of military genius; but, even when placed
side by side with the illustrious names of
Turenne, Charles the Twelfth of Sweden, Peter
the Great of Russia, Marlborough, Prince
Eugène, and Villars, the fame of Sobieski stands
out brilliantly. It would have been well for
his country if he had been equally successful
in domestic legislation. But he was
perpetually thwarted in his projects of reform; and
he saw the consequences of his failure with
the prevision of a prophet. At the close of the
diet of 1688, he thus addressed the assembly:
"What will be one day the surprise of
posterity to see that, after being elevated to such
a height of glory, we have suffered our country
to fall into the gulf of ruin; to fall, alas! for
ever. For myself, I may from time to time
have gained her battles; but I am powerless to
save her. I can do no more than leave the future
of my beloved land, not to destiny—for I am a
Christian—but to God, the High and Mighty."

Eight years after the delivery of these
memorable words, Sobieski died; and the first
steps of that ruin which he predicted were not
long in making themselves visible. The crown
became subservient to the Russian court.

The first partition of Poland took place in
1772, at the instigation of Frederick the
Great of Prussia. A territory of upwards of
eighty-three thousand square miles was thus
lost to Poland, and gained by Russia, Prussia,
and Austria. The nobles at last set to work
to introduce some of those improvements which
had been advocated, a century before, by
Sobieski; but even then the most important were
refused. A new code was proposed to the diet,
with a view to partially emancipating the peasants.
With scarcely credible fatuity, the diet rejected
it. A new constitution, however, was proclaimed
on the 2nd of May, 1792; and by this act the
throne was made hereditary after the death of
Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski, the reigning
king. Russia and Prussia opposed the new
constitution, with the treacherous connivance of
Poniatowski; and in 1793 there was a second
partition of Polish soil between the two invading
powers. The Russians occupied Warsaw; but
in the following year occurred the celebrated
insurrection of which Kosciusko was the leader.
It succeeded for a little while, but was eventually
crushed out in 1795, when the remainder of the
distracted country was divided between the three
powers who had shared the first spoliation.
The invasion of Prussia and Russia by Napoleon
in 1806, reanimated the hopes of the Poles;
but the peace of Tilsit disappointed their more
sanguine expectations. The greater part of the
Prussian-Polish territory, however, received a
quasi-independence, under the title of the Duchy
of Warsaw. This state of things lasted until
the general peace of 1815, when Russia, Prussia,
and Austria, resumed possession of the whole of
the ancient kingdom, with the exception of the
city and small territory of Cracow, which were
erected into a republic. It must be within
the memory of most of our readers that this
last fragment of independent Poland was seized
by Austria in 1846, on the ground that it had
long been a centre of intrigues for the restoration
of the fallen nationality. Cracow was the
ancient capital of Poland; in its fine old Gothic
cathedral may be seen memorials of her great
men, from the heroes of the mediaeval ages,
down to Kosciusko.

High Tory though he was, Lord Castlereagh,
who represented England at the Congress of
Vienna in 1815, did the most he could to
procure for the Poles, not only humane treatment,
but something like freedom. The
Emperor Alexander of Russia showed himself
especially desirous of according those favours,
though not to the full extent demanded by
Castlereagh; and, the Duchy of Warsaw
having been erected into a Kingdom of
Poland attached to the Russian crown, a constitution
was granted, which guaranteed to the
people a separate executive, a parliament, a
national army, and the use of the national
language. Had the engagement been faithfully
observed, that part of Poland which fell to the
Czar would probably have remained content.
But it is in the nature of such compacts to
suffer shipwreck on the first trial. The
subjects take more advantage of their guaranteed
liberties than the foreign conqueror is pleased
to see; repression follows; isolated outbreaks
among the governed, express the old longings
for nationality and complete freedom; and a
pretext is soon found by the despot for falsifying
his promises. It was so in Russian Poland;
and at length, in November, 1830, an
insurrection burst forth, more formidable than any
that had been seen since the days of Kosciusko.
To the indignation of Europe, Prussia gave the
same aid to Russia that she is now rendering;
and, after a brief career of success, the patriots
were defeated in several engagements, and the
autumn of 1831 saw the entire ruin of their plans.
From that time to this, Russia has spared no
cruelty or oppression to destroy the nationality
of the Poles, and to make them a mere
undistinguished element in the Muscovite population.
A little before the close of the insurrection of
1831, the government of Louis Philippe sought
the co-operation of England in demanding of
the Czar Nicholas the execution of the stipulations
of Vienna. Our present Prime Minister
then held the seals of the Foreign Office; and
he declined to interfere, on the ground that
England was not prepared to support the
demand by " more direct and effectual
interference" with her " good and faithful ally" of
Russia. Tennyson, writing at the time, said
that our neglecting to " aid the right" was

A matter to be wept with tears of blood.

And it was so wept, a quarter of a century later,
in the Crimea; for there can be little doubt
that the impunity with which the Emperor
Nicholas violated the engagements he had
inherited, encouraged him to make that subsequent
attempt on the life of " the sick man" which,
though it terminated in his own humiliation,
cost the Western Powers dear.