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lution in Europe , if once evolved ia > om . the eleepless fire of national feeling , cannot be guided or limited by the' exigencies of English policy . When "Warsaw speaks , Milan may reply , and Combrn may once more shut its gates against the Austrian garrison . Because—and this is the truth which generous sympathisers sometimes forget - — a people that revolts fights in its own interest , and not solely in the interest of " Western . "Eur ope . "
It is probable that Ministers would gladly . arm and pay a Polish Legion , if they . oould disconnect it from all political and ulterior objects . A Polish flag outside Sebastopol might produce disaffection within , find cause an uneasy motion to be felt throughout the Polish provinces of Russia . But after men of that nationality had shed their blood in the efforts of the desperate siege , painful questions would arise : Whether , for instance , the populations near Odessa and the Baltic Sea should not be defended , if induced to rise in behalf of the allied powers , or should be left to be dragooned , Jcnouted , and hanged by imperial martial law ? Moreover , if a Polish Legion could be established , merely to give a vent to the military inclinations ef a certain class of Poles , what would be the result ? Do Englishmen , ready as they are to boast that Britons never , never shall be slaves , conceive that the high-spirited exiles , who have suffered banishment , confiscation of property ,
social outlawry , and ruin , m the cause of their national independence , would take arms merely , to fill up the bloody chasms in the besieging ranks beforeJSebastopol ? Ho they think that to pay them Swiss wages while they figlit , and to grant them colonial allotments , or hospital pensions afterwards , would gather the bravest of the Polish people Under the flag of a mercenary Legion ? Have they so forgotten—under the wings of the [ French eagle—that men do not fight
for bread alone , that they can approve and ratify the suggestions of an insolent correspondent of the Times , who asks the Poles why they do not secure clean beds , good food , beer , and the animal delight of injuring Russia by enlisting in the Foreign Legion ? In the first place , the Poles are too discreet ; secondly , they have too much self-respect . The worst of them , indeed , the . beggars , the soldiers of fortune , the venal , the desperate , and those who do not keep in view the principles which alone render them a formidable nation .
might enlist for the double pleasure of fighting against Russia and living a trooper ' s careless life , with rations , pay , and the chance of booty . Wo have never concealed or overlooked the difficulties of the Polish question . Perhaps some Poles impute it to * us as a fault that we have not started , at their appeal , and hurried on a revolutionary crusade . But the problem ia this :-r-Are wo to proclaim the dismemberment of the Russian Empire as the
distinct object of the war , and shall we be pledged to fight until the Cabinets of Northern Europe consent to the restoration of PolandP No bold man , who is not n bad man , woura , rush inconsiderately into such a conflict . But , if the enterprise be attempted , it must be attempted sincerely . If the Poles revolt in our favour , and at our instigation , they must have tlioir reward . / No mere arguments of the recruiting sergeant will tempt the best of them into mercenary ranks .
The Poles are ropresentod to tho world by their emigration , which is tho elite of thoir « ociefcy . It is not , like so many other emi' grations , the relic of an expatriated faction , * ho remxmnt of a vanquished ormy . It is the perpetual nucleus to which tho most
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GERMANY . The political aspects of Germany , irrespective of the war , deserve attention . Since the overthrow of governments and the confusion of authority in 1848 , there has been no such development of public opiuion as that which is at present going on . The press teems with suggestions hostile to that bureaucratic policy which misrepresents before the world the tendencies of the German race . In
all the states that allow free discussion , to whatever degree , speculations , dangerous to power , are alloat . But the most significant manifestation ia the tenacity with which the Germans cling to their little remnants of civil liberty , and the politic resistance they oppose to tho Confederate Diet . In Hanover , tho institutions conceded by fear , in 184 S , have survived the clowntal of those which simultaneously arose throughout Germany . Tho King—a man of tho most
despotic predilections , but not remarkable- for courage—incessantly strives to regain the ground he then surrendered . He has lately appealed to tho Central Government at Frankfort in aid of his design , but the Chambers , strong in their moral position , have disavowed tho authority of the Diet , and have represented to the King that he must determine tho relation of his crown with
their privileges , in concert with them alono . A similar , and perhaps a more important defection from the Federative Assembly , is that of Wurteraberg . Tho Chamber of Doputies , in harmony with the reigning prince , have declared for n reform in the public and general low , on tho plea that tho existing Diet is incompetent , and does not represent tho people of G-ermanj r . It ia simply
composed of delegates , ^ accredited by the various governments , rand ^ entirely free from public control . Such a protest , in a variety of forms , has been made at different times by almost all the lesser German states . Austria and Prussia , however , at variance on so many points , are agreed on this , and steadily discountenance everv project of innovation .
13 ut the point is of the highes t importance and we trust the German nation will have the wisdom to persist in its claims . The Diet of Frankfort , formally deposed in 1851 , and reconstituted under Russian influences , is the incubus which presses on all the provincial estates , and neutralises their more liberal action . Before one German Government
can enter into active co-operation with foreign powers , or undertake a course of internal reform , it must move to compliance the inert mind of the federation , or , if it be . a leading power , drag after it a mass of the unwieldy Bund . Not that the primal law of Germany prohibits separate action on the part of any state , but that , when it serves the interest of the great Courts , the Diet is invariably ready to prove that any policy obnoxious to them is a breach of federal obligations . Germany , in
fact , has existed since 1815 under unnatural conditions . Austria and Prussia , though professing that their interests were identical , entered into the general settlement on terms which rendered a mutual policy impossible . Prussia enjoyed this singular advantage , that she was left with the greatest number of German subjects . Austria , while her territories were larger , incorporated with herself many alien populations , and was more exposed to the dangers of civil strife . Austria , therefore , possessed of inferior German influences , relied on the aristocracy of her
estates , while Prussia , turning to account the national sentiment , affected to be the representative of Germany , and , through this artifice , ruled in the Frankfort Assembly . It will be remembered that , in 1851 , when the two power 3 were in arms , and had all but declared war , Austria resigned the nominal presidency of the Diet , and Prussia took the lead , de jure , which she had long exercised de facto- The consequence has been that Austria has established a system of statesmanship that connects her with the rest of the Continent : her German action is
subordinate to her European diplomacy . Prussia , on the contrary , wields an influence in Europe , solely because she wields an influence , scarcely less than paramount , in Germany . Tefc Austria and Prussia , with these diverging lines of policy , had principles in common to defend in the Federative Diet . A number of the lesser states evinced an early
desire for political changes . Some of fcheu ? governments consented to rule by a new tenure , and called free parliaments to frame their laws ; others invited the predominant courts to aid them in maintaining absolutism . The revolutions in Belgium , Brunswick , Saxony , and Hesso , united the great powers under * the guarantees of the Holy Alliance j the provisional diets struggled for separate d
authority ; and Prince Metternioh adopte a political scheme—of which ho has erroneously been styled the inventor—to repress this liberal activity . It was by this course that ho weakened nnd impoverished the empire . Austria being compelled by l * er " mission" to maintain the most costly police in Europe , was at length unable to s PP ° ™ the pressure , and became a political bankrupt
The interference of Russia UP . *^?^ Bion , was probably as much m the mtorortof the Emperor Nichols as »» *^ . ° * * ^™ £ Joseph Successful insurrection m & ** & * % would have been a dangerous precedent on
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drigh ^ -spirubed and hopeful of the people arefiort , and constitutes the feithful manifesta tion of their national character . It does not decay with time , because it is continually recruited ; and it is not exhausted , because it never wastes its powers in desultory , vague , or speculative undertakings . Such , we believe , is the light in which ., among this
class of Poles , the English scheme of a Legion is regarded . The Region , if once armed and organised , must ; be supported in an enterprise , not against Sebastopol only , but against Russian Poland , or it will be as unimportant asaband of Swiss mountaineers . Avast proportion of the male Polish population is now embodied in the armies of
Russia , Austria , and Prussia , —300 , 000 in the first , 100 , 000 in the « econd , 60 , 000 in the third . About 150 , 000 men who now follow the plough might be taken from it for six months without starving their country , and with , even their passive aid an earnest and vigorous movement might paralyse the Russian forces throughout a large area of the empire . That ,
in spite of the hereditary arts employed to denationalise them , and to break their spirit by baffling their hopes , these men are , for the most part , disaffected to Russia , is proved by the iron rigour and incessant vigilance necessary to keep them in safe subjection . The fortress of Alexander , at -JtVarsaw , is a confession , by the successive Czars , that they reign by the terror of arms in Poland .
Our Liberals would do well to keep these considerations in view . If they desire to contend with Russia for a point of honour , and have the means of victory , let the war be left on its diplomatic basis . If , on the contrary , they see no security , unless in crippling the enemy , who is even now all but impregnably fortified , let them urge a Polish crusade ; but on this condition , that the strug-gle shall end not only in the rescue of the Ottoman Empire , but in the acknowledged restoration of Poland .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 4, 1855, page 743, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2101/page/11/
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