlightenment and guidance of the nation. He
marked an epoch in Polish poetry, and inaugu
rated the era of neo -romanticism. Under his
breath decadence melted away, the soul of the
nation became regenerated, and poetry nationalized.
From the seeds of his sowing sprang a host
of young worshippers of might : W. Orkan, with
his songs of the foothills of Tatra ; Danilowski,
with his vision of purity, goodness, and salvation ;
L. Staff, with the Promethean soul ; T. Micinski,
endowed with an extraordinary and original
poetical organization, is more akin to the mystics
of Spain or Belgium than to the romanticists of
Poland. Eagles are his companions, and if his
flight is lower than that of Wyspianski, it is more
sustained, more equal.
The great moral influence of the Polish poetry
of recent years is due not to its didactics but to

HISTORY OF POLISH LITERATURE 229
its high artistic value. When we read such master
pieces as " On the King's Lake " of Tetmajer, " By
the Sea " of Przybyszewski, " Ahriman Revenges
Himself " of Zeromski, " Dies Irae " of Kasprowicz,
" Legion " of Wyspianski, " Oaks of Czarnobyle "
of Micinski, we soar to such a height that we lose
sight of all that crawls and creeps upon the face
of the earth, and we begin to discern how beau
tiful, reposeful, and stimulative the God of Good
ness must have intended Nature and Life to be.
But this becomes perceivable only from the height
at which our souls begin to vibrate in unison with
the symphony of the Universe.
Poland through her literature has demonstrated
to the world an inexhaustible amount of vitality.
Moreover, her spiritual achievements contribute to
the universal culture, and it is only for the universe
to avail itself of the treasures displayed before it.

A SKETCH OF THE
HISTORY of POLISH ART
BY
JAN de HOLEWINSKI

A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY
OF POLISH ART
And only the Master shall praise us,
And only the Master shall blame,
And no one shall work for money,
And no one shall work for Fame.
Rtjdyard Kipling
L'Envoi— " The Seven Seas."
There was a time when the preconceived idea
that the Polish nation was racially destitute
of artistic capabilities had made headway in
many minds, so thoroughly and well, that few
students of the evolution of European art thought
it necessary to give their attention to the art of
Poland. Even some Polish historians (Professor
Klaczko), otherwise perspicacious aesthetes, having
cursorily skimmed through the pages of the artistic
past and found it void of Polish Titians, Michael
Angelos, da Vincis, and Velasquezs, proclaimed the
nation to be artistically sterile. The later brilliant
development of art in Poland contradicts this
opinion and shows that they assessed the nation's
capacities over-hastily, without having taken into
consideration the fact that the hoofs of war -steeds
bring death to the subtle and exquisite flower of
art, which prospers under the careful tending of

234 A SKETCH OF
the cultivator in the balmy atmosphere of luxury,
but refuses to blossom on the trampled battle-field.
The geographical situation of Poland laid her
open to every invasion of her plundering neigh
bours. The lack of natural defences had for result
that the country was constantly swept by storms
of violence depriving it of any rest, even in the
periods between the great catastrophes, which
deserve rather the name of cataclysms. Thus in
1240 the bloodthirsty hordes of Mongol savagery,
under Baidar and Peta, leading with them a
portion of the Batu horde, rolled over the land
like a tidal wave, to be stemmed by the Polish
knighthood only under the walls of Lignica in
Silesia (re -christened Liegnitz by the Germans).
Twenty years later the barbarians returned to
change Sandomierz and Cracow into smouldering
heaps of rubble. Before the latter town the
third invasion, under the Nogai Han, was broken
in the reign of Leszek the Black, but the
defenceless towns and villages paid a bloody
tribute to the invaders, who, faithful to the
tradition of Tchingis Han, left behind them only
the sky and the earth. Over 21,000 Polish girls
were carried off into yassyr (slavery), and every
man was put to the sword. Of a like character
were the Turkish invasions, and the Cossack
wars which ended at the battle of Beresteczko
in 1651 ; these Were followed by the Swedish
invasion (1655-60) of Carolus Gustavus, which,
advancing from the north, flooded the oountry

THE HISTORY OE POLISH ART 235
as far south as Cracow and Lwow ; t a study
of the further history of Poland shows a continual
recurrence of similar events even up to the present
day. Compared with these gigantic life -and -death
struggles the mediaeval inter -republican Lom-
bardian wars seem almost farcical, especially
since the profession of arms passed into the
hands of the condottieri. We may smile at the
description of those glorious battles, where a
couple of handfuls of hirelings paced and
traversed, and battered at each other's plates of
steel from dawn till dusk. Their mutual considera
tion was touching. The battle of Aughiari,
immortalized by Michael Angelo and Leonardo da
Vinci in the famous Florence cartoons, bereaved
the world, according to Machiavelli, of two heroes
slain through some misadventure. It is easy to
understand that the Master-painters of some Sienna
or Florence could quietly and happily give them
selves up to their inspiration, while without the city
walls the mercenaries so sparingly shed their blood
for the honour of their republics.1
The terrific hecatombs exacted from Poland by
the repeated invasions, which left no stone upon
another, each time broke the continuity of her
artistic traditions, because not only the works of art
themselves but the accumulated experience of the
past and the secrets and methods of the craft were
again and again irretrievably lost. Each time it
1 See T. Jaroszynski, " Zaranie Malarstwa Polskiego," 1905.

236 A SKETCH OE
was necessary to start afresh, under the most
unfavourable conditions, in a society whose minds
had been shaped in a peculiar way by the stress
of circumstances. The country was continually on
the qui-vive, and the knighthood, trained to an
incessant vigilance and a rough camp life, could
not indulge in the cultivation of their aesthetic needs.
Austerity was considered the principal virtue of
the knightSj proud of their position as the defenders
of their country and of Christendom, and conscious
that under the protection of their shields European
culture was enabled to grow and develop. They,
were the foremost of the nation, and required the
highest regard and privileges for their caste, looking
with a disapproving eye on the growth of the class
of burgesses, who, it was feared, might achieve
power through the development of industry, and
commerce. The middle-class was harassed for
luxury in dress and domestic appurtenances, and
forbidden to wear certain colours, jewels and
weapons ; for the commons the possession of
pictures was considered as a punishable offence.
With these opinions prevailing among the all-
powerful caste of nobility it is not to be wondered
at that from the burgesses, even at a time when
they were safely sheltered within the walls of their
towns, sprang no patrons of art, such as the
famous Italian parvenu, Giovanni dei Medici of the
Renaissance. It is true that the artistic disposition
of the courts temporarily spread to the magnates,
but their needs were catered for by foreign artists,

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 237
imported from the West and even from the East ;
aesthetic tastes, however, had for long been given no
opportunity of penetrating to the core of the nation
so as to awaken the national creative spirit. But in
the Middle Ages, in the time of unwavering faith,
Polish art, if it did not occupy a prominent place
among the general cultural attainments, presented
a homogeneous whole bearing certain characteris
tics, which raised it to the importance of a distinct
school. The nascent art in Poland was confined within
the narrow limits of the professional-religious
congregations, to enmesh itself later, when it passed
into lay hands, in a tangle of trade -regulations
which, in principle, put a restraint upon its further
development. In its time, nevertheless, it strongly
manifested its vitality, sufficed for the requirements
of the epoch, and in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and
the first half of the sixteenth centuries produced
works which cannot be esteemed lightly from the
point of view of the history of art.

CHAPTER I
The question as to what popular art was in Poland
in the pre-Christian epoch is outside the sphere
of artistic history— properly so called. Ethnologists
have rightly determined that the art of the people re
mains immutable throughout the ages, only becoming
gradually enriched by some new feature borrowed
from the artists — that is to' say, from the creators
of plastic art. It would be inexpedient, therefore,
to consider popular art in the study of the evolu
tionary progress of the artistic achievements of a
nation. History commences only from the moment
when art takes the shape of a profession, handing
down the wealth of technical knowledge from one
generation to another.
Such art did not spring up spontaneously, but
was brought to Poland in the tenth century together
with Christianity, with which the era of the civiliza
tion of this country opens. The level of art was
nowhere very high at this time. The iconoclasm
of the eighth century had severed it from the
classic traditions. Semitic in character, Byzantin-
ism, which was rather Church-craft shackled
in regulations forged at Mount Athos, was
commonly adopted throughout Europe even until
238

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 239
the commencement of the thirteenth century ; it
is surprising how the generation which professed
an ascetic contempt for the beauty of the body
craved for the debauchery of magnificence in dress
in their paintings ; this love of adornment gave
scope for applied art ; the craft of the gold
smith took precedence of sculpture, weaving and
embroidery of painting. A sufficient number of
the objets d'art of this period have escaped
destruction to testify to the aesthetic needs of the
nation. There are still in existence chalices, patins,
covers of missals and crosses embellished with
enamel, niello, or mosaic. From the tenth century
comes, among others, the enamelled reliquary
belonging to the Cathedral of Kujawy, and from
the twelfth century the one kept in the church of
Czerwinsk. The current of Byzantinism flowing through Kiev
from the east met in Poland with Romanism
brought thither by the monks of the West, probably.
by the Benedictines installed in 1006 at Sieciechow
by King Boleslaw the Great. Although Romanism
eventually triumphed, no traces of it are to be
found in pictorial art. The Tartar tempest which
ravaged the country at the end of the Roman epoch
destroyed both the pictures then painted on wooden
panels and the mural paintings in the churches ;
the degree of the development of pictorial art in
Poland is thus rendered even more uncertain than
its beginnings in other northern countries, where
very scanty relics still remain. France in St. Savin,

240 A SKETCH OF
near Poitiers, and Germany in Schwartzheimdorf,
near Bonn, possess the only two churches in which
are preserved paintings dating from the eleventh
century. The sole relics of the epoch, which may
be of some guidance to the student of Polish art,
are the miniatures illuminating sacerdotal books.
Although a portion of these must have come from
the brushes of the foreign clergy domiciled in
Poland, they may be considered as proofs of the
quality of the artistic culture of contemporary
craftsmen. In the ornamentation of writings Celtic
motifs preponderated, thanks to the spread through
out the Continent of Irish manuscripts, which
reached as far as Leodium and Wuertzburg, and
from there passed to Poland, where they served as
models. Stone structure was, in the country of forests,
a new feature also introduced by the immigrant
monks, Cistercians and Benedictines ; the latter
began in the eleventh century the erection of the
cathedral in the Wawel Castle in Cracow. The
architects of later generations rebuilt it in the
fourteenth century in the Gothic style, so that of
the original Roman edifice, there remain only a few
fragments of walls and the crypt. Of the other
Roman churches built in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries, the cathedrals of Plock, of Kruszwica
in the Grand Duchy of Posen, and of Leczyca,
and the walls and towers of the Church of St.
Andre" in Cracow partly retain their original style,
as do five or six smaller churches scattered

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 241
throughout the country. In a few of these still
remain sculptures of this epoch, interesting in
their barbarous endeavour to repeat the Western
forms. The marvellous bronze gates of the
cathedral at Gniezno (German Gnesen), dating from
the same period, are undoubtedly of German
workmanship.

16

CHAPTER II
Poland owes her speedy regeneration after the
Tartar debacle, partially at least, to the influx of
immigrants, especially those of German origin, seek
ing their fortunes in a depopulated country. There
were moments when the vast privileges with which
the settlers had been endowed since 1257 might have
brought disaster upon Poland, as the new-comers
threatened to denationalize the country. The Polish
element, however, eventually proved itself to possess
enough vital force to assimilate these strangers, and
this is why, to-day, foreign-sounding names are to
be met with even among Polish patriots.
The Gothic style issued from the Roman as far
back as 1160 in France, where it maintained a
specific character. With the colonists it drifted
into Poland in the thirteenth century from Germany
in the form it had acquired in that country. The
different structural principles of this style involved
the reshaping of all other plastic arts. Frescoes
were no longer used to cover the great stretches
of side-walls, as these became superseded by lofty
pillars interspaced with large windows, to which the
decoration of the building migrated and filled them
with stained glass ; pictorial art proper transferred
242

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 243
itself to the easel, to tempera and to canvas -covered
panels. From the illuminations alone, which
extended themselves to the illustration of lay works,
it is evident that the imaginative powers of the
contemporary artists must have increased con
siderably. The influence of the famous Tcheque-Praha
school, founded in 1348, made itself felt in Polish
painting in the first half of the fifteenth century;
later came the influence of the Cologne school, but
the 1467 painting of the triptych of the Holy Trinity
in the chapel of the Holy Cross in Wawel Cathedral
shows traces of the Nuernberg influence. In spite
of these influences the majority of the pictures of
the Gothic and Renaissance epochs bear the national
stamp, not only in the type of faces but also in the
landscape ; this is instanced by the painting in
which the Tatra mountains form a background to
the Madonna of the Church of St. Nicholas in
Cracow, and permits the inference that Polish art-
guilds, although they have not bequeathed to us
the names of the painters — in fact, we are obliged
to seek these from indirect sources — were numeric
ally and spiritually strong enough to maintain the
national character. The Wroclaw guild, according
to Alvin Schultz, between 1345 and 1523 produced
150 masters. To the artistic development of the
Cracow and Poznan guilds, apart from many Church
pictures, witnesses a well-conceived and executed
painting of an artist's studio, included in the " Codex
Picturatus 'Balthasaris Bemii, anno 1505, Continens

244 A SKETCH OF
Privilegia et Plebiscita Urbis Cracovioz." The cus
tom of these corporations was to send their best
apprentices for two years' study abroad', whence they
returned laden with rich spoil of technical know
ledge. In the Lwow school alone Eastern currents
mingled with those of the West, but met with little
encouragement from the Court. It is true that King
Jagiello, brought up in the traditions of the East,
commissioned Russian painters about 1393 to adorn
the chapel, called Jagiellon, in Wawel Castle. A
very fine specimen of their polychromy was rescued,
in a good state of preservation, from under a layer
of plaster in 1905. Russian painters, too, decorated
the mausoleum of Casimir Jagiellon, in 1471, but the
remains of Eastern art are scarce, as the Polish
school was guided by Western tendencies.
In architecture the Gothic style bore the imprint
of the national individuality ; the building material,
most often brick, contributed to the creation of
variety in the original style, hence Polish Gothic
is called synonymously the Vistula-Baltic style and
Brick Gothic. Among the churches that withstood
the crushing blows of the great historical calamities
are the Franciscan and St. Mary's in Cracow, the
cathedrals of Gniezno and Wloclawek, and several
others simple in decoration but remarkable for the
beauty and purity of their silhouettes.
Many sculptures, some of them! prodigies of art,
have outlasted this age and are still to be found
in the Gniezno and Cracow churches. They consist
chiefly of tombstones, sarcophagi, and figures of

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 245
taints in stone, bronze, or wood ; these last, especi
ally, Poland owes to her own masters, among others
to Wit Stwosz (1435-1533), a sculptor and engraver
of European fame, who after prolonged studies in
Nuernberg returned to live and work in the land
of his forefathers. Besides his great masterpieces
— the triptych and the splendid figure of Christ in
St. Mary's Church in Cracow— there are several
minor products of his chisel scattered throughout
this town and the German and Bohemian churches.
His great value to art is confirmed by the eagerness
with which the Germans have endeavoured to confer
their nationality upon him. They have shown their
appreciation, not only of Wit Stwosz but also of
the great Polish astronomer Kopernik, by appro
priating them both in the same way as a certain Ger
man savant, by means of scientific anthropological
apparatus, has appropriated for Germany the Italian
creative spirits— Giotto, Dante, Ghiberti, Vinci,
Raphael, Titian, Tasso, and Buonarotti, discovering
their real names to have been— Jotte, Aigler, Wiebert,
Wincke, Sandt, Wetzel, Dasse, and Bohnrodt.1 Recent
close investigations have established that Wit Stwosz
was a Pole ; even R. Muther in his " Geschichte der
Malerei " says that the paintings in St. Wolfgang's
Church, dating from the dawn of German art, are
to-day considered by Franz Heege to be the) work of
the Polish master Wit Stwosz.2
1 See Woltmann's " Die Germanen und die Renaissance in
Italien," 1905.
2 Ghristliche Kunstblaetter, No. 11, 1915 : " Arbeit des
Weit Stoss am Altar e von St. Wolfgang."

CHAPTER III
The regeneration of painting in Italy found no echo
in Poland. Cracow, teeming with the Italian
architects and sculptors summoned by King Sigis
mund I, still awaited for a long time the coming of
Italian painters. The Court painter, Hans Duerer
(born 1478), brother and pupil of the famous
Albrecht but himself of secondary talent, did not
contribute much to the development of Polish art. A
better artist than he, who arrived in Poland in 1514
and left behind him a great number of works, was
Jan Suess of Kulmbach. To the art-guilds remained
faithful only the lower classes and the poorer clergy,
who by the imposition of their naive didactic ten
dencies precipitated the downfall of pictorial art.
The decline of painting was a phenomenon so much
the more remarkable as it occurred simultaneously
with the impetuous development of science and
literature. Renaissance architecture made Wawel its first
home in Poland. The Gothic castle was destroyed
by fire in 1499, and rebuilt as Renaissance
in the first quarter of the sixteenth century ; the
purest product of this style, the northern " pearl of
the Renaissance," is the chapel of King Sigismund
246

THE HISTORY OF. POLISH ART 247
the Old, which, like other structural achievements
of the epoch, was the work of " Itali," such as
Francesco della Lore, Berrecci, Nicolo da Castig-
lione, Giovanni Cini, Antonio da Fiesole, and other
Italian architects and sculptors. The royal example
inspired many of the magnates, and patrician
residences of the epoch frequently display the
decorative motifs of the Renaissance.
The majority of the monuments in the churches
of Cracow and Warsaw belong to the seventeenth
century, though among these are many, indubitably
of Italian workmanship, dating from the sixteenth
century.

CHARTER IV
The art-guilds descend altogether to the level of
trade at the end of the sixteenth century. Painting
becomes the occupation of a few independent artists,
some of them1 indigenous, and some foreigners accli
matized in Poland. At the Court of King Sigis
mund August (1548-72) works Coraglo, an engraver
of great artistic temperament. At Gdansk (German
Dantzig), under the influence of Marcin Kober, por
trait painting develops. The Polish nation, however,
showed a greater appreciation of art only after the
coming of Thomas Dolabella, the pupil of the
famous Antonio Vassillachi, called Aliense. He was
invited from Venice by, King Sigismund III, and
being a painter of great facility of execution, left
numerous pictures and a host of imitators ; he
became naturalized in Poland as a citizen of Cracow,
where he lived fifty years and where, on his death
in 1650, he was buried in the Dominican church.
Among his pupils, Wawrzyniec Cieszynski (died
1650) and Marcin Blechowski (died 1761) deserve
mention, and among his imitators Zacharyasz
Zwonowski and Lukasz Porebowicz. Another Court
painter of Sigismund III was Jakob Troszel (born

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 249
1538), son of the famous Nuernburg clo ck -maker ;
he, too, spent all his life in Poland, and died in
Cracow in 1624.
The influence of Rubens, who painted the
portraits of Sigismund III and Wladyslaw IV, was
extended by his pupil, Peter Soutmans, and also
by the Westermans' popular engravings after the
master's pictures. This influence makes itself felt
even in the religious paintings of Abbe Franciszek
Lexycki ; the great Flemish painter also inspired
Bartlomiej Strobel, a native of Wroclaw, retained
by King Wladyslaw IV about 1642. The Court
painter of King Jan III Sobieski was Jerzy Eleuter,
an artist of great breadth of talent, who for many
years was considered a foreigner ; he was a Pole,
however, a nobleman who had better reasons for
concealing his real name, Siemiginiowski, than the
fear of " staining his escutcheon with trade." In
this time the prejudice against art had considerably
weakened and did not restrain the passion for
painting felt by Pawel Grodzicki, General of the
Crown Artillery, any more than that of the really
talented and technically highly developed painter
King Stanislaw Leszczynski.
The confirmation by King August III, on the
5th of December, 1746, of an Act raising painting
to the dignity of free art and conferring University
privileges upon the artists finally released Polish
art from the fetters of trade regulations.

CHAPTER V
The present powerful and independent art of
Poland came into being only in the nineteenth cen
tury ; the works of painters like Czechowicz (1689-
1775) and Smuglewicz (1745-1807) were only pale
semblances of Italian art in the epoch of its
decadence. Chodowiecki, of Gdansk, disheartened
by the lack of artistic stimulus in Poland, removed
to Berlin, where he painted portraits and genre
pictures, and made excellent engravings free from
the classical bias of the time.
The artistic proclivities of King Stanislaw August
Poniatowski brought to the country a host of foreign
painters; of these Bacciarelli (1731-1818) remained
in Poland for life, while Giovanni Lampi (the elder)
and Giuseppe Grassi, fashionable portrait painters,
as well as Bernardo Bellotlo, called Canaletto, the
Frenchman Norblin, and others made a lengthy stay,
in this land of hospitality. The pupil of the last
mentioned, the first of contemporary Polish painters
worthy of the name, was A. Orlowski (1777-1832),
a lover of horses, and a draughtsman of fiery
temperament finding pleasure in the rendering of
scenes full of life and movement from the military,
past.
250

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 251
Again the implacable hand of Fate struck Polish
art, ruling it out of the first half of the nineteenth
century in lines of red ; French and even German
art outdistanced it ; the dilettanti, brought up in
the traditions of the time of the last King of Poland,
bequeathed nothing noteworthy to posterity. Land
scape painting, especially, was a stunted growth.
Zaleski (1796-1877) and Gryglewski (1833-76)
painted interiors and copied the city streets with un
critical precision. In fact, landscape painting in
Poland begins only with Szcrmentowski, who, though
very modest in his choice of motifs as well as in
technique, possessed a deep and true feeling for
the character and beauty of the country. One of
the few painters of real talent was Piotr
Michalowski, a pupil of the Paris academies and of
Landseer ; he depicted military scenes and horses,
and his love of this noble animal descended to
the first Polish painter who attained to European
reputation— to Juljusz Kossak (1824-99). In the
works of the latter painter, horses were the chief
subject through which his love of romantic gallantry
found expression ; his landscapes, beautiful and sun-
flooded, are such as many of us still retain among
the joyous memories of youth.
H. Rodakowski, belonging to the same genera
tion, was a portrait painter also reaching the
European standard ; but Polish painting made its
great debut with the coming of Grottger and
Matejko. Artur Grottger's (1837-67) inspiration flowed from

252 A SKETCH OF.
the same source as did the pain of the great Polish
poets of the romantic epoch. He poured forth the
whole depth of his soul in the series of marvellous
cartoons, " Polonia," "Lithuania," and "War." These
are no mere illustrations of the historical drama:
they are rather an inspired pean, an ideal and subjec
tive synthesis in which he gives, not so much the
actual historical events but the spirit which shone
through and animated them. From his cartoons
breathe a boundless enthusiasm for heroic deeds and
an angelic spirit of sacrifice. Poland treated him as
all civilized countries usually treat their national
geniuses : she was indifferent to him during his
life, to exalt and adore him after his death.
In the meantime, only a stipend from Francis
Joseph and the help of his friend Count Pappenheim
enabled him to live and work in Vienna.
Historical painting had many adherents ; it was
essayed by Lesser, though somewhat ineptly, by
Simmler, and by Loeffler. W. Gerson was more
punctilious and accurate than these, but his attach
ment to the recipes of Delaroche rendered his work
academically chilly.
No parallel can be drawn between this group
and Jan Matejko (1838-93). He stands alone,
beyond and above all to which the name of school,
direction, or tendency can be attached — above the
whole art of Europe. A colossus of the breed of
the masters of the Renaissance, by his side the
greatest painters seem dwarfed. An automath of
genius, he averted his face from the pettiness and

THE HISTORY OE POLISH ART 253
drabness of our contemporary life and plunged into
the only real world for him— the world of the past,
which he resurrected, or, more correctly, created
again. One does not stop to consider his technique
—that brusihwork with which some clever Euro
pean art jugglers captivate the hearts of the critics
— for him it is an innate medium of expression,
and is as amazingly great and simple as his genius.
No school ever had the shadow of an influence
upon him ; he worshipped Nature alone, and for
him beauty resided in truth and forcefull characteri
zation. In his paintings the personages of the old
stiff engravings and indifferent miniatures became
again living beings, swayed by the whole gamut
of passion. From his first works—" Stanczyk,"
" Kazanie Skargi " (" Skarga's Sermon " ), and
" Rejtan "—emanates a profound pessimism like
that of the world's greatest tragedians, Dante
or Michael Angelo. A superhuman force breaks
from his later gigantic canvases. The " Battle
of Grunwald " is a mighty struggle of Titans,
an awe-inspiring melee of human bodies, em
broidered trappings, horses, armour, banners, all
painted with an indomitable impetus, though with
extraordinary realism. The wonderful polychromy
in St. Mary's Church in Cracow is another of
Matejko's achievements, remarkable for its mar
vellously subtle harmony of colour. The National
Museums of Cracow and Warsaw or the Vatican
in Rome, where his pictures are to. be seen, should
and will certainly become the Meccas of all artists.

254 A SKETCH OF
Contemporaneously with this genius, puny of
body but gigantic in spirit, Siemiradzki (1843-1902)
and Brandt (1841-1915) followed the path of his
torical painting. In the works of Henryk Siemi
radzki, in spite of the mannerism grafted upon him
by the St. Petersburg Academy, famous for its
pseudo -classicism, one must admire the purity of
colour, especially in the beautiful sun-dappled
southern landscape of his pictures, drawn prin
cipally from the past of Rome and Greece.
Siemiradzki's figures, like those of Alma Tadema,
to whom the Polish painter was spiritually akin,
have no great psychological depth but are
exceedingly beautiful and noble in line. Jozef
Brandt did not choose epoch-making historical
events for his brush, but, concerned chiefly with
the decorative side of his compositions, he
represented episodes of the past so as to combine
figures, horses, and dwellings in tasteful sil
houettes, broadly painted and richly coloured. His
" Forays," " Cossacks," and " Steppes " won him
recognition, not only in his own country and in
Munich, where he wintered, but all over the
Continent, gaining him many awards there.
His was the time of the vigorous expansion of
Polish art, young and earnest in its striving, and
full of promise. The atmosphere was charged with
new ideas, which revealed themselves in the works
of the excellent colourist Witold Pruszkowski
(1846-96). At the head of the group of young
painters then stood W. Gerson (1831-1901), re-

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 255
nowned for his historical pictures and his masterly
painting of the nude, but not yet sufficiently
appreciated for his landscapes, especially those
of mountains, which are in reality the best of
his productions. To the group of which he
was foremost belonged the old students of the then
lately opened Warsaw School of Art, H. Pillati,
Gierdziejewski, the clever humorist Kostrzewski,
Szermentowski, Bakalowicz, and others, to whose
common efforts Warsaw owes the founding in 1859
of the Society of Encouragement of the Fine Arts—
the first permanent art-exhibition in Poland.
Munich then ceased to be the only rendezvous of
Polish artists, to whom the three governing Powers,
jealous of Polish culture, refused the right of
instituting art-academies in their own country.
They began to gravitate towards Paris, the centre
of ever-fresh and vigorous art, and this greatly
aided in the elevating of the Polish artistic level
to that of other Western countries. Intellectual
Europe was then passing through the epoch of
realism ; the chief representatives of this tendency
in painting were Millet, Courbet, and Meissonnier.
In Poland appeared Witkiewicz, an excellent painter,
a polemical writer of great talent, a deep and
original mind, who succeeded in cleansing the
Augean stables of Polish criticism. From art
he required truth, precision, and depth. His
demands, however, differed in some respects from
the postulata of French realism, which took no
hold on a nation of romantic predisposition, and

256 A SKETCH OF
had but two prominent representatives in Poland
— Maksymiljan (1846-74) and Aleksander (1849-
1900) Gierymski. Both, though of quite different
temperament, had one trait in common— a love of
truth, undeterred by the struggle with technical
difficulties, which they found pleasure in creating
for themselves and successfully overcoming.
The greatest artist of this generation was Jozef
Chelmonski (1849-1914), a keen observer, who
hearkened to the earth's most secret confessions,
who espied her in her most serene moments, and
rendered all his profound love of Nature with
absolute simplicity and sincerity. In his pictures
one fails to perceive the tremendous extent of the
technical accomplishment ; in fact, one forgets the
paint ; one breathes the true atmosphere of the
glorious mornings, ardent noons, bewitching nights.
From those canvases, through which flying teams
of fiery horses gallop at full speed, there comes to
the onlooker the crisp chill of autumn or the frosty
breath of vast sweeps of snow ; before others one's
epidermis seems to feel the contact of hot gusts
of wind rushing over the Vistula sands on scorching
summer days. Rousseau, Constable, Dupre painted
landscape to perfection, but none of these had
either Chelmonski's poetry or his mystic love of
Nature. The same spirit animated the painters Wycz61-
kowski and Falat. The value of their paintings,
however, consists less in the philosophical concep
tion than in the mastery of execution. Wycz61-

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 257
kowski is a virtuoso of colour in his technically
unsurpassed oil-paintings and pastels. Falat is a
virtuoso of technique in water-colour, from which
no one, except perhaps Besnard, has been able to
extract such wealth of colour and such force of
tone. Alfred Wierusz Kowalski (1849-1915) does
not belong to this group, although his early
paintings give him a right to the title of Master.
The founding of illustrated papers about 1859
fostered illustrative art, and brought to light great
talents such as Andriolli, Stachiewicz, and later,
the most gifted among Polish black and white
artists, A. Kamienski, an artist -thinker, bitterly
synthetic in his cartoons, excellent in portraiture,
and refined in etching. With the illustrated papers
came xylography, up to the eighties of the last
century the only reproductive art at the disposal
of the periodicals. A considerable number of wood-
engravers, Schuebeler, Styfi, Zajkowski, Gorazdow-
ski, Nicz, and others were led by Jozef Holewinski
(born 1848), who developed his art to the acme of
perfection and of whose collaboration many great
European publishers were justly proud.
The appearance at an exhibition in 1888 of the
works of Pankiewicz and Podkowinski disconcerted
both the public and the critics. These paintings
brought for the first time to Warsaw a gust pf
impressionism, the healthy elements of which
became absorbed by Polish artists, although none of
them, not even the two pioneers of the new
doctrine, followed it undiscerningly in its primi-
17

258 A SKETCH OF.
tive form and in its crude ultra -reformatory
tendencies. The wholesome influence of the contact with
other countries of Europe is manifest in the works
of great painters such as Lenc, Horowitz, Szyndler,
Z. Jasinski, Rapacki, Maslowski, Zmurko, Kedzierski,
Siestrzencewicz, Olga Boznanska, Augustynowicz,
Zofja Stankiewicz, Debicki, Ajdukiewicz, W. Kossak
(son), W. Tetmajer, and in some portraits by
the old Viennese master K. Pochwalski.
A current which gave new stamina to Polish art
and literature in the last quarter of the nineteenth
century, neo -romanticism, greatly differed from the
romanticism of the fifties, insufficiently independent
and not even entirely free from classical leanings.
Neo -romanticism availed itself of all the great
discoveries of realism and impressionism, comple
mented by the close study, of ancient European
and Japanese art. The individualism of the neo-
romantics became more marked, their intellect
broader, their feelings deeper.
Among the greatest of these is a seeker after
new methods of expressing the whole extent of
the longings and strife of the modern soul, Jacek
Malczewski (born 1855), a painter-poet; the creator
of the cycles "The Artist's Golgotha," "The
Wandering Derwid," and " The Halting Place," all
remarkable for their freedom of symbolic composi
tion, for their psychological subtlety, realism in
painting, and admirable exactness of drawing.
Malczewski accepted the professorship of the

THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART 259
Cracow Academy, formerly the School of Art, the
directorship of which, after Matejko's death, had
been entrusted to J. Falat. There the best of Polish
artists were Malczewski's colleagues — Mehoffer,
Axentowicz, Pankiewicz, Weiss, Wyspianski ; but
the leading spirit of this academy was Stanislawski,
a man of immense artistic culture, who knewi how
to charm the enormous expanses of the Ukrainian
landscape, with all its play of changeful light, into
small -sized yet broadly painted canvases.
The Warsaw School of Art waited long for its
liberation from the tutelage of the St. Petersburg
Ministry of Education, which set itself the task
of curbing Polish intellectual aspirations. The
appointment of two talented directors, K. Stab-
rowski and K. Krzyzanowski, brought about the
desired change by modernizing the trend of the
school. Cultural institutions in the Kingdom of
Poland were never subsidized by the Government
and owed their existence to, private initiative, to
which is due the imposing building erected for the
Warsaw School of Art in 1914. Within its walls
art began to prosper under the guidance of the
eminent portrait painter S. Lenc, with the co-opera
tion of such artistic forces as Pienkowski, Maslow-
ski, Kotarbinski, Trojanowski, Krzyzanowski, and
Ruszczyc. It is interesting to note that the wealth
of feeling displayed in the works of the last-named
painter strongly stimulated the younger generation.
His landscapes are more than simple views of the
countryside ; without any assistance of symbols

260 A SKETCH OF
they are capable of inspiring awe, or stirring
feelings of tenderness and melancholy.
The great value of modern Polish decorative art is
apparent in the mural paintings of the Szafraniecs'
chapel and of the Treasury in Wawel Cathedral.
The author of these polychromies, Jozef Mehoffer,
a painter unrivalled in decoration, is known also
for his portraits and fantastic compositions. When
twenty -five years of age he won the first prize in an
international competition for a design for the
stained glass windows for Freiburg Cathedral,
which, thanks to his work, became a place of
pilgrimage for European artists and critics.
The stained glass windows by Mehoffer and
Wyspianski, adorning the Franciscan Church in
Cracow, afford an excellent opportunity of observing
the profound difference between these two talents,
equal only in their greatness. There is no realism
in the works of Wyspianski (1869-1908), who
captivates by the subtlety of his interpretation of
type and the extraordinary expressiveness of his
line — nervous, powerful, and original. The span of
Wyspianski's life Was brief, and still the greater
part of his time Was absorbed by those high literary,
achievements which gave immortal tragedies to
Polish literature ; but the four years he sacrificed
to pictorial art left an abundant testimony to his
many-sided genius.
Polish sculptors had little scope for the develop
ment of their talent. The elder generation, Sos-
nowski, Oleszczynski, Brodzki, remained faithful to

THE HISTORY OF. POLISH ART 261
the classical canons, as did also the most gifted of the
succeeding generations, Pius Welonski. T. Rygier,
though exceedingly conscientious, brought to art
no new ideas ; these began to reveal them
selves in Polish statuary with the coming of
Szymanowski, Wasilewski, Blotnicki, Professor
Laszczka, Otto, Professor Breyer, Lewandowski ;
but the decisive break with the old traditions in
sculpture was due to Dunikowski, some of whose
works, however, show traces of the influence of
French masters.
It is now the turn of the new generation to
show their ardour and faith in the great mission
of Polish art. Their name is legion, and among
them are talents such as Frycz, CzajkoWski,
Bukowski in decorative art, Buyko, Kamir, Karp-
inski, Ziomek, Kowalewski, J. Kossak (grand
son), Fabjanski, Straszkiewicz in painting, Raszka,
Konieczny, Kucharzyk, Jackowski, Puszet, Wilk,
and Wittig, the most gifted, in sculpture.
It would be wrong to endeavour to classify these
modern artists in schools. It is true that some
of them, in different stages of their development,
are subject to the influences of the divers con
flicting currents flowing through European art, of
which they discriminately assimilate only the best
constituents, winnowing away all that is artificial,
insincere, and hysterical. Another factor which
keeps them from making their devotions at the
small Chapels of Art is their idealism, which
excludes the commercial spirit from: the art of

262 THE HISTORY OF POLISH ART
Poland, a spirit which has so often been the undoing
of even strong minds among European artists, by
tempting them into the fashionable mannerisms that
render work saleable. Among Polish artists,
competition, free from commercial motives, takes
the shape of noble emulation. The receiving
juries, whether at the permanent exhibitions of the
Society of Encouragement of the Fine Arts in
Warsaw, the Societies of the Friends of Art
in Cracow and Poznan, or even of private and
provincial " salons," dispensed from the necessity
of forming a ring to uphold" either the followers
of their own philosophy or the financial interests
of their group, admit all works bearing the stamp of
talent. This enables the public to follow the
manifestations of Polish art in all their variety at
exhibitions, where the venerable classicism of aged
masters jostles the most daring attempts of young
innovators, without detriment to either.
The freedom enjoyed by Polish artists, unre
strained in their zeal by any side -considerations,
permits the casting of an auspicious horoscope for
the future of Polish art, which already occupies
a conspicuous place among the attainments that
enrich the life of the civilized world.

THE NATIONAL
MUSIC of POLAND
ITS CHARACTER & SOURCES
BY
MARGUERITE WALAUX
With an Introduction by
EMIL MLYNARSKI
Conductor of the Scottish Orchestra, Formerly Conductor of the
Warsaw Opera and the Warsaw Symphony Orchestra.
.' Director of the Warsaw Conservatoire, etc.

A la Pologne indipendante
j'offre
Vhommage de cette 4tude

MAEGUEEITE WALAUX.
Janvier 1916.

Londees,

INTRODUCTION
It has afforded me a real pleasure to be allowed to
have my name associated with Madame Walaux's
study of " The National Music of Poland." And
this, not only, I may say, because I am a Polish
musician myself, but because in a very few words
Madame Walaux has so admirably summed up the
history and characteristics of my native music. Her
brochure is very informative. Indeed, I am not aware
of any existing work in the English language which
deals so well in so brief a space with this subject so
near to my heart. Apart from this, however, apart
altogether from the personal equation, the subject of
Polish music is surely one of which the world, and
especially the English musical world, with which I
have had the honour and the pleasure of being for
many years intimately associated, is likely to hear a
great deal in the future. My own hope is that such
Polish music as I have been able to introduce into my
various Slavonic concert programmes in London will
be taken, as it were, merely as samples of what Poland
possesses. Believe me, in England, far too little is known of
the wealth of Polish music. But I live, nevertheless,
in the sure and certain hope that a day will dawn,
after the war, when the multitude of music-lovers in

266 INTRODUCTION
England will find as warm a place in their hearts
for the music of my country, as before the war and
since has been found for that of other Slavonic
countries. I feel sure that the more one hears of the genuine
Polish music the more one comes to love it for its
emotionalism, its definite character, and its beauty,
for that, in point of fact, which gives the breath
of life to the music which appeals directly to you
English. It is my own hope that from a new Poland,
which is inevitable after the war, the national musical
element will be more strongly developed in the younger
school of composers, and that its expression will
become crystallized. EMIL MLYNARSEI.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF
POLAND
While still boys and girls our young hearts were
stirred with admiration for a people so valiant as
the Polish people have undoubtedly been at every.
stage of their history. That noble national character
which marks the movements of a Sobieski as he
sallies forth to the succour of Austria sore menaced
by the invasion of the Turk, or the generous spon
taneity of a Kosciuszko, embarking for free America
to range himself resolutely on the side of the weaker
in the fight for the independence of the United
States, the heroic death of Prince Joseph Ponia
towski, indelibly stamp on every young and
generous spirit an impression of beautiful and
elevated thought.
In later years, when we get to know the com
plete story of that scandalous political intervention
in the affairs of Poland which historians dignify
by the name of high diplomacy, our admiration
and sympathy only grow greater than ever. This
high access of mind in which we rest has never
been better expressed than by George Brandes :
" We love Poland," he says, " as we love freedom.
267

268 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE ROLAND
Poland is a symbol, a symbol of all for which
the best of the human race have either loved or
fought." i
We have only to consider the history of the
oppression of Poland, says the same Brandes, to
find there on the one hand " all that is most hateful
and despicable," and on the other hand " all that is
most lovable and lustrous. In the first the con
trasts of human life are found in bold relief. In
the second, the cosmos is concentrated as in an
essence." How can any true-hearted spirit avoid cherishing
a sincere and continual interest in the history of
such a country?— a country whose chief crime, in
the eyes of the States who combined together to
divide and then destroy her, was this, that she
possessed a civilization distinct from1 their own, a
civilization which united her with all that was most
progressive in Western Europe.
Brandes, in his noteworthy work on Poland,
which is interesting both as the impressions of a
traveller and also as the result of close and intimate
study of Polish literary and artistic history, speaks
of the Poles as a people dowered with enthusiasm
which yet needed to be corrected by practical ex
perience, as endowed with vivid imagination, quite
uncommon intelligence, and beautiful, exalted feel
ing, as loving all intense and delicate, sensuous and
intellectual enjoyments," but also, above all, who
worshipped independence to the point of insanity,
1 " Poland," p. 48.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 269
freedom to the extent of the liberum veto, and who
even now, when they had lost their independence
and freedom, had remained faithful to their old love.
The German Chancellor, Bethmann-Hollweg, on
the day following the fall of Warsaw, speaking in
the Reichstag, paid a high tribute to this spirit of
independence which the Polish nation has retained
in the face of any trial, and which nothing has been
able to humiliate. And it is this national charac
teristic which manifests itself to an intense degree
in the works of writers and poets of this oppressed
nation. But it is not only the study of Polish literature,
above all that of the nineteenth century, which en
dows us with an understanding of the aspirations
and the soul of this people, it is equally by the reve
lation of her fine arts and her music that we are
enabled to grasp and comprehend them.
Music is our subject here, the national music of
Poland, in which is revealed in a striking manner
in the works of her composers, and above all in
those of Chopin, Moniuszko, or Noskowski, the soul
of this heroic people in all its individuality, agonies,
joys, hopes, aspirations, loves and hates, and in
its most marked peculiarities. From this last point
of view the two songs, Wibicki's " Jeszcze Polska
nie zginela" (" Poland not yet Lost ") and Ujejski's
"Z dymem Pozarow" ("With the Smoke of the
Fires") are characteristic. These songs express
the despair of the younger race at seeing the hopes
of Poland brought to naught, and reflects the lofty,

270 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND
burning earnestness, the love of country, as a
religion. Wibicki's song, the expression of the bright hopes
of the race, even after the blow of the third parti
tion has fallen, is an extremely careless, merry song,
the ballad of heroic thoughtlessness, joy to live, to
sing, to fight. The first is a psalm, the second a
march which approaches a mazurka.
It ought to be borne in mind that in Polish music
melancholy never leads to despair. There is always
something hopeful in the most intense sadness. We
find this impression again, moreover, in the music
of Chopin, who draws it into the rhythm of the
popular melodies of his country, idealized by his
poetic nature. We find it, above all, in the " Prelude
in B Minor," which is to some extent the realization
of it. Kleczynski explains it for us thus : " The
picture which is formed is that of drops of rain
falling at regular intervals, which by their continual
patter bring the mind to a state of sadness ; ;a
melody full of tears is heard through the rush of
the rain ; in passing to the key of C sharp minor
it rises from the depths of the bass to a prodigious
crescendo, indicative of the terror which Nature
in its deathly aspect excites in the heart of man.
Here, again, the form does not allow the ideas to
become too sombre ; notwithstanding the melan
choly which seizes you, a feeling of tranquil
grandeur revives you." •
1 Kleczynski, " F. Chopin, De l'interpretation de ses oeuvres,"
pp. 26 and 27.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 271
The soul of Poland, the inspiration of these
melodies, is an impulse towards hope and liberty ;
this liberty is the goal, the end to which she aspires.
This is contested with her through the centuries,
but she carries on the struggle without allowing
herself to be weakened.
This all-powerful idea is found again and again
in Polish music, in its rhythm, its inspiration, and
in its melancholy charm. This melancholy, in
which there always sounds an under-current of
hope, is rather the outcome of the thoughtful and
sentimental temperament than of the dejection of
despair occasioned by the misfortunes of the father
land. Here is no resigned, quiescent spirit, but
the true soul of the heroic Pole, chivalrous, care
less, and light-hearted, which delivers itself of sad
ness in songs, but whose joy is tinged with intense
melancholy. Here is the unchained spirit of
Poland, which no Government has ever been able
to fetter, and which, notwithstanding the centuries
of suffering, has always kept untouched her indi
viduality, originality, and romanticism, of which
poetry and music are the living and harmonious
manifestations. The Poles are gifted with an essentially musical
temperament, and their taste in music is recog
nized all over the world. It is not true, however,
that this taste and aptitude is visible only in the
last century.
Polish music is of as ancient an origin as her
history ; this fact will be seen by the following

272 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
account of the principal stages of her development
through the centuries.
According to Sowinski,1 the history of music in
Poland may be divided into three distinct parts : —
1. Early music dating from the appearance
of music in the country, and finishing in the
reigns of the Sigismunds.
2. Music of the Golden Age, including several
phases, and attaining its highest perfection
during the sixteenth century, following next the
decadence of literature. In this general ship
wreck only a few works of religious com
posers survive ; these even are forgotten.
This period terminated in 1764.
3. Modern music from the reign of Stanislas
August Poniatowski to our own times.
In Poland, as elsewhere, the art of music is
affected by many outside influences, before attain
ing originality and assuming a truly national char
acter. For many years, following the example of
many other European nations, it found inspiration
from the Italian School. The grave beauty of this
music and its sweetness seemed to fit it at this
time to be the melodious organ of Christianity.
Bohemians and Poles, the first Christians among
northern nations, went to Rome to study there,
and feel the inspiration of the artistic beauties of
the eternal city. There it was that St. Adalbert
studied the elements of the Gregorian Chant. In
995 he composed the hymn of " Boga Rodzica "
1 " Polish and Slav Musicians " (1857).

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND 273
(the Mother of God, worshipped by the Poles and
Slavs), which is found engraved on the saint's tomb.
It was not till the eleventh century, that the eccle
siastical chant became known in Poland.
Pope John VIII gave permission for the use of
the national language in the services of the Church ;
this permission gave a national character to re
ligious music in Poland, whereas in other coun
tries sacred music progressed no farther than the
Gregorian Chant or the Plain Chant. At this time
there are found in Polish music charming airs
for Christmas, which, together with certain old
canticles, made up the first song-books.
From the fourteenth to the sixteenth century a
number of composers flourished in Poland ; l'Abbe
Witowski composed several religious chants in his
native tongue. Jean de Kampa Lodzia, Bishop of
Posen, is identified with hymns of great value.
Later Wenceslas Brzozowski (fifteenth century),
poet, priest, and musician, left the Canzionale, a
collection including setting for several voices. The
golden age of the Sigismunds was also productive
of noble compositions, the most important of
which was, without doubt, the Psalter of Nicholas
Gomolka. For a long time in Poland only sacred music
existed, inspired by religion and the Church. At
this time, moreover, all the arts looked to religion
for their inspiration, as to a never -failing fount.
The history of architecture can be learned only
by a study of the churches ; painting dealt exclu-
18

274 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF, POLAND
sively with subjects drawn from the life of Christ ;
and music itself was seldom of anything but a
sacred character. Dramatic music was united with
the religious drama, in which satiric songs occasion
ally made their appearance.
There was, however, some military music, which
consisted solely in flourishes of trumpets and cym
bals, and there was also Court music. The tem
perament of the early Poles led them to love music ;
they had a preference for the glad and joyous rather
than the sad and melancholy. Hymns, however,
charmed their ears, and they amused themselves by
listening to them, but it was their characteristic
national airs that held the greatest attraction, the
melody, accent, and rhythm of which brought out
in a wonderful way the feeling inherent in the
nation. It would be difficult to compile a history of
these Folk Songs. Many of them have never been
written down, and are handed on by tradition and
by the ancient chronicles, which give merely the
title and the words. Songs exist on every theme:
historic, bucolic, erotic, etc. Others accompany
Polish dances, and their rhythm is still a source
of inspiration to modern Polish composers, as is
the case with the Polonaise and the Mazurek. There
are numberless folk songs in existence belonging
to every period, and even to the last century, ;,
Francois Karpinski is responsible for some charm
ing examples, the words and music of which are
familiar to every one.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 275
The Polonaise is one of the most characteristic
manifestations of the art of music in Poland. The
germ of it may be recognized in the motive of an
old Christmas song, and in the air of " Wzlobie
lezy " the rhythm and the finale of this old dance of
striking originality is found, the music of which
resounded at the pompous feasts of the old Polish
lords and at the Court of the Kings.
The exact date of the invention of the Polonaise
is not known. The Court must have been its birth
place. Karasowski l tells us that "tradition assigns
to the Polonaise the following origin : when the
dynasty of the Jagellons died out, Henry of
Anjou, son of Catherine de Medicis, was in 1573
elected King of Poland. The following year he
received the representatives of the nation in solemn
state at Cracow Castle, and the gentlemen made their
wives slowly defile before the King, keeping step to
an accompaniment of music. Every time a foreign
prince was elected to the throne this ceremony was
repeated, and from it was gradually developed the
national dance of the Polonaise. It became a
political dance. It is really a march, a processional
dance, grave, moderate, flowing, and by no means
stereotyped. It is at once the symbol of war and
love, a vivid pageant of martial splendour, a weaving,
cadenced, voluptuous dance, the pursuit of shy,
coquettish woman by the fierce warrior. Despite
its essentially masculine mould, it is given a feminine
title ; formerly it was called " Polonais." Liszt wrote
1 " Life of Chopin."

276 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF ROLAND
of it : " In this form the noblest traditional feelings
of ancient Poland are represented." The Polonaise
is the true and purest type of Polish national char
acter, as in the course of centuries it was developed
partly through the political position of the kingdom
towards east and west, partly through an indefin
able, peculiar inborn disposition of the entire race.
In the development of the Polonaise everything
co-operated which specifically distinguished the
nation from others. In the Poles of departed times
manly resolution was united with glowing devo
tion to the object ofl their love. Their knightly
heroism was sanctioned by high, soaring dignity,
and even the laws of gallantry and the national
costume exerted an influence over the turns of the
dance. The Polonaises are the keystone in the
development of this form. They belong to the most
beautiful of Chopin's inspirations. With their
energetic rhythm they electrify, to the point of
exerted demonstration, even the sleepiest of indif
ference. Chopin was born too late, and left his
native hearth too early to be initiated into the
original character of the Polonaise as danced
through his own observation. But what others
imparted to him with regard to it was supplemented
by his fancy and his nationality.
Mickiewicz, the national poet of Poland in the
nineteenth century, consecrated some beautiful
verses to the Polonaise, in his celebrated " Pan
Tadeusz," Book 12, " Let us love one another."1
The melody of the Polonaise is sometimes simple,

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND 277
but its rhythm is somewhat martial and of a war
like enchantment. It is solemn and possesses great
fascination. The conclusion suggests the stately
manners of the Middle Ages. Written in triple
time, it is grave, but gaiety is not debarred, which
rendered it popular among the people, whose
favourite dance it was up to the close of the seven
teenth century.
The movement of the Mazur or Mazurek is
accentuated in more lively fashion than that of the
Polonaise. It is also written in triple time, but
more licence is allowed, and the contretemps is
marked. The Mazurek is full of feeling, and is
often melancholy ; it is truly poetical, and is
representative of the national character. Emanating
from the people, it was adopted by all classes ; it
was claimed with joy among the rich, and charmed
young and old alike.
The first Mazureks date from the players on the
lute in the fifteenth century. They were of popular
composition, and were of simple construction with
two repetitions, with a prelude or " ritournelle,"
a kind of improvization of the village fiddlers, and
the words were in praise of the simple life. Later
their range was enlarged. They are exceedingly
numerous. Some treat of history, others of the
rustic life, dancing or love. Poets of renown com
posed words for them, which were set to music
by celebrated composers. The Mazurek is the true
national song of Poland, the embodiment of the
national character. Chopin made it popular in

278 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
Europe, and Polish opera drew on it to a consider
able extent. Chopin penetrated the most deeply
into the national sanctuary, and his melancholy
genius made more than one tender heart weep and
vibrate. Liszt says : " Coquetteries, varieties, fan
tasies, elegies, vagues, emotions, passions, conquests,
struggles upon which the safety or favours of others
depend, all, all meet in this dance." He gives a
wild, whirling, highly coloured narrative of the
Mazurka with a coda of extravagant praise on the
beauty and fascination of Polish women.
In Poland the Mazurka is not the dance which
is called by that name, but a long, difficult,
and impassioned national dance, in which the
gentlemen and ladies, though they dance hand in
hand, constantly take different steps in the same
time. The Krakowiak (French Cracovienne) is born of
the people. Its movement is quick and bright, and
it is written in double time. Polish peasants dance
it in national costume, which adds to the picturesque
appearance of the dance ; added to this there are
often satirical couplets, which the dancer sings to
his partner. The poems of Miaskowski (1622)
prove that the Krakowiak originated in the seven
teenth century.
The Dumy or Dumki (reveries) are of earlier
origin, and their music is of a particular kind :
they modulate from the minor key to the relative
major, and vice versa. This minor modulation
gives them a plaintive and heartrending effect.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 279
They are nearly all in double time, and very slow,
and were accompanied formerly by the guzla or
<gousla, an ancient Slav instrument which has been
replaced in modern times by the bandura or
bandurka and the Uorbe. The Ukrainian dumkis
(wrongly termed Russian songs) are sung generally
without accompaniment. Among the Zaporogues
there were bandouristes, who sang a kind of dumki
accompanied on the bandura, the sad and yearn
ing melodies of which filled the soul with emotion
and melancholy.
Lithuania, the history of which has been inti
mately connected with that of Poland, has supplied
us with many popular songs ; for example, the
Dainos (a gay air). These tunes are simple, sweet,
and fresh, and are sung in Lithuanian. Some of
them are of very early origin. Modern composers
have made collections of them. Rhesa has trans
lated a book of them into German with music, under
the title " Dainos, or Lithuanian Folk Songs," and
Chopin composed one.
The early kings of Poland used to love and
patronize music. They were greeted by the sound
of music when they entered one of the towns of
their kingdom1, or when they visited the castle of
one of those lords whose wealth was the astonish
ment of Europe. They surrounded themselves with
hired musicians at great expense, and lute-players
and other performers of all kinds formed part of
their suite continually. The nobles, too, had their
orchestras, and the lordly dwellings echoed to the

280 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE ROLAND
sound of music, which accompanied all their feasts
and festivals.
King Sigismund I and his son, Sigismund August,
professed a veritable cult for the art of music.
Under their reigns it attained a high state of per
fection. It was, in truth, the music of the Great
Century. The Court was the show-ground of
numberless talents. Musicians were paid fabulous
sums. In the Royal choir composed of cele
brated musicians, among whom were many Italians,
the combined effect produced was indeed wonder
ful. It was also in the reign of Sigismond I that
the first college or chapel for the celebration of the
Mass to music was instituted. No other country in
Europe possessed such an institution, which received
the name of College of the Roraristes, and was
attached to the cathedral at Cracow. Its founda
tion dates from 1542. The original of the Royal
Charter given to this chapel, and its original music,
can be found among the archives of the cathedral.
It was productive of marvellous results in the
interpretation of sacred music at this time. The
sixteenth century was fruitful, moreover, in master
pieces, as is illustrated by the works of Broscius
Jacques Lubelczyk, Gorczyn, Liban de Lignica,
Spangenberg, Sigismund Lauxman, Simon Staro-
wolski, l'Abbe Gorczycki, and many others.
Under Sigismund III music attained to its highest
degree of perfection in Poland. His chapels sur
passed in talent and magnificence anything pre
viously seen and heard. Jean Zamoyski, Batory,

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 281
Wladislas IV, Jean Sobieski, proved themselves
ardent patrons of music, and endeavoured to spread
the taste for it among the people, whose efforts they
encouraged. At that time there was, perhaps, no
other country in Europe where music was held in
such high honour. Nearly every lord and every
high dignitary had his own theatre, orchestra, opera,
and even ballet. The reign of the Kings of Saxony
marked the progress in particular of instrumental
music. August II was generous to the point of
folly in the upkeep of his chapel, and his orchestra
was recognized as the finest in Germany.
After centuries of brilliance, music in Poland
passed through several phases. It followed in the
wake of political decadence, and its progress from
that time was arrested. The institutions of sacred
music were no more. All perished ; but dramatic
music had new birth in the reign of Stanislas
August Poniatowski.
At the end of the eighteenth century dire mis
fortunes overwhelmed this unfortunate country, and
there was a revival of religious music. New can
ticles were composed, as well as fine music for
the Mass. The Church from that time had her
modern repertory. At Posen were published a
series of sacred chants to be sung during the Mass.
Eisner set them to music later on the words of
Brodzinski, and his example was followed by
Felinski, who was inspired by the words of Wenzyk,
and Kurpinski by those of Minasowicz.
Sacred music was always very remarkable in

282 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
Poland, and, above all, at Cracow, which is, accord
ing to Sowinski, " the cradle of the music of the
Church." Stanislas August Poniatowski had an enormous
influence on the development of the music of his
country. He saw the opening of the modern era,
which is characterized by the appearance of the
National Polish Opera.
This King adored music in all its forms ; his
choir, composed of native and foreign musicians,
was one of the best of the time. His example was
followed by the great lords, several of whom were
recognized as distinguished performers. In the
castles were excellent orchestras. Musicians were
well looked after there, and certain great lords
became notable composers ; for example, Prince
Michel Oginski (1765-1833), whose works, and,
above all, his charming Polonaises, had distinctive
national characteristics and became popular in
Europe. At this time of rapid progress in the art
of music and its general perfection in Europe, the
Polish opera made its first appearance (1778).
Italian opera had been in existence at the Court
of Warsaw since 1633, but the poetic and literary
movement of the end of the eighteenth century
created the Polish opera, of interest by its character
and its direct relation with the youth of Chopin.
The first Polish operas composed by Kaminski
and Stefani followed the German style and the
fashion of the French comic opera. The new and
original element was found in the employment of

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF. POLAND 283
popular themes. Their subjects were taken from
peasant life — " Krakowiaki i Gorale " (" Craco-
vians and Mountaineers") of Stefani. The ideas
of these two composers were taken up again at
the beginning of the eighteenth century by J. Eisner,
the professor of Chopin, and by Ch. Kurpinski,
creators of the first historical Polish operas. At
this time the national opera became the most per
fect expression of the musical art in Poland, and
Eisner was vexed and surprised that his good-
natured pupil, Chopin, never became the composer
of operas, and that he confined himself to musical
forms of less magnitude.
Boguslawski contributed largely to the advance
ment of the national opera. It was he who pro
duced the six operas of Kaminski, which enjoyed
considerable success. He translated the " Axur "
of Salieri, with fine results (1793). But the greatest
work of this time was the " Cracovians and Moun
taineers " of Stefani. Its success was immense.
Eisner composed several operas which met with
great approval, as well as an operetta of Kamienski
and an opera of Caietana, the master of the chapel
of Stanislas August.
All this is a proof that music was held in great
esteem in Poland, and that it had been cultivated
there from an early date ; but it is only subse
quent to Chopin that this music attracted the atten
tion of foreign nations. In truth Chopin was the
first Polish musician who gained for Poland a
world-wide fame in the world of music. There

284 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
are two different reasons for this. The first is
that Chopin was the inventor of an entirely new
pianoforte life. His music invoked general ad
miration, both by the exquisite form and by the
sublime beauty in it. Centuries of intense and
uninterrupted work are usually necessary before
a nation can produce a genius such as Chopin. As
we have seen in previous pages of our historical
exposition of Polish music, this work was accom
plished slowly in Poland, and the great-hearted
musician, loved and admired by all, was worthy
of the effort.
The second reason was set forth by Schumann
and Liszt. " How can we understand," asks Schu
mann in his letters, " why Chopin interests us so
greatly, attracts us more than other composers of
our day? It is because of the strong and distinc
tive nationality that animates him : the nationality
of Poland."
Liszt, after having heard Chopin's " Funeral
March," declared, " A Pole alone could have written
that funeral march, because all the inborn sublimity
and introspect of a people cries out, through Chopin,
in that marvellous inspiration, which seems the
mourning cry of a whole nation following the bier
of their dearest hopes."
Count Tarnowski ' is perfectly right when he
says that, whether it be with the inexpressible
melancholy and forlorn wailings of a funeral
march, or the reckless abandon of a tarantella,
" Chopin, as Revealed by Extracts from his Diary," pp. 6-8.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF. POLAND 285
it is only Chopin who can express to foreigners
that inspiration, original, melancholy, homely, and
patriotic, which is the feature of Polish poetry,
because his music is enlivened by that same inspira
tion and impressed by it. It is, as it were, a trans
lation of that poetry. Therefore it is in the history
of Poland, subsequent to the partition, that his
music has its great significance and merit. It con
tains in itself the essence and expression of the
spirit which created Polish poetry. It represents
to the outside world the leading spirit of the Polish
nation so thoroughly that Chopin has acquired glory
for himself and for his countrymen, a citizenship
in the realm1 of music.
There is a likeness between Chopin and his con
temporary Polish poets of the Romantic school ;
there is similarity of feeling and inspiration ; there
are even some similarities of disposition. And if
to this be added the charm of a nature strangely
noble and refined, with beautiful and exalted feel
ing, with a rich, fervid imagination, with quite
an unusual intelligence, with rare tenderness to
suffering in others, one discovers elements that go
to make one of the most enchanting and interest
ing personalities of Poland.
To sensitiveness, tenderness, and a genuine deli
cacy of feeling he united a childlike gaiety and
humour. It is true that his moments of humour,
and forgetfulness never lasted long, as in some
of the mazurkas, where the sincere, almost rude,
gaiety ends in the most intense despondency.

286 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
There is a widespread, but erroneous, opinion
that the music of Chopin lacks manliness, moral
and intellectual. But, as Huneker has pointed out,
if Chopin's manners were a trifle feminine, his
brain was masculine, electric, and his soul cour
ageous. His Polonaises, Ballads, Scherzi, and
Eludes need a mighty grip — a grip mental and
physical. Chopin was born in 1809, near Warsaw. In
infancy he could not hear music without crying.
In 1827 Chopin left his regular studies at the
Warsaw Lyceum, and devoted his time to music.
"He was much in the country," says James Huneker
in his biography of Chopin, " and singing of the
Polish peasants, thus laying the corner-stone of
his art as a national composer." In 1828 he went
to Berlin, and this trip gave him1 a foretaste pf
the outer world. Stephen Heller, who saw Chopin
in 1830, described him1 as pale, of delicate health,
and not destined for a long life. He was constantly
admonished by his relatives to keep his coat closed.
Chopin went to Berlin under the protection of his
father's friend, Professor Jarocki, to attend a great
scientific congress. Count Tarnowski relates that
Chopin left Warsaw with a light heart. On the
way home he stopped at a place called Zullichau,
and improvized on Polish airs so charmingly that
the departure was delayed.
Tarnowski declares that the Polish poet Julius
Slowacki was Chopin's warmest friend and a
starting-point of inspiration for the composer.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND 287
In July 1829 Chopin arrived at Vienna, where
his improvization on the Polish tune called
" Chmiel " and a theme from " La Dame Blanche "
stirred up much enthusiasm at the Karntnerthor
Theatre. The Press was favourable. According to
Huneker his style was admired, and voted original.
A remark by a lady, "It is a pity his appear
ance is so insignificant," reached the composer's
ear and caused him ian evil quarter of an hour,
for he was morbidly sensitive, but being, like most
Poles, secretive, managed to hide it. Encouraged
by his triumph, Chopin gave, on August 18th, a
second concert on the same stage. This time he
played the Polish " Krakowiak."
By September 12th, after a brief sojourn in
Breslau, Chopin was again safe at home in Warsaw.
About this time he fell in love with Constantia
Gladowska, a singer and pupil of the Warsaw Con
servatoire. According to Huneker,1 Chopin shrank
from coarseness of all sorts, and the Fates only
know what he must have suffered at times from
George Sand and her gallant band of retainers.
" To this impressionable man," writes Huneker,
" Parisian badinage— not to call it anything stronger
—was positively antipathetical."
On March 17, 1830, Chopin gave his first concert
in Warsaw. In November 1830, before the out
break of the Polish Revolution, he left Warsaw for
Vienna. " A thousand times," says Huneker, " he thought
1 " Chopin."

288 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
of renouncing his artistic ambitions and rushing
to Poland to fight for his country. He did not
do so, and this indecision — it was not cowardice —
is our gain. Chopin put his patriotism, his wrath,
and his heroism into his Polonaises. That is why
we have them now."
At Stutgart, when Chopin heard of the capture
of Warsaw by the Russians on September 8, 1831,
his agitation was terrible. " Sometimes," writes he
in his diary, " I groan, suffer, and despair at the
piano ! O God, move the earth that it may swallow
the humanity of this century ! May the most cruel
fortune fall upon the French, that they did not
come to our aid."
He did not go to Warsaw, but at the end of
September started for France, arriving early in
October 1831. "A neurotic man," says Huneker,
" his tissues trembling, his sensibilities aflame, the
offspring of a nation doomed to pain and partition,
it was quite natural for him to go to France —
Poland has ever been her historic client — the
France that overheated all Europe. Chopin, born
after two revolutions, the true child of insurrection,
chose Paris for his second home."
Count Tarnowski considers that the time at
Warsaw was the free, peaceful, and happy period
of Chopin's life; the other (when he lived abroad)
was marred by the storms and sorrows of later
years. Warsaw is comiected with the thought and
love of his country ; the other with the memory of
that other love which poured so mueh bitterness

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 289
into his life- All this preyed upon a tragic
nature, that state bordering on despair Which is
perceptible throughout his compositions. Possibly
such a nature was predestined never to attain
equanimity ; yet if his surroundings had been
different, if he had remained in his country and in
the ordinary way of life, in course of time his
health might have become better and his talent
would have developed with more virility. Thrown
suddenly out of gear, as it were, he became more
and more unbalanced, and his talent developed in
the direction of effeminate tenderness and senti
mentality. This disposition appears soon after his
departure from Warsaw.
Soon after his arrival in Paris, Chopin was
known throughout Europe. It seems that the
peculiarly Polish form of the Mazurek became the
natural expression of the one feeling which was
the background of Chopin's disposition, as it was
of Poland's— namely, sorrow. This sorrow breaks
forth freely in all his compositions ; but it is strange
that when he composes under the influence of bitter
ness or despair he pours his genius into the most
varied forms, excepting only that of the mazurka.
What strikes one in Chopin is the refined style
of the romance, the morbid charm of a play full
of caress and tenderness. One has not always
understood, said Count Tarnowski, that behind the
strangeness of his rhythms resided the deepest
classic culture. $
19

290 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND
Like poetry, the music of Chopin is the flower
of romanticism, not only because, as a composer,
he belongs to the school of romanticism, but much
more because his music has the same charm, the
same character, the same failings as Polish romantic
poetry. It has, like that poetry, the highest tender
ness of sentiment ; it has originality and a great
richness of forms and ideas ; it has also much
vivacity and colouring of imagination, and in that
imagination there is something veiled, ethereal, and
undefined, alike through sensitive feelings and
patriotic inspiration. It has faults : an over
strained melancholy and an interior discord that
appear in thoughts which are sometimes incom
prehensible and in a strange and sometimes eccen
tric execution. The Polish emigration gave to the
country the most beautiful works in literature. The
same may be said of the music of Chopin which1,
under the influence of the same feelings, produced
the highest inspirations and the most Polish in
spirit and form.
To give a competent analysis of Chopin's works
would require a volume to itself, and that will
not be our purpose. To appreciate their impor
tance we must consider the circumstances amid
which they were written. The period to which
his earliest composition belongs was one of
apparent calm. After the Battle of Waterloo,
which took place between the peaceful settlements
of the two Congresses of Vienna, the nations began
to breathe freely once more. In Poland national

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 291
pride grew stronger and stronger and impelled the
true lovers of their country to an active propaganda
for the improvement of its internal affairs. Men
of genius whose lives were devoted to the search
after knowledge threw all their energies into the
discoveries of new truths and to casting fresh light
on old ones. Everywhere was the breath of a
new spiritual life full of soaring aspiration ; and
rising from the exhaustion of the Napoleonic wars,
the nation seriously gave itself to the revival of
art and literature.
A passionate battle began between the two schools
of poetry : the classic and the romantic. The great
Polish poet Mickiewicz, the author of " Grazyna,"
"Dziady," and "Pan Tadeusz," stood at the head
of the romantic school, and by his genius triumphed
over the other.
According to Brandes,1 the Polish literature of
the nineteenth century bears a peculiar stamp, apart
from the peculiarities issuing from the national
character, in that it developed in a country which
had recently ceased to exist as an independent State.
For this reason the literature, and especially the
poetry, came to supply, as it were, the place of a
national life which was lost at the partition of
the State. It gained thereby in spiritual exaltation,
but necessarily lost in variety and freedom.
Polish romanticism, as Brandes masterly de
scribes it, is intelligent and imaginative, splendour-
loving and visionary, with a tendency to chivalrous,
' Page 192.

292 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OE POLAND
virtuous, and religious aspirations. It was akin
to the French in its fickleness ; it differed from
the French in the nature of that fickleness. The
Frenchman is capricious when his native rational
ism leads him to shatter his historic heritage, the
Pole when temperament or enthusiasm carries him
away. Throughout the romantic literature of Poland
we find here and there features so realistic that
they do not seem to belong to the period. Some
of the poets carry realism so far that they even
introduce living or recently deceased persons into
their poems. But that which is peculiarly Polish is
that, hand in hand with the hankering after reality
and futurity, there is an unconquerable tendency
to abstraction, allegory, superstition. "They are,"
says Brandes, " at once realists and spiritualists.
Two circumstances united to make their poems
abstract and allegorical : first, the propensity to
mysticism which lay. in the inmost recesses of their
souls and which, after having slumbered for a while,
was easily awakened in them all since they had
been educated as Catholics from the first ; in the
next place, the political oppression, the considera
tion of their censorship which compelled them to
describe their thoughts by circumlocution and to
etherealize the outlines of the beings whom they
painted. In reality, Polish poetry, by its very
obscure and prophetic character, has had a greater
bearing on the future of the nation than a logical
and convincing poetry could have had. It inspired

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 293
perseverance, self-reliance, firm faith in the future,
and obstinate optimism, which were so much the
more remarkable as no country seemed likely to
offer a more fruitful soil for pessimism."
Slowacki, Krasinski, and especially Mickiewicz,
the most celebrated poets of modern romanticism
in Poland, whose works and poetry reflect the most
peculiarly national characteristics, impressed an
intense influence on the music of their time, and
they are, it is said, the leaders who preceded Chopin
into the artistic world. The music of Chopin, in
spired almost entirely by his country, its rural life,
its dances, its past splendour, its sorrows and
desperate fights, seems the harmony of the soul of
romantic poetry. Living among young Poles, who
were enthusiastic about folk-poetry, regarding it —
not without reason— as the basis of all poetry,
Chopin sought out national melodies for himself,
seeking by careful artistic presentation to secure
for them a lasting place in musical literature. In
this he succeeded much better than any other
composer has done. No one was so well able to
reproduce the peculiarly melancholy strain which
runs through all the Polish melodies. A spon
taneity, at once noble and natural, pervades
Chopin's music. It is the complement, or rather
the illustration, of the national poetry. An eminent
Polish historian has said : " Chopin's music is of
supreme importance because it represents the nation
more gloriously in the domain of the love of art
than that of any other composer. It gives us the

294 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
honour of an independent position such as we had
never attained before."
Chopin's earliest works are undoubtedly the
result of the musical tendencies of the age.
Traditional forms opened to him the gates of the
temple where the greatest masters of the pianoforte
sit enthroned. But into these forms he infused his
own creative genius. Chopin's imagination struck
deeper chords than previous pianoforte composers ;
he inaugurated a new era and cut a way for him
self, not for the sake of surpassing others, but by
the unconscious impulse of his own originality.
Most of his works are written for the piano, the
instrument he preferred to any other. He shows
also some preference for the violoncello. " Its
elegiac tone was in harmony with his own nature."
Chopin was very partial to the dance forms-
mazurka, polonaise, waltz, tarantelle, cracovienne,
and bolero— which he was the first truly to idealize,
but of the large number of his mazurkas it is diffi
cult to say which is the best. Some of those
mazurkas are perhaps among the most effective
which, in spite of the tripping dance measure,
display melancholy, as though the composer had
indulged in a momentary diversion and neurotic
intoxication to return the more sadly to his original
gloom. " The plaintive little mazurka of two lines," says
Huneker, " the Seventh Prelude is a mere silhouette
of the national dance. Yet in its measure is
compressed all Polish Mazovia."

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 295
" Do you know Chopin's sorrowful mazurkas,"
asks Ehlert, "those pathetic dances in which the
deepest, the most heartfelt sorrow has donned red
buskins, to weep itself to death amid a bacchanal
tumult? I have one of those in my own mind now :
anything sadder you can scarcely imagine : —
Te still must dance, poor feet so weary
In gay shoes drest,
Though 'twere for ye a fate less sad and dreary
'Neath earth to rest.
Poor Chopin ! Was he afflicted by the sorrow of
his people, or by a secret woe, a fatality of
love?" Chopin's polonaises may be divided into two
groups : the one those with marked rhythm, dis
playing the martial element ; the other, the dreamy,
melancholy feeling peculiar to the master. The
" Fantasie Polonaise," in A flat major, holds a
position distinct from both these groups. It is
intended to represent the national struggle, and
concludes, therefore, with a proud hymn of victory.
Chopin's belief in the ultimate victory of the Polish
nation after its many bitter trials, a feeling so well
depicted in the poetry of Mickiewicz, Krasinski,
and Slowacki, the greatest poets of that period,
speaks out clearly in this, the most finished of his
larger pianoforte works.
Chopin's waltzes, musically considered, offer less
of interest and novelty than his other compositions.
What they lose in the rhythm of the dances they

296 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
gain in innate grace and outward brilliancy. The
most interesting are those which are pervaded by
that peculiar, dreamy, melancholy vein which is
one of the chief charms of Chopin's inspiration.
It has been said of the Chopin waltzes that they
are dances of the soul and not of the body. Their
animated rhythms, insouciant airs, and brilliant,
coquettish atmosphere represent the true atmosphere
of the ballroom. They are exquisite exemplars
of social intimacy and aristocratic abandon.
Schumann declares that the dancers of these valses
should at least be countesses.
The four ballads are amongst the finest and most
original of his works. Chopin said to Schumann
that he had been inspired to the creation of the
ballads by some poems of Mickiewicz. There is
about them a certain narrative character which is
particularly well rendered.
" None of Chopin's compositions," says Niecks,
" surpasses in masterliness of form and beauty and
poetry of content his ballads." Louis Ehlert says
of the four ballads : " Each differs entirely from
the others, and they have but one thing in common
— their romantic working and the nobility of their
motives." In the nocturnes, Chopin not only introduced the
dramatic element, but displayed in a striking manner
a marvellous enrichment of harmony of the re
sources of pianoforte composition. The F Sharp
Nocturne is the most popular. Kleczynski finds
that the doppio movement is extremely striking,

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 297
and the entire piece is saturated with young life
and love and feeling of goodwill to men.
Chopin also deserves special honour for having
perfected the study. Some of his studies serve
purely technical purposes, but others are intellectu
ally interesting. Heller wrote : " Chopin's Seventh
Study engenders the sweetest sadness, the most
enviable torments, and if, in playing it, one feels
oneself insensibly drawn towards mournful and
melancholy ideas, it is a disposition of the soul
which I prefer to all others. Alas ! How I love
these sombre and mysterious dreams, and Chopin
is the god who created them."
Niecks does not think Chopin created a new type
in the preludes : " They are too unlike one another
in form and character." The Sixteenth Prelude is
the most brilliant. Full of imagination, life, caprice,
and stormy dynamics^ it is the darling of the
virtuoso. Its pregnant introduction is like a madly
jutting rock from Which the eagle spirit of the
composer rushes upward. The Fourth Prelude, in
E minor, is, as Niecks says, " a little poem, the
exquisitely sweet, languid pensiveness of which
defies description." The Fifth, in D minor, is Chopin
at his happiest. There is a dewy freshness, a joy
in life that puts to flight much of the morbid tittle-
tattle about Chopin's sickly soul. The Sixth Prelude,
in B minor, is doleful, pessimistic. " It precipitates
the soul into frightful depression" (George Sand).
The sixteen Polish songs published by Fontana
after Chopin's death were written without any title.

298 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
If Chopin met with any new and beautiful poetry
in his native tongue, he would set it to music, not
for publication, but for his own pleasure.
The last mazurka, " Senza Fine," composed a
few days before he died, is sad, very sad, like the
last days of the great master. He showed by this
swan song, and by his yearning after the hour of
his happy youth, that in the very last hour of his
creative inspiration he remained faithful to his
national music and to his sorely tried fatherland.
Chopin introduced the mazurka into modern
music. Although exemplified in popular songs, they
are his sole property, because the master, while
keeping the rustic and popular character of these
national songs, has changed the form, enobled the
melody, and enriched the contents.
In addition to Frederic Chopin, Poland during
the nineteenth century has given another musical
genius to the world — Stanislas Moniuszko (1819-72).
In fact, if musical genius is characterized by
loftiness of spirit and a wonderful subtlety of human
feeling, if it is an extraordinary creative force,
united to astonishing power to soar towards new
regions hitherto unattainable, Moniuszko was un
doubtedly a genius.
But as Mr. Polinski, a Polish musical critic
rightly observes,1 there are composers in whom
genius is allied with talent, that is to say the faculty
of adapting rules and known means to an end,
theory to practice. Such were Mozart and Wagner.
1 Muzyka Polska.

THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND 299
They realized the two essential conditions for giving
complete expression to their creative power. Apart
from these types of great musicians, Polinski admits
two others, namely, where a great talent exists in
conjunction with a lesser genius, such as Meyerbeer,
and where a great genius lacks talent. Moniuszko,
according to Polinski, belongs to the latter category
of composers, and this is perhaps the reason that
he is little known outside his own country. In
his music Moniuszko paid too little attention to
details, unimportant perhaps in themselves, but
necessary to bring his genius into proper relief.
Although Moniuszko was not the originator of
the opera in Poland, it is he who first created the
National Polish Opera. The inspiration of his
music is found in the atmosphere of national life,
and is placed in a Polish milieu.
The influence of contact with nature, attachment
to poetry and national melodies, have exercised a
profound influence on his soul, and consequently
on his music. All this is reflected later in the
rhythm, the harmonies, and in the plasticity of
Moniuszko's music. All this explains the extra
ordinary enthusiasm with which the first opera was
received in Poland, when it appeared in 1858
at Vilno. It was the peculiar province of Moniuszko
to touch and vibrate the unseen and delicate tissue
of which the soul of a nation is composed, which
explains the unprecedented success which his opera
" Halka " gained in Poland, in spite of its technical
and other imperfections. Polish critics agreed that

300 THE NATIONAL MUSIC OF POLAND
the dependence of his genius on national elements
was so strong, that every time he tried to give a
more cosmopolitan and less national character to
his music it was useless. His music lost in interest
and value.
The limits of this study would have to be ex
tended in order to do justice to all the Polish
musicians, composers or artists, whose names belong
to the history of modern and contemporary music
in Poland. The names of Zelenski, Noskowski,
Katski, Wieniawski, Paderewski, Mlynarski, Szyma
nowski, Rozycki, Karlowicz, Stojowski, Statkowski,
Opienski and others come quite naturally and in
stantaneously to the minds of the lovers of music.
Paderewski, like Chopin, possesses extraordinary
lightness and exquisite delicacy of touch ; he is
certainly the great representative of Polish music
abroad. His originality as a pianist virtuoso is
beyond compare.
The musical genius of Poland which first estab
lished itself with so much force in religious music,
which produced the Polish opera, and which has
given to the world Chopin and Moniuszko, will
not be lacking in many brilliant manifestations in
the future. May external conditions, in the front
rank of which stands peace and the realization
of national independence, be favourable to its
development in the years to be !

INTELLECTUAL POLAND
A LECTURE DELIVERED AT CAMBRIDGE
ON MAY 19, 1916
BY
LEON LITWINSKI
With a Preface by
The Rt. Hon. VISCOUNT BRYCE, O.M.

PREFACE
By VISCOUNT BRYCE, O.M.
The fortunes of the Polish people have long engaged
the sympathetic interest of the peoples of Britain and
France. We have always deplored that First Partition
of Poland which was prompted by the unscrupulous
ambition of Frederick II of Prussia. We grieve over
the subsequent calamities of a gifted and gallant race,
many of whose leaders had found a refuge among us.
Within the last feiv years our interest has been
rekindled by hope, for the prospect is brighter to-day
than it has been for three generations, and we now
look forward both to her recovering a united life
under institutions calculated to meet her long-cherished
aspirations, and to a permanent reconciliation of the
Poles with other great branches of the Slavonic stock
from which a series of unfortunate events have
divided them in feeling. It is natural and proper
that we in England should desire to be better in
formed regarding the history of the Polish People,
and especially regarding their intellectual achievements.
We know how much they have accomplished in poetry
and music, as well as in science and letters. The
303

304 PREFACE
names of Copernicus and Mickiewicz and Chopin are
those most familiar to us out of a long and brilliant
list. But we need to know much else, and to have a far
more complete picture presented of the whole history
of the national mind and of its varied efforts in the
field of creative literature. It is a history which is all
the more interesting because it enables those who apply
philosophical methods to history to appreciate the
relative importance and the peculiar character of the
two external factors which have borne their part in
the development of thought and art among the Slavonic
peoples ; I mean the influence of the Latin and
Teutonic West upon the Poles and the Czechs, and the
influence upon the Russian races of the East Roman and
Hellenic culture of the JEgean countries. We friends of
Poland are glad, therefore, to see this book and the series
of which it forms a part, brought before the English
public, and 1 cannot doubt that it will not only be
welcomed by scholars, but will also find a large circle of
readers among those who have honoured the memory
of Polish heroes of the older time, from John Sobieski
down to Kosciuszko, and who have admired the tenacity
with which the nation has clung to its ancient traditions
and has preserved its ancient love of liberty.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND

i

THE CONDITIONS OF INTELLECTUAL LIFE
IN POLAND
No one would readily deny that the intellectual
life,1 like all other forms of life, must be con
sidered as affected by the particular conditions of
its existence and development. Unfortunately,
however, it is not very easy for the free citizens
of these islands to realize the conditions which
determine the expression of thought in fettered
Poland. Just let us imagine for a moment three
different enemies dividing up Great Britain amongst
them, and let us further suppose that the centres
of her intellectual life, such as Oxford, Cambridge,
London, Edinburgh — to which in Poland corre
spond Cracow,2 Lemberg,3 and Vilno a — are isolated
to such an extent that the establishment of any
1 The term " intellectual " is used here chiefly with reference
to the capacity for the higher forms of conceptual thought.
The Intellect is often opposed to other fundamental functions
of the human soul, namely, to the "Will and the Feeling.
2 In Polish Krakow. 3 In Polish Lwow. * In Polish Wilno.
20 305

306 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
free intercourse between London and Oxford, for
example, becomes infinitely more difficult than to
have dealings with Indians or the Senegalese. Add
to these suppositions the further enormity that two
of these enemies, not satisfied with seeing their
victim living an abnormal existence in each of the
three parts of a single body, make a crowning effort
to destroy the intellectual life at the very source of
its being, by attacking one of the most marvellous
instruments of mental production, which is called
national individuality. They refuse to it those
fundamental rights which are conducive to the de
velopment of the human personality, such as the
right to personal freedom, the right of freedom of
discussion and the liberty of the press, the right
of public meeting, etc. All methods that contribute
to this malevolent end will be considered fair in
the estimation of these hostile Powers. They allow
themselves such licence in the prosecution of their.
purposes that they pillage museums, burn and carry
off libraries and national collections, and even
appropriate scientific instruments, including the
fittings of an astronomical observatory. Imagine,
lastly, that the intellectual exponents of the comity
of nations— i.e. the international congresses, which'
are generally regarded as representative of human
dignity and the idea of progress, and as opposed
to plunderers and the forces of reaction— imagine
that these very intellectual exponents, so far from
protesting against these incredible enormities, prefer
the complicity which is undoubtedly associated with

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 307
a refusal to allow the delegates of the tortured
country to take a part in their debates as a separate
and distinct nation.
Sad to say, this is no imaginary portrait. It
is only too true. The country on Which Europe
has imposed the conditions just described is
Poland. Truly there is need here of the pen of a literary
artist rather than that of a scholar, to paint the
terrible and affecting picture of the conditions in
which Polish thought must perforce move, not to
advance, but merely to keep itself alive — to protect
itself against the sentence of systematic and merci
less extermination passed upon it by the enemies
of Poland more than a century ago.
This is why any one wishing to give foreigners
some idea of the intellectual life of Poland must
always appear first of all in the character of an
accuser, and draw up a long indictment, too long,
certainly, to form the subject of this publication.
We shall therefore confine ourselves to quoting here
a few facts in illustration of our statement.

Intercourse between Poles and the Repressions
of the Partitioning Powers.— By a law of 1906,
freedom of association was granted to the Russian
Empire, including the Kingdom of Poland. Three
months after the new law was proclaimed there
was founded in Warsaw the Society Macierz
("Mother of Schools"). An announcement of its

308 INTELLECTUAL ROLAND
fall will be found in the following telegram, which
appeared in The Times of December 19, 1907 :—
. . . According to the Russ, the " Macierz " during its two
years of existence has formed 781 committees, enlisted 120,000
members, including all classes of the population, has applied
for permission for 1,247 schools, of which 651 have been
authorized, has educated 36,000 children, and has this
year received subscriptions aggregating 1,000,000 roubles
(£100,000). An assembly of delegates of the local com
mittees was held recently in Warsaw. The " Macierz " was
fined 3,000 roubles (£300) by the Governor-General on the
complaint of the German Consul that three Poles from Posen
attended the meeting. Four days later the " Macierz " was
closed. . . .
It ought not to be inferred that the " Macierz " was
closed because the German Consul complained.
There were other causes as well. The fact shows
only that intercourse between the Poles on ques
tions of their public life and interests is severely
repressed by mutual understanding of the par
titioning Governments.

Removal of Polish Libraries by Russia and
Prussia. — By way of opening the subject of the
libraries of the capital of Russia, M. Eugene Morel,
the author of the famous work " Bibliotheques,"
begins thus : " Saint-Petersbourg a des richesses
uniques, il a meme toute la Pologne." There is a
great truth in these words, for if Russia does not in
reality possess all Polish territories, at least half
the books collected by Poles during the eighteenth
and the first part of the nineteenth century have

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 309
been carried away to Russia. If it is true that
collections of books and works of art of conquered
nations are confiscated and removed, we must
confess at the same time that this mode of
procedure has never been more generally applied
than in respect to Poland, and never more systemati
cally carried out than in the conquest of Poland by
Russia. It was begun in 1772, by the transportation
to St. Petersburg of the private collection of books
belonging to the princely house of Radziwill.
But it was the removal of the, Zaluski Public Library,
opened in Warsaw in 1747, which was the most
terrible loss to Poland. This library was founded
by Joseph Andre Zaluski, Bishop of Kieff. At the
time of opening it contained nearly 200,000 volumes.
By 1774 the number of books in the library was
brought up to 400,000 volumes. This library was
therefore at that time the largest in Europe.1
After the occupation of Warsaw by the Russian
General Souvoroff, the Zaluski Library, which was
under the administration of the Commission of Edu
cation (a Polish institution which was the first
Board of Education in Europe), was removed in
1795 to St. Petersburg, where it became the nucleus
of the present Imperial Public Library, which was
then founded. According to Russian authorities, the
1 According to A. Franklin, " Guide dans les Bibliotheques
de Paris " (1908), amongst the libraries of Paris the " Natio
nals " contained in 1722, 98,000 vols. ; in 1790, 153,000 vols. ;
in 1795, 475,000 vols. ; that of Ste. Genevieve in 1716, 45,000
vols. ; in 1791, 58,000 vols.

310 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
collection which reached St. Petersburg numbered
only 262,000 volumes, 120,000 pamphlets, 11,000
manuscripts, and 24,000 engravings. The remainder
must have been lost through the haste with which
the library was removed, and only a portion could
be saved by some bibliophiles who managed to bribe
the Cossacks escorting the convoy.1
The struggle between Russia and Poland in 1831
served as a new opportunity for the transportation
of the Polish libraries in a body to the shores of
the Neva. Warsaw alone then contributed more
than 170,000 volumes to the Imperial Public
Library. At the same time the library of the
Czartoryski princes at Pulawy, containing 40,000
very choice books, was also added to the collections
of the Imperial Public Library at St. Petersburg.
The collections of the Plock Academy, numbering
nearly 42,000 volumes, were divided between St.
Petersburg and Moscow. In addition, the Library
of the Cadet Corps at Kalisz and that of the
Princes Sapieha at Doroczyn followed the same
road northward.
The end was not yet reached. In 1866, after the
1 See Olenine, Director of the St. Petersburg Imperial
Library, " Essay on the New Bibliographic Order."
The Abbe Georgel, secretary of the French Embassy in Vienna,
in his " Memoires pour servir a l'histoire des evenements de la
fin du 18me siecle," describes the manner in which the packing
up of the library was effected " by a horde of Cossacks."
Among other incidents he tells how a beautiful book of en
gravings was cut in half by the Cossacks because it was too
large for the box.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 311
monasteries were finally abolished in the Kingdom
of Poland, the Government entered into possession
of their libraries, dispatching a great number of
their books to St. Petersburg.
A part of the private library of King Stanislas
Augustus Poniatowski found safe quarters at
Astrachan, where it belongs at present to the local
Orthodox Church seminary.
At the commencement of the present war seventy
chests containing valuable prints were carried away
from the library of the Warsaw University to
Moscow, thus depriving this library of what
escaped from danger even in 1831.
The Prussian Government proceeded along the
same lines, by removing to Berlin between 1835
and 1839 the libraries of the monasteries of the
Grand Duchy of Posen.

The Fate of Prince Jablonowski's Scientific
Endowment. — But the most scandalous example
of German hostility towards the development of
Polish thought may be found in the case of
Prince Joseph A. Jablonowski's Scientific En
dowment.1 Prince Joseph, a Polish magnate,
gave in 1768 a donation in cash with a
view to encouraging Polish science and Polish
scientists. This donation was accepted by the
University of Leipzig. In 1774 it received the royal
1 A. Kraushar, " W sprawie fundacyi naukowej J. A. Jablo-
nowskiego," 1911.

312 INTELLECTUAL ROLAND
sanction of Frederick Augustus,1 with special guaran
tees that the will of the donor should be held sacred.
To-day the endowment still exists, but the University
of Leipzig has entirely changed its application. It
no longer serves for the encouragement of Polish
science. Poles are deliberately excluded from its
management. The essays must be presented ex
clusively in German. Such action would normally
come under Sect. 87 of the German Code of
August 18, 1896. Unfortunately, there is no chance
that the law will be applied in this case.
International Congress of Neurologists, Alienists,
and Psychologists, and the Poles. — A fortnight be
fore the War broke out the well-known Polish
physician Professor Henryk Halban of Lemberg
sent to the Press the following decision : —
In the name of and in concert with my colleagues who
formed part of the Select Committee of the International
Congress of Neurologists, Alienists, and Psychologists at Berne
(Warsaw : represented by Messrs. Flatau, Eadziwillowicz,
Weryho ; Posen : Szuman ; Cracow : Heinrich, Piltz, Wach-
holz, Zanistowski ; Lemberg : Twardowski, Sieradzki, Halban),
I beg to inform the societies and institutions interested in that
Conference that we have unanimously resolved : (1) not to
take part in the Conference, and (2) to request the striking out
of our names from the list of the Organizing Committee. At
the same time we beg of all our colleagues who intended to
take part in the Conference not to come to Berne. We arrived

1 " Fundatio perpetua prasmioruni viris doctis quotannis
distribuendorum " (Konig. Saechs. Hauptstaatsarchiv Original-
urkunde, No. 10538).

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 313
at these resolutions in consequence of the fact that the Central
Committee at Berne, which at the beginning proposed to us
of its own accord a separate Polish Committee, later on, at the
request put forward by German medical societies, without any
agreement with us, set aside the Polish Committee and included
its members in the particular committees of the countries
which have partitioned Poland. Further particulars con
cerning our correspondence with the Central Committee
at Berne will be brought to public notice at a very early
date.
Lemberg,
12** July, 1914.
Are we to conclude from instances like the one
just cited that to the mind of twentieth-century
members of international congresses the prospect
of a banquet honoured by the presence of a high
official in the person of a Minister or an Ambassador
is more valuable than the humiliation of Poland?

M. Delcasse and M. Henryk Sienkiewicz. — But
Europe refuses to recognize, not only the individu
ality of the science of Poland, but also that of her
literature. Some years ago M. Delcasse, Minister
of Foreign Affairs for France, wrote a letter to
Henryk Sienkiewicz, in which he announced that
the French Government had decided to confer a
distinction on that eminent " Russian author " by
naming him in the Legion of Honour. It was only
when Henryk Sienkiewicz had expressed his great
astonishment that the militant French Radical
should consider him a "Russian" author, that M.
Delcasse agreed to correct this error. For the Poles

314 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
it was almost a victory — a good reason for placing
in the French Radicals their hopes of a brighter
future !

Byron, John Stuart Mill, and the Warsaw Censor.
—Finally, as another illustration of the conditions
under which Polish intellectual life has to struggle
for its existence it may be mentioned that among
the books prohibited by the Warsaw censor were
those of such authors as Byron and John Stuart
Mill! After all these examples it will be easier to under
stand the meaning of the following words written
by Boleslawicki : —
The opposition between inward feelings and outward con
ditions, between the burning faith of the heart and the
crushing tyranny of the commonplace day, has reached with
us a state of tragic tension, upsetting the balance of delicate
natures. Why should the spirit of politics and diplomacy get the
upper hand of the spirit of justice ? Why should the noble
inspirations and persevering efforts of good and honest men
be wasted in the struggle with baseness ? The Polish nation
has been deprived of the conditions indispensable for the
expression of its intuitions, capabilities, and powers.1
A Polish publicist, speaking recently of the un
usual conditions under which Polish national life
has to develop, said : —
We have been born, we are living and acting, so to speak,
in the crater of a volcano which ever threatens us with an

1 Boleslawicki, " Kwestja Polska" (1899).

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 315
irruption, and which now and then throws out streams of
fire and molten lava. We have never enjoyed, like other
countries, the happiness of work conducted under the pro
tection of a lasting peace. We are accustomed to see around
us graves and ruins. Unlike many other countries, we erect
our institutions and perform our tasks with the conviction
that they will sooner or later be swept away by our enemies,
and that we shall be obliged to rebuild them or to perform
them over and over again.
This work may be compared with that of an
ant persistently repairing an ant-hill whilst her cruel
and unscrupulous pillagers are destroying all the
results of her toil.
The Polish citizen needs a great deal of adapta
bility to keep his footing in the forefront of civili
zation while his enemies are continually trying to
take away the solid foundation on which he rests,
and which he needs in order to make his work
secure.

II

THE VITALITY OF POLISH INTELLECTUAL
PROPENSITIES
Taking into account the extraordinary conditions
dealt with above, one may well ask if it is to be
expected that any room can be found in Poland
for the development of intellectual life generally.
In this Poland, where intellect is in itself an object
of suspicion — as is acknowledged by a French1
writer— where societies Whose aims are as far as
possible removed from the realm of politics have
yet the utmost difficulty in obtaining permission
to exist, or are dissolved, as was, some years ago,
the Society of medical men at Warsaw ; where the
best energies of the nation are squandered in an
unequal struggle with restraint and force ; where
the most distinguished intellects often perish on the
scaffold, in damp prisons, or in limitless Siberia ;
where affirmation of national individuality is the
object of brutal persecution ; Where everything has
to develop without any encouragement from the
State ; where, in short, all must depend on the initi
ative of individuals and on personal sacrifices ;
where the very foundations of national existence
are in danger — under conditions such as these it
316

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 317
would be, surely, a great thing to show even that
the creative genius of the Polish nation is not atro
phied, and that Poland has succeeded in preserving
her spiritual integrity, her native language, her
artistic and literary taste, in short, her " spiritual
faculties," in potential form— or, if you will, the in
ternal conditions conducive to intellectual literary
and artistic activity. If it can be shown that this is
the case, the Poles will already have given to the
civilized world proof of the extraordinary vitality
of their national spirit.
Now, this proof the Poles have given in the
past, and are constantly giving, arousing in their
enemies an irreconcilable fury. History shows
clearly that every time exterior conditions have
been favourable to the expression of these " potential
faculties " they have never failed to manifest
themselves. It has been so in Poland under
all the three regimes, Prussian, Russian, and
Austrian.

Intellectual Life in German Poland about 1845
and after 1870.— After the year 1840, Posen, as
Professor Struve has said, put herself at the head
of the Polish intellectual movement, thanks to the
greater liberty she enjoyed in comparison with the
other two parts of divided Poland. The result was
that many Polish scholars from Russian Poland
established themselves there, either temporarily or
permanently.

318 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
About this period (1843-5) Posen became in
some measure the intellectual capital of the whole
of Poland. There were to be found there Kamienski,
Jarochowski, Kosinski, Mielzynski, Bentowski,
Libell, Moraczewski, Cieszkowski, Trentowski,
Kremer, Dembowski, and many others.
Later on the Prussian policy with regard to
Poland underwent a change, and was directed
towards a merciless and brutal persecution of the
Polish element, so that in 1905 the same Professor
Struve stated, at the International Philosophical
Congress, held at Geneva, that the conditions im
posed on Polish scientific societies and institutions
in Posen were so severe that it was not at all
astonishing if there was then talk of a real " emigra
tion " of Polish scholars from Posen to Cracow and
Lemberg. A similar statement might be made of that part
of Poland which had fallen under the dominion of
Russia.

Reformed Vilno University, 1781-1831— At the
beginning of the nineteenth century the Polish
provinces under Russian rule had two chief centres
of intellectual culture, Warsaw and Vilno.1 So
far as the second of these is concerned, the intel
lectual movement there gravitated round the Vilno
University, founded in 1579 by Stefan Batory, King
of Poland. Although in its far distant past Vilno
1 To which might also be added Pulawy.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 319
University could pride itself upon names like Skarga,
Warszewicki or Sarbiewski, whose muse Grotius
justly compared with that of Horace, it must be
admitted that its rapid progress dates chiefly from
the reforms of 1781 and 1803.
Alexander I, Emperor of Russia, proclaimed in
a statute dated April, 1803:—
We secure for ever the future of the ancient University
of Yilno, founded in 1578 and reorganized in 1781 according
to the scientific standards of the most advanced countries
of Europe. Twenty -nine years after, i.e. in 1831, this re
formed shrine of Polish intellectual life, raised by
men with brilliant intellectual powers and excep
tional capacity for organization, like Czartoryski,
Czacki, Sniadecki, and others, was suppressed.
Short as was the existence of the new Vilno
University, yet its achievements were magnificent.
It is acknowledged that in the last decades of its
existence the torch of this University burned with
a flame so living and resplendent that it lit up,
not only Lithuania but also the whole Kingdom of
Poland. In the history of the intellectual life of
Poland it will be the eternal glory of this University
that from its midst came men like Mickiewicz,
Slowacki, Kraszewski, Chodzko, Korsak, Odyniec,
and others.
Warsaw " Szkola Glowna" (1862-9).— The history
of the seven years of existence (1862-9) of the
Warsaw "Szkola Glowna" (Chief School) affords

320 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
another striking piece of evidence of the reality of
our contention that the inward propensities towards
the intellectual life, as well as literary and artistic
interest, have never died in the Polish soul. They
have only been held back by unfavourable outward
conditions, the influence of which was not the same,
it must be pointed out, with regard to the intellectual
life of Poland as with regard to its literary and
artistic life.
The year 1831 was the beginning in Poland of
a period of arrested development in every branch
of her national life. The intellectual element in
the country was in part banished and in part
paralysed by Draconian measures. As a result there
was a great danger of mental apathy in the com
munity. It was absolutely necessary to escape from
this condition of things, which was threatening the
country with a retrograde movement. It was neces
sary to find some means for reawakening the natural
aptitude for the cult of the sciences, an aptitude
which was almost asleep, and, so to speak, frozen.
This role was exactly filled by thie creation in
1862 of the "Szkola Glowna "—that is to say, by
the revival of the Polish University of Warsaw,
which was again closed in its turn in 1869, not
identically the same, it is true, but still a revival.
The task undertaken by the " Szkola Glowna "
consisted, as M. Dickstein, a distinguished Polish
mathematician, has explained,1 of creating the largest
1 " Ksiega pamiatkowa b. wychowanc6w b. Szkoly G16wnej "
(1905).

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 321
possible number of Chairs and filling them with
the best scientific forces ; establishing contact with
the research work of the West ; creating a favour
able atmosphere for, the scientists and students of
the future.
It was necessary, therefore, to fill up the gaps in
the general education of the people caused by
long years of stagnation ; to render higher education
more accessible to the young ; to show them the
important problems that await them in future ; to
prepare useful citizens for the country, capable of
occupying responsible posts, demanding University
training. In spite of adverse circumstances the
" Szkola Glowna " discharged its duties for seven
years. After a few years important scientific works
written by former students of the " Szkola Glowna "
began to appear in the Memoirs of the Association
of Exact Science in Paris, and in the Transactions of
the Academy of Sciences in Cracow. From amidst
these pupils there had grown a generation which
for the last forty years has been uninterruptedly
working on the scientific and social fields in Poland.
But only a handful of them were in a position to
devote themselves to purely scientific work or to
fill University Chairs. :
It is known that the " Szkola Glowna " produced a
large number of men of great, if not exceptional,
value (Sienkiewicz, Prus, Swietochowski, Chmielow-
ski, Dygasinski, Rembowski, Badouin de Cour-
tenay, Dunin, Kraushar, Gloger, etc) ; that amongst
21

322 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
them appeared magnificent talents and critical
minds ; that they created one of the most beautiful
periods of our literature ; that they brought about a
powerful intellectual movement whose waves and
currents flow through our life even to-day. All
this could not have been a matter of accident, but
was much more owing to the merit of the School.
The School freed new forces of the nation, which
would otherwise have withered away and perished ;
it succeeded in utilizing the great passion for learn
ing in the young, and the inclination to education in
the older ; it created a scientific atmosphere for
the Polish intellectual classes ; it gave free play to
Polish thought ; it welded heterogeneous elements of
the nation in the fire of comradeship ; it prepared
the soil for the new seed of democracy ; and it
restored, or at least helped to restore, the spiritual
balance of the people, which was disturbed by a
one-sided artistic development, by transferring the
excess of energy from the heart to the brain.
A most astonishing fact is that this was accom
plished during barely seven years, not only through
the scientific knowledge of the teachers of the School,
but also, as has been pointed out by M. A.
Swietochowski, through its national character : the
School was Polish throughout.
Students listening to lectures delivered in their native
tongue [says M. Swietochowski] are not hampered by various
psychic factors obstructing the free association of thoughts
and cooling rather than stimulating their interest in work.
The collective soul of every nation is a distinct prism in

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 323
itself, in which the rays of knowledge break in a specific
manner, different from other prisms. It can also be compared
to an individual organism which can feed itself successfully
only according to its own nature. The national School offers
its people suitable food in the best form for assimilation and
for maintenance of health and vigour.
All this was done by the " Szkola Glowna." To say this is
not a patriotic sophism, but a conclusion based on experience,
because whenever we had the chance of having a Polish
University its strong influence was immediately and distinctly
reflected in the development of the nation's culture. We
know the salutary influence of the Universities of Warsaw
and Vilno, we know what powerful light they cast on the
country, and what deep darkness fell upon her the moment
these institutions were closed.1
In place of this wholesome institution, which pro
vided for the needs of the intellectual development
of the country, there was established in 1869 its
exact opposite— a University, whose aim was, in the
words of Professor Askenazy, " to serve as an
auxiliary instrument, among many others, with a
view to the policy of unification, in conformity with
the idea of the State as a means of levelling every
thing and everybody, as well as to act as a purely
bureaucratic machine created for the purpose of
distributing University diplomas." a The Polish
language was banished from this new University,
together with Polish professors and scholars. From
the standpoint of scientific movement, it played no
part whatever either in Poland or in Russia,
and its professorial staff was destitute of scientific
authorities. 1 " Ksiega Szkoly G16wnej," p. 23.
2 S. Askenazy, Uniw. Warszawski, 1905.

324 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
Further, some of its professors set themselves to
create in the minds of their pupils a real feeling of
distaste for the institutions and ideas of Western
Europe. France, for instance, was represented to
them as a decadent country, in process of falling to
pieces. It is not astonishing, therefore, that the
result of all this has been disastrous as regards
Poland, and entirely negative as regards Russia.
The numbers of the attendance at this University
have fallen 210 per cent, as compared with those
of the university it replaced.
Austrian Poland, which occupies a very inferior
economic and cultural position, and where half the
population is made up of Ruthenians, much less
suited to a University education, has nevertheless
an attendance of students several times greater than
is found in the Kingdom of Poland. In 1905, in
Galicia there were 5,000 students out of 7,500,000
inhabitants, While in Russian Poland, out of
11,000,000 inhabitants only 1,500 were students.
The fact that Russian and Prussian Poland have no
Polish University, has sent a large number of
students to the Universities of France, Belgium,
Switzerland, Germany, etc.
It will be superfluous to try to show that the
constitutional and liberal regime enjoyed by the
Poles in Galicia has had a highly favourable effect
on the development of Polish intellectual life in
that part of Poland.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 325
Revival of the Polish University at Warsaw in
1915. — Lastly, as a concluding proof that the Poles
have been able to preserve potentially their natural
capabilities, and that the whole policy of Russi-
fication or Germanization has succeeded only in
retarding its development, there may be adduced
the fact of the creation of the University of Warsaw
after the fall of that city.
The Warsaw Courier (November 1915) describes
at some length the extraordinary, difficulties which'
had to be overcome by the Education Department of
the Citizens' Committee of Warsaw, in order to
create in that city a Polish University and a Polish'
Technical High School. Having obtained the
permission of the authorities, the said depart
ment achieved its aim in the course of a few
weeks, in spite of interrupted communication with
the provinces, where there is to be found a
not inconsiderable number of Polish scientists and
professors, in spite of the devastation of the country,
threatened by. poverty and hunger, and in spite of
the fact that the original Polish University of
Warsaw had been closed for fifty years.
The above-mentioned paper pays a high tribute
to this remarkable and unusual manifestation of the
energy and organizing talent of the Poles, and adds :
" History will some day do justice to this city, which',
being able to offer neither money nor facilities to
Polish science, has yet always possessed a certain
number of men devoted to science with disinterested
ness and endurance, who have fulfilled their duty.

326

INTELLECTUAL POLAND

towards civilization and country without any
brighter prospects, and often under most trying
financial conditions."

Production of Books in Poland.— Perhaps a few
statistical data showing the number and the distribu
tion of Polish books published in 1911 will be of
interest in considering the reality of Polish literary
and scientific propensities.
According to the Swiss periodical Droit dAuteur,
the following was the production of books in 1911 :
France, 11,652; Great Britain, 10,914; Holland,
3,673; Poland, 3,462; Spain, 2,790; Hungary,
2,032. The following is a classification of Polish books,
according to their subject-matter (1910):—

Bibliography, 63
Philosophy and Psychology, 66
Mathematics and Natural
Sciences, 141
Anthropology, 13
History, 135
Medicine, 100
Law, Economics, and Socio
logy, 98
Ethnology and Ethnography, 9
History of Literature, 164
Comparative Study of Lan
guages, 15
Technology, 42
Trade and Commerce, 22
Agriculture, 84

Geography and Travels, 39
Novels, 267
Poetry, 122
Art, 51
Music, 114
Drama, 82
Pedagogy, 70
Textbooks for Schools, 117
Books for Children, 173
Theology, 370
Popular Literature, 262
Sensational Literature, 57
Books of Songs, etc., 81;
Miscellaneous, 322
Almanacks, 147
Reports, etc., 200

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 327
The above examples prove that it is true to say
that the Poles have been able to preserve all those
civilizing propensities which from mediaeval days
down to the present time have distinguished Polish
national life. And this in spite of the unequal
struggle, in spite of the violence of the means
employed by thle partitioning Powers— a violence
which oftentimes nothing but the limitations of the
human imagination could check. The Powers in
question have succeeded merely in hindering the
normal development of these propensities, in creat
ing for them conditions entirely out of harmony
with the past history of the intellectual life of
Poland.

Intellectual Life in Poland in the Past— Before
the loss of their political independence, the Poles
possessed five Universities, and were consider
ing the foundation of two more— in Posen and
in Wolhynia. At the beginning of this War
they possessed only two. The Polish Univer
sity of Cracow, founded in 1364— that is to
say, at an earlier date than the foundation of the
first German University— quickly became the rendez
vous of young students who came in streams from
all the countries of Europe, even from those which
already possessed their own Universities, to attend
the lectures of celebrated professors such as the
astronomer Wojciech (better known as Adalbert),
the teacher of the immortal Copernicus. Thus

328 LNTELLECTUAL POLAND
in the period 1433-1509 nearly half the students
of the Cracow University were foreigners. But
now, in our own time, the young students of Russian'
and Prussian Poland, as well as numbers of scholars,
are obliged to migrate to foreign countries, such
as France, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, and
others, to seek the light they cannot find in their
own land or are forbidden to kindle there.
Frankly, such a state of things is not deserved
by the Poland which in the past has given to the
civilized world sufficient proofs of its capacity to
contribute to the development of intellectual life and
civilization in general.
The Cracow University, which educated Coper
nicus, had as early as 1416, says the " Encyclopaedia
Britannica," " so far acquired a European reputation
as to venture upon forwarding an expression of its
views in connection with the deliberations of the
Council of Constance, and towards the close of the
fifteenth century the Cracow University was in high
repute as a school of both astronomical and human
istic studies." '
Leonard Cox, an Englishman and a former
student of Cracow University, in his De Laudibus
Academic Cracoviensis, published in 1518, gave
expression to his intense admiration of the Polish'
scholastic dialectic, and it was Erasmus of Rotterdam
himself Who, in 1529, dedicated his edition of the
works of Seneca to the Bishop of Cracow, as
to a centre of learning of European reputation.
1 " Encyc. Brit.," 1911, vol. xxvii. p. 757.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 329
Although in the subsequent period of Polish thought
there was a decline, the Poles have always pre
served their interest in the intellectual life, public
instruction, methods of teaching, etc. Poland,
therefore, as was stated a few months ago
by M. Siedlecki in the Warsaw weekly paper
Tygodnik Hustrowany, came up to the require
ments and the high standard of University life
as far back as the fifteenth century, and since
that time she has not once deviated from1 her
spiritual course. There has been no period in her
historic past When the loss of a centre of higher
education has not been painfully felt by the nation.
What the Poles are apt to call the epoch of decline
in Poland, namely the seventeenth century, witnessed
not only the formation of higher educational institu
tions in Poland proper, but also in Lithuania and
the distant provinces of the realm. The banner of
higher education was hoisted over the northern
town of Polock, bringing with; it the torch of Western
European intellectual light. In the same century, we
find another example of Polish educational initiative
in the formation of the Academy of Kieff, so that
at a time which, with scrupulous self-criticism^ the
Poles term the period of decay, Polish science had
still so much elasticity, so much excess of energy,
that it was able to undertake intellectual missions
outside the ethnographic boundaries of the Polish
C ommon wealth .

Ill
THE ORGANIZATION OF POLISH
INTELLECTUAL LIFE
If fettered Poland has been able to preserve and
even to develop what we have called her " potential
faculties," this has been made possible only by the
enormous sacrifices she has always been ready to
make for the retention at any cost of her indi
viduality. Of this an eloquent example is to be
found in the institutions connected with the intel
lectual life of Poland. These are the incarnation of
the spirit at once of sacrifice, of self-defence,
and of organization.
Polish Scientific Institutions and Societies.— After
Poland lost her independence, the necessity of main
taining and developing science and arts called into
being a number of new societies as far as the parti
tioning Powers would permit. One of the most
important of these is the Ossolinski National Insti
tute and Public Library in Lemberg. It was
founded by Count Joseph Maximilian Ossolinski in
1817. In 1823 the Lubomirski Museum was
added to it. This Institute has gradually become
one of the leading scientific institutions in Poland,
330

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 331
although before the year 1860 its development was
greatly hindered by the repressive measures of
the Austrian Government. Even the adjective
" national " in the name of the Institute was
regarded as an offence by the Government, Which
persistently tried to change it to "scientific." In
spite of these difficulties " Ossolineum," as it is
commonly called, has flourished, and possesses over
£32,000 of capital, as well as a large building in
Lemberg and its own printing works, library, and
museum. In Posen, the Society for Promoting Science,
founded by Karol Marcinkowski in 1841, has
rendered great services to the cause of Polish
intellectual life. This prosperous Society has
endowment funds amounting to £52,000.
There are two institutions in Poland whose
special object is helping the cause of research. The
first is the Mianowski Loan Fund, established
in Warsaw in 1881 by Dr. Joseph Mianowski, and
the second is the Society for Promotion of Polish
Science, founded in Lemberg in 1901.
Among the most visible signs of the activity
of the Mianowski Fund are the publications which
it has helped to issue. Its catalogue contains over
620 titles of works in all departments of knowledge.
Besides separate books this institution helps to
publish series of important works.
The Lemberg Society, for Promoting Polish
Science was founded twenty years later than the
Mianowski Loan Fund, and cannot therefore boast

332 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
of an equally splendid record ; nevertheless, con
sidering its comparatively slender resources, it has
given proofs of great vitality and efficiency. During
the second year of its existence its membership in
creased by 1,015. The aim of the Society is " to
help Polish scientists or institutions which devote
themselves to the cause of research in any branch
of knowledge " ; this aim has been achieved chiefly
by helping such persons or institutions to publish
the results of their inquiries. So far 49 books
have been published, on the following subjects :
Polish Law, History, History of Literature, Art,
Science, and Psychology. Besides these works the
Society, issues the following publications : " The
Archivum of Knowledge "—divided into two sec
tions : the historical -philosophical (6 volumes) and
the mathematical-scientific — and " Studies in the
History of Polish Law." In order to enable foreign
scholars to become acquainted with the results of the
Society's researches it issues a " Bulletin " in French
(12 volumes up: till now).
These few societies do not exhaust all the
activities of the Polish community in support of
art and science. Many smaller associations and
institutions exist, and some of them have rendered
valuable services to the cause of Polish intellectual
life. Such are, for instance :—
Circle of the Polish Mathematicians at Warsaw (Kolo mate-
matyczne w Warszawie).
Warsaw Psychological Association (Tow. psychologiczne w
Warszawie).

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 333
Lemberg Pedagogical Society (Tow. pedagogiczne we
Lwowie).
Polish Philosophical Association at Lemberg (Polskie tow.
filozoficzne we Lwowie).
Cracow Philosophical Society (Tow. filozoficzne w Krakowie).
Lemberg Law Association (Tow. prawnicze lwowskie).
Warsaw Law Association (Tow. prawnicze warszawskie),
Cracow Law and Economic Association (Tow. prawnicze i
ekonomiczne w Krakowie).
Lemberg Historical Society (Tow. historyczne we Lwowie).
Cracow Historical Society (Tow. historyczne w Krakowie).
Warsaw Historical Society (Tow. milosnikow historji w
Warszawie).
Cracow Numismatic Society (Tow. numizmatyczne w
Krakowie).
Lemberg Folk-lore Society (Tow. ludoznawcze we Lwowie).
Lemberg Mickiewicz Literary Society (Tow. literackie im.
Mickiewicza we Lwowie), etc.
The interest taken in all scientific societies by
the Polish community is very noteworthy. The
best proofs of this are the great number of members
and the rapid spread and development of such
societies ; the latter fact also proves how very much'
desired they were. A few years were sufficient for
the Warsaw Scientific Society to become a very
influential institution.
Unfortunately, the Polish scientific societies and
institutions depend for their monetary resources
solely on voluntary subscriptions. Thus, for instance,
a few years ago a generous patroness presented the
Public Library in Warsaw with a fine building,
the cost of the erection of which represented over
£40,000. The donations received by. the Cracow
Academy, the Warsaw Scientific Society, and the

334 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
Vilno Society afford another convincing proof of
the great generosity of the public in Poland. Thus,
as soon as the Vilno Society of Friends of Learn
ing received a few years ago a legal status, gifts
began to pour in from all over Lithuania ; col
lections of books, archives, and many other gifts
were sent, regardless of the fact that many times
previously such collections have after a time been
taken away to Russia by the Government.

Central Institutions of Intellectual Life in Poland.
—All the above institutions have been created as being
essential to the promotion of the development of the
intellectual life of the country. There are other
institutions which occupy a more central position
and which exercise a more controlling or directing
influence. At the head of Polish scientific institutions js
the Cracow Academy, originally called the Cracow
Scientific Society. It was inaugurated in February
1816 by the Rector of Cracow University, Valen
tine Litwinski. The foundation of this institution is
directly connected with: Cracow University, which
represents the embodiment of centuries of Polish
intellectual tradition. According to the regulation
of 1816, the rectors of Cracow University had
to perform at the same time the functions of the
President of the Cracow Scientific Society. After the
closing, by order of the Russian Government, of the
Society of the Friends of Learning in Warsaw, the

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 335
Cracow Scientific Society became the leading insti
tution in the intellectual life of the whole of Poland.
In 1873 it received new regulations and the title
of " Academy." During the forty, years from that
date, acting under somewhat better political con
ditions, the Academy has done excellent work in
every domain of knowledge. Its publications of
important documents relating to Polish History,
Literature and Law, Polish Bibliography, the
History of Art in Poland, Archaeology, and Eth
nography, are truly monumental works in no way
inferior to the corresponding publications of other
nations. At present the Academy has commenced the publi
cation of the " Polish Encyclopaedia " ; the con
tributors to this number several hundred and the
volumes several score. There is a branch of the
Academy in Paris, and for several years now a
party of Polish scholars sent by the Academy to
Rome has been conducting researches relating to
the history of Poland. Similar parties have latterly
visited Sweden and Hungary, for the same purpose.
An examination of the list of publications shows
the wide scope of the Academy's activities.
As Lemberg did not wish to compete with the
Cracow Academy, no large and comprehensive
Society of a similar nature has been formed in
Eastern Galicia, but in respect of the number of
societies devoted to the furthering of special subjects
this town is first in all Poland. In Warsaw, Posen,
and Vilno the need for an institution which would

336 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
be representative of all that was best in the intel
lectual life of each part of the country was also
felt. There was a twofold reason for this : first, the
difference in the conditions prevailing in the three
parts of Poland— Russian, Prussian, and Austrian ;
and secondly, the fact that even the many and varied
activities of the Academy were not sufficient to meet
the growing intellectual needs of the country. At
the present time the centres of intellectual activity in
Poland may be divided into five, namely : Cracow,
which serves as such for; the whole of Poland ; Lem
berg, for Galicia ; Warsaw, for the Kingdom of
Poland ; Vilno, for Lithuania ; and Posen, for the
Duchy, of Posen. Thorn may, be added as a sixth
centre, for it can boast of a smaller but very
energetic Society.
After the suppression in 1833, by Russian Imperial
order, of the Towarzystwo Naukowe Warszawskie
(Warsaw Scientific Society) there was no central
institution in Warsaw co-ordinating the scientific life
of this part of Poland. It was only in 1907 that
the revival of the above institution was allowed.
The work of the Society is carried out in sections,
which publish their Transactions. There are three
sections : (1) Philology, and Literature ; (2) Anthro
pology, Social Sciences, History, and Philosophy ;
(3) Mathematics and Natural Sciences. The Society
possesses a certain number of laboratories for.
research hi the departments of Physiology, Anthro
pology, Neuro biology, Meteorology, Radiology,
Zoology, etc.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 337
In German Poland the Polish Scientific Movement
is promoted as far as possible by the Towarzystwo
Przyjaciol Nauk w Poznaniu (Society of Friends of
Learning in Posen), founded in 1857. It issues an
Annual (since its foundation) and Medical News
(since 1889), as well as separate publications. It
is also active in promoting scientific lectures, the
care of ancient monuments, and the erection of
statues to the distinguished dead.
The Society consists of five sections : (1) History
and Literature (existing since 1857); (2) Natural
Sciences (since 1857); (3) Medicine (since 1865);
(4) Law and Economics (since 1908); and ](5)
Technology (since 1912).
The Society possesses a library consisting of
140,000 volumes, 800 manuscripts, as well as
numerous collections, viz.: (1) Picture Gallery
(about 800 pictures) ; (2) Prehistoric Archaeological
Collection; (3) Ethnographic Collection; (4) Nu
mismatic Collection ; (5) Natural History Collec
tion ; (6) Collection of Objects of National and
Historical Interest.
As to Lithuania, it was only in 1906 that permis
sion was granted to found Towarzystwo Przyjaciol
Nauk w Wilnie (The Society of Friends of Learning
in Vilno). This Society issues an annual publica
tion as well as separate publications. The meetings
take place once a month,, The Society organizes
lectures and devotes its energies to the preservation
of national monuments and memorials. In 1911
its members numbered 400: 353 ordinary and 47
22

338 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
honorary, patrons, and life-members. The Society
possesses a library as well as rich archives.
During 1913 the Society was amalgamated with
Muzeum Nauki i Sztuki (The Vilno Art and Science
Museum) and is therefore now in possession of
the valuable collections of the Museum.
We must again emphasize the fact that, in order
to estimate at its true worth the work done by
Polish learned societies, it is necessary to realize
the difficulties they have had to contend with. In
Galicia, where the Government did not hinder their
formation, they developed rapidly and accomplished
a great deal of valuable work. In the Kingdom
of Poland it was not until the year 1905, when the
status of such societies was legalized, that the con
ditions became somewhat easier ; since then a great
number of societies have arisen and flourished. It
must be borne in mind that the continuity of their
work had been completely broken, and that for
over half a century there had been no room in
Russia for Polish intellectual activity. This break
lasted from 1831 till 1907 ; it was not till 1907 that
the formation of the Warsaw Scientific Society was
permitted. Vilno suffered the same fate; its ancient
University was closed and all societies abolished in
1831. The only Society which escaped was the
Medical Society, but its privileges were gradually
curtailed, and in 1874 it was forbidden to use the
Polish language ; Russian was the language to be
used at meetings and for documents, treatises, etc.,
but any of the members Who did not know it were

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 339
allowed to speak French, German, or English ;
finally, the Society was completely taken over by the
Russian Administration. The list of Polish societies
which were abolished by the Government and those
which existed without being authorized to exist
would be very long. Although conditions were
better before the war broke out, it may be said
that every society which is flourishing and attracts
large numbers of the intellectual classes is threatened
with extinction by the Government.
It is almost superfluous to speak of the difficulties
encountered in Prussian Poland.
The before-mentioned fact showing how the
Leipsic University has misused certain funds Which
were given by a Polish magnate, Prince Jablo-
nowski, in 1774, is a very typical instance among
many, others.

IV
EPILOGUE
The Poles are standing out for the acquisition of
such conditions as will allow them to develop their
living personality and to bring their tribute to the
common treasure of mankind.
Apparently the fulfilment of these conditions
does not require the right to an independent political
self-determination, and if so, i.e. if the Poles do
not claim what is sometimes called a radical solution
of the Polish question, the present war may easily,
it may be said, realize their aspirations. This
ought to be the view especially of that part of
Polish public opinion which comprises its intellec
tual classes, the mental attitude of which in all
countries is generally characterized by a diminished
enthusiasm for such things as the idea of a king,
that of a national army, or that of outward strength
or expansion.
This is perhaps true in the case of the countries
which have never ceased to enjoy political indepen
dence, but it is certainly false in the case of a
country which, like Poland, has lost this indepen
dence. The intellectual classes in Poland take
340

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 341
their stand firmly under the banner of political
independence. For them, as for other sections of
Polish society, freedom constitutes the indispensable
condition of the development of Poland's indi
viduality, which ought not to be confounded with
" originality." The history of the last hundred
years has shown to the Poles quite conclusively that
there cannot be real and lasting freedom for Poland
without political independence, without a Polish
State and a Polish Army. The spirit of imperialism
and expansion, the jealousy between nations, etc.,
will remain for a long time the main obstacle
towards a mutual understanding between nations,
especially in the case of inequality in their respective
strengths. This is a fact which cannot be abolished
by mere reasoning or speculation, like those, for
instance, which are based on the distinction between
" good-hearted " and " brutal " nations. The Poles
have little to expect, either, from the future develop
ment of what is called " liberal " tendencies in
politics. History, shows that in the development of
liberal and progressive political parties there occur
very curious transformations as soon as they, attain
to power or even as soon as they realize that they
are beginning to exercise a real influence on govern
mental authority.
What intellectual Poland wants is an intense,
complete, peaceful, and uninterrupted national life.
It is only in the restored Polish State that such a
life can exist. Such an intense and peaceful
life will certainly be favourable to the development

342 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
of those fundamental mental " faculties " which have
been responsible for the development of Polish
thought in the past, and which the Poles have been
able to preserve in spite of unfavourable outward
conditions. Among these '' faculties " a prominent place has
been taken by creative imagination.
It is a well-known fact that different nations
contribute not merely in different degrees but also
in different ways towards the development of various
high expressions of thought, feelings and will.1 In
this connection it is to be expected that psycholo
gists will be able to demonstrate in the future that
the Polish national genius is distinguished for the
1 Herr Hans Delbruck, Professor in the University of Berlin
and Deputy to the Reichstag, expressed this opinion some years
ago : " The splendour and the intellectual wealth of our epoch,
our progress in the sciences, in philosophy, in art, and in technical
matters — in a word, the whole of civilization is based on the
plurality of the great nations. Each has its own qualities,
its own nature, its own development, and the labour and
productions of each have an influence upon the others. The
great minds of Germany could never have been what they
were without Voltaire, Rousseau, Shakespeare, and neither
the French nor the English could be what they are without
Luther and the Reformation." Herbert Spencer and other
sociologists affirm that the world passes from the homogeneous
to the heterogeneous, everything acquires complexity and is
subdivided. The division of labour carried to infinity con
duces to the interdependence of countries and of individuals.
This interdependence cannot be realized, as Fouillee empha
sized, either by a narrow nationalism or by a half-understood
internationalism which fails to recognize both the true nature
and the true needs of national organisms.

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 343
power of its creative imagination and its peculiar
mental freedom. From Copernicus down to
M. Henryk Sienkiewicz this quality may be noticed.
Professor Hoffding, a well-known Danish philoso
pher and psychologist, writes on this point as
follows : —
What is marvellous in scientific genius is the mental freedom
with which it is able to abstract from experience and to picture
the different possibilities with all their consequences, in order
to find by this means a new reality, not accessible to direct
experience. Kepler x cited this mental freedom as a significant
feature in the genius of Copernicus.2
It is also this rare freedom and power of imagina
tion which strikes one most in reading certain of
M. Henryk Sienkiewicz's works.
Simon Newcomb said about Copernicus : —
There is no figure in astronomical history which may more
appropriately claim the admiration of mankind through all
time than that of Copernicus. Scarcely any great work was
ever so exclusively the work of one man as was the heliocentric
system, the work of the retiring sage of Frauenburg.3
Although the position of M. Sienkiewicz in the
history of literature is different from that occupied
by Copernicus in the history of astronomy, the
reading of his works leaves a similar impression :
1 Reuschle, " Kepler und die Astronomie," Frankfurt, 1871,
p. 119 : " Copernicus vir maximo ingenio et, quod in hoc
exercitio magni momenti est, animo libero."
2 Hoffding, " Outlines of Psychology," p. 179.
3 " The Problems of Astronomy," pp. 83, 84.

344 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
it is at times difficult to decide what to admire more,
M. Sienkiewicz's works or the mind which produced
them. That creative imagination is needed both in the
scientific and in the literary or artistic activities
of man may. be easily gathered from the following
statement made by Professor Karl Pearson in his
well-known "Grammar of Science" (p. 30):—
There is an element in our being which is not satisfied by
the formal processes of reasoning ; it is the imaginative or
aesthetic side, the side to which the poets and philosophers
appeal, and one which science cannot, to be scientific, dis
regard. We have seen that the imagination must not replace
the reason in the deduction of relation and law from classified
facts. But, none the less, disciplined imagination has been
at the bottom of all great scientific discoveries. All great
scientists have, in a certain sense, been great artists ; the man
with no imagination may collect facts, but he cannot make
great discoveries. If I were compelled to name the English
men who during our generation have had the widest imagi
nations and exercised them most beneficially, I think I should
put the novelists and poets on one side and say Michael
Faraday and Charles Darwin.
The above quotation tends to prove that it is
a fallacy to think that pure intellect is, so to
say, a self-supporting and self -determining factor in
scientific production. But it is equally a fallacy
to imagine that the intellect is genetically indepen
dent of its national milieu, " because the ' father
land ' is shown by history to be an institution
necessary to the life of man, and because man is
by nature a social being, and the universal com-

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 345
munity of all men has been up to now— and will
be for long years yet— a pure creation of the imagi
nation." i
So intellectual Poland no less than literary and
artistic Poland is deeply interested in this intense
and peaceful civilizing work, which she needs and of
which the possession of her own externally indepen
dent political form is a condition. Polish thinkers
as well as Polish politicians are right when they
require, not a disabled and humiliated " autono
mous " Poland, fruit of somebody's " generosity " or
" benevolence," but a Poland armed for the future,
and conscious of her own strength and destiny, con
scious of the civilizing part which she may play in
a regenerated Europe, a Poland embodied with a
spirit of national dignity and honour. Romanti
cism !
It is a curious thing that only the Great Powers
are allowed to be romantic. The others, and
especially the Poles, must refrain from it under
pain of making themselves appear ridiculous.
On May 15, 1916, the papers published a state
ment made by Sir Edward Grey to the London
representative of the Chicago Daily News, which
closed with the following sentence, referring to the
German authorities : " They do not understand that
free men and free nations will rather die than submit
to that ambition, and that there can be no end to
war till it is defeated and renounced."
The Times of June 3, 1916, in a leading article
1 Le Fur, Revue droit int. pub., vol. v. p. 463.

346 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
on the Jutland Naval Battle declared that this battle
will steel the British people's "nnalterable resolu
tion to win this war or perish."
These declarations were received with general
approbation and enthusiasm by the people.
Similar expressions of romanticism might be
found in hundreds, in the countries of the Allies as
well as in those of the Central Powers. Everywhere
they meet with approval.
Why, then, is it only Polish romanticism that
offends the ears of Europe?
Why must the Poles have preached to them the
necessity, of slavery when the whole world besides
demands the liberty?
That is a deviation from the moral sense which
it is exceedingly difficult to understand.
But as has been stated above, for intellectual
Poland the question of the political independence of
the country is not simply one of romanticism. It
can confront a scientific and " positive " discussion.
There is a general tendency to give the Poles
lessons in practical wisdom. They are constantly
invited to compromise and conciliation. As to the
compromise, a Polish political writer, M. Jan Dom
browski, said recently in a Polish daily, Dziennik
Petrogradzki : " Compromise is known only, by,
Governments and parties — the peoples ignore it."
M. Dombrowski is quite right. There are certain
eternal values, certain fundamental facts on which
the development of mankind is based, Which cannot

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 347
be made the object of compromise or conciliation.
They are, and they will ever remain, high above
international congresses and diplomacy. The Poles
will never understand or admit that their country
and they themselves may be made the property
of another nation, that there may be a foreign
mortgage on their country.
It may be interesting to know the attitude the
Great Powers themselves are taking towards the
suggestions of compromise coming from outside on
matters which they consider of vital importance
to their countries.
Here is a quotation which speaks for itself :—
In the meantime the British people and their Allies would
look upon suggestions of compromise, however friendly, and
from whatever quarter they came, very much as President
Lincoln and Mr. Seward looked upon them in the Civil War.
The American records of that period afford the classic instance
of how a great democracy fighting for its life, and for what it
prizes more than life, meets even the hint of interference from
outside. Neutrals cannot be too tender of the susceptibilities
of belligerents when they undertake to criticize their political
action.1 As to the necessity of being practical— i.e. of not
abandoning such aims as are unrealizable under
given conditions—the Poles, even if their realism
were not subordinated to some higher ideals
which make life worth living, ought not to be
unnecessarily moderate in their judgment of what
is realizable and what is not. History shows that
1 The Times, May 27, 1916, "The Hollowness of Peace
Talk."

348 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
man's capacity to forecast the future is still very
limited and there is no power so strong as the
will. What is sometimes called by the high-
sounding name " political realism " is often nothing
more than lack of foresight, which may, be fatally
disastrous to those who carry it too far.
Of the fact that neither individuals nor countries
can foresee the future this war has given ample
evidence. It has given many evidences to the Poles
also. " When a man feels himself bereft of all pro
tection, when he can reckon no longer on either
friendship, or justice, or pity, there is nevertheless
one feeling that remains — that is hope. Hope alone
is adequate to defend him against despair. Hope
alone possesses the power of administering the last
unction to his dying lips. It is hope, too, this good,
sympathetic, and faithful source of consolation,
which irradiates the image— far off, and yet so
near— of our dear University— a hope which by its
very presence brings comfort to our soul."
These were the words with which M. Alexander
Swietochowski concluded his oration in 1903, when
he met the former students of the Polish University,
of Warsaw ("Szkola Glowna"), which had been
closed in 1867.
What do such words as these prove if not that
in 1903 the chances of the restoration of the Polish
University of Warsaw were so remote that it was
necessary for Swietochowski to impress on his
colleagues their bounden duty to keep on hoping?

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 349
For, as Casanova once emphasized, despair is a form
of suicide, and then, as Crebillon added, there is
nothing left but shame.
Truly, the outlook was most unpromising !
What was an impossibility even so recently as
1903 has become to-day a solid reality : the Polish
University at Warsaw was resuscitated in November
of last year.
Such an example, precarious as it may appear,
so long as the Poles have no effective power to
administer their own affairs, so long as a Polish
State is not a living reality, must strengthen the
Poles in the belief that they must never give up
the idea of national independence. There is every
reason to think that the Poles will never; give up
this ideal, and that it may on,e day be realized,
because, as Lord Weardale said : " The Polish race
has many gifts, but perhaps its enduring faith is
its most remarkable characteristic." '
The faithfulness of the Poles to the idea of inde
pendence will prevent them from one day deserving
to have said of them what Montesquieu said about
Rome :—
When Sylla wished to give back Rome her freedom she
could not take it — nothing but the shadow of her virtue
remained ; . . . she fell deeper and deeper into slavery 2 ;

1 " Poland's Struggle for Independence," by Kucharski.
With an Introduction by Lord Weardale.
2 " Esprit des Lois," iii. 3 : " Quand Sylla voulut rendre a
Rome sa liberte elle ne put plus la recevoir, elle n'avait plus
qu'un faible reste de vertu ; . . . elle futtoujours plus esclave."

350 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
or what Tetmajer, a Polish poet, said about
illustrious Greece :—
The soldier alone is the defender of the honour of an en
slaved nation. When Ancient Greece was occupied by the
Romans she continued to give to the world thinkers, philo
sophers, and artists, but this in no way prevented the
Romans from despising her. In contempt perished the
nation which yet was — as the Romans themselves recognized
— in the highest rank of intelligence in the world of her time,
which was able to impose her own tongue upon her conquerors
as an auxiliary language and a model to the learned circles and
the intellectual classes of the Roman people.
The Poles really feel that if they give up the ideal
of independence they will very rapidly cease to be
a united although partitioned nation, that they will
lose their individuality and therefore the possibility
of active participation in the higher forms of expres
sion of the spiritual as opposed to the merely
material life, that they will abase themselves
morally, and will deserve the contempt of all the
honest and dishonest world. And in so thinking
the Poles are undoubtedly right, beeause, psycho
logically speaking, the idea of national dignity plays
the same part in the life of a nation as the idea
of self-respect in the moral consciousness of the
individual, although it is less evident.
If the object is to preserve and develop the
personality as a whole, you cannot sacrifice these
sentiments with impunity without harming the
individual or the social organism in which they
occupy a central position.
Modern social psychology, is ready, we think,

INTELLECTUAL POLAND 351
to acknowledge this truth, and it is to be expected
that the Western democracies will not show them
selves incapable of understanding what vital and
profound meaning there is in faithfulness to the
ideal of national independence in the case of an
enslaved, but not degraded, nation, in the case of
a nationality which desires to keep itself distinct
and united in the midst of other peoples.
Was it not a great English poet and philosopher,
Pope, who said : " Let fortune do her worst what
ever she makes us lose, as long as she never makes
us lose our honesty and our independence"? And
was it not a French humanist, Gueroult, who pro
claimed : " Toutes les fois que la France est infidele
a une noble cause, elle s'appauvrit et se degrade " ?
The truth contained in these words is deeply
rooted in the convictions of Polish patriots. And
when the German Chancellor, Herr von Bethmann-
Hollweg, included the following sentence in his
speech in the Reichstag on the 19th of August last,
after the fall of Warsaw :—
For centuries geographical and political fate have forced the
Germans and Poles to fight against each other. The recollec
tion of these old differences does not diminish respect for the
passion of patriotism and tenacity with which the Polish
people defends its old Western civilization and its love of
independence in the severe sufferings from Russoism, a love
which is maintained also through the misfortune of this war —
he knew perfectly well that from a Polish point of
view he was paying the Poles the greatest tribute
they could crave for themselves. He knew, too,

352 INTELLECTUAL POLAND
that he would strike the most tender chord in the
Polish soul.
Whatever comment may be made on the sincerity
of the Chancellor's words, it must, at least, be
admitted that in this case, as in many other
circumstances, Germany has proved to be " well
informed " about Polish aims and Polish political
aspirations. In this war the Poles have no other means of
asserting their imprescriptable right to the inde
pendence they claim, except through the pen kad the
spoken word, and even that much is often denied
them. If this right is not given to them in the next
Peace Congress, from which the optimists hope will
ensue a regenerated Europe, there will be only one
thing left for them to do : to struggle on until the
final victory, for, as Staszyc, a great Polish patriot,
said after the partitions : " A great nation may
fall, only a vile nation can perish."

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