their act of spoliation. Frederick the Great describes how that consent was obtained. After mentioning that each of the partitioning Powers sent an army to Poland to overawe the people, and that Warsaw was occupied by troops, he wrote in his Memoirs':

At first the Poles were obstinate and rejected all proposals. The representatives did not come to Warsaw. Having grown tired of the long delay, the Court of Vienna proposed to appoint a day for the opening of the Diet, threatening that in case of the non-appearance of the delegates, the three Powers would partition not merely part but the whole of the country. If, on the other hand, the cession of the outlying districts was effected by voluntary agreement, the foreign troops would be withdrawn from Poland. That declaration overcame all difficulties. The Treaty of Cession was signed with Prussia on the 18th of September, and Poland was guaranteed the integrity of her remaining provinces. . . . The Poles, who are the most easy-going and most foolish nation in Europe, thought at first that they could safely consent because they would be able to destroy the work of the three Powers within a short time. They argued thus in the hope that Russia might be defeated by Turkey.

At the first partition Prussia, Austria, and Russia were, according to their treaty concluded with Poland, to take certain vast but clearly defined territories from that unhappy State. However, by fraud and violence they greatly exceeded the stipulated limits. Frederick the Great tells us with his habitual cynical candour:

The Poles complained loudly that the Austrians and Prussians increased their shares without limit. There was some reason for these complaints. The Austrians used a very wrong map of Poland on which the names of the rivers Sbruze and Podhorze had been exchanged, and making use of this pretext enlarged their portion very greatly beyond the limits agreed upon by the Treaty of Partition. The basis of the Treaty had been that the shares of the three

Powers should be equal. As the Austrians had increased their share, King Frederick considered himself justified in doing likewise, and included in Prussia the districts of the old and the new Netze.

Careful study of the 'Memoirs' and of the diplomatic and private correspondence of the time shows convincingly that Frederick the Great was the moving spirit, and that he was responsible for the first partition of Poland, that Russia and Austria were merely his tools and his dupes. He has told us in his Memoirs' that he sent the original plan of partition to Petersburg, attributing it to the fertile brain of a visionary statesman, Count Lynar. The late Lord Salisbury wrote in his valuable essay Poland,' published in the Quarterly Review in 1863, in which, by the by, he treated the claims of the Poles with little justice :

By a bold inversion of the real degrees of guilt the chief blame is laid on Russia. Prussia is looked upon as a pitiful and subordinate accomplice, while Austria is almost absolved as an unwilling accessory....

To Frederick the Great of Prussia belongs the credit of having initiated the scheme which was actually carried into execution. It is now admitted, even by German historians, that the first partition was proposed to Catharine by Prince Henry of Prussia on behalf of his brother Frederick, and with the full acquiescence of Joseph, Emperor of Germany. Frederick had never been troubled with scruples upon the subject of territorial acquisition, and he was not likely to commence them in the case of Poland. Spoliation was the hereditary tradition of his race. The whole history of the kingdom over which he ruled was a history of lawless annexation. It was formed of territory filched from other races and other Powers, and from no Power so liberally as from Poland.

The fact that Frederick the Great was responsible for the first partition of Poland is acknowledged not only by leading German historians, but even by the German schoolbooks. As an excuse, it is usually stated that necessity

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compelled Frederick to propose that step because the anarchy prevailing in Poland made impossible its continued existence as an independent State. However, German writers never mention that the Poles themselves earnestly wished to reform the State, and that Frederick not only opposed that reform but greatly increased disorder by putting his own nominee on the Polish throne, by causing civil war to break out in the country, by raising the Polish Dissenters against the Government, by occupying Poland in conjunction with Russia, by interfering with its elections and Government, and by bribing and overawing its Legislature by armed force.

The second partition of Poland in 1793 is perhaps even more disgraceful to Prussia than was the first, because it involved that country and her King in an act of incredible treachery. Frederick the Great died in 1786. His successor, Frederick William the Second, was a worthless individual, and he brought about the second partition by means which his uncle would have disdained. Mr. M. S. F. Schöll, a German diplomat of standing, described in Koch's classical Tableau des Révolutions de l'Europe,' which is still much used by students of history, and especially by diplomats, the infamous way in which Prussia betrayed Poland at the time of the second partition in the following words :

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While in France, during the Revolution, the nation was seized by a sudden rage and abolished all institutions and all law and order, giving itself up to excesses which one would have thought to be impossible, another nation in the North of Europe, which was plunged in anarchy and oppressed by its neighbours, made a noble effort to establish good order and to throw off its foreign yoke.

The Poles had persuaded themselves that they might be able to change their vicious Constitution and to give renewed strength to the Government of the Polish Republic during a time when Russia was occupied with wars against Sweden and Turkey. An Extraordinary Diet was convoked at Warsaw, and in order to abolish the inconvenience of

the liberum veto, which required unanimity of votes, it adopted the form of a Confederation. The Empress, Catharine the Second of Russia, approached the Polish Diet and endeavoured to conclude with it an alliance against the Turks. Her plan was spoiled by the King of Prussia, who, in consequence of arrangements made with England, did all in his power to rouse the Poles against the Russians. He encouraged them by offering them his alliance to undertake the reformation of their Government which Prussia had recently guaranteed. A Committee of the Polish Diet was instructed to draw up a plan of a Constitution designed to regenerate the Republic.

The resolution taken by the Diet was likely to displease the Empress of Russia, who considered that step as a formal breach of the Treaty between Russia and Poland concluded in 1775. As the Poles could foresee that the changes which they desired to effect were likely to involve them in differences with the Empress of Russia, they ought before all to have thought of preparing their defence. However, instead of improving their finances and strengthening their army, the Diet lost much in discussing the projected new Constitution. Prussia's protection, of which they had officially been assured, made the Poles too confident. The alliance which the King of Prussia actually concluded with the Republic on March 27, 1790, gave them a feeling of absolute security. King Stanislaus Augustus hesitated a long time as to the attitude which he should adopt. At last he joined that party of the Diet which desired to draw Poland out of the humiliating position in which she had fallen. The new Constitution was proclaimed on May 3, 1791.

Although that Constitution was not perfect, it was in accordance with Poland's conditions. It corrected the vices of her ancient laws, and although it was truly Republican in spirit, it avoided the exaggerated ideas to which the French Revolution had given rise. The throne was made hereditary. The absurd liberum veto was abolished. The Diet was declared permanent and the legislative body was divided into two chambers. The lower one was to discuss laws. The upper one, the Senate, presided over by the King, was to sanction them and to exercise the veto. The

executive power was entrusted to the King and a Council of Supervision composed of seven responsible Ministers. . .

The exertions made by the Poles for ensuring their independence aroused Russia's anger. As soon as the Empress of Russia had concluded peace with Turkey, she induced her supporters in Poland to form a separate confederation which aimed at revoking the innovations which the Diet of Warsaw had introduced. It strove to bring the old Polish constitution once more into force. That confederation was concluded on the 14th of May 1792, at Targowice, and the Counts Felix Potocki, Rzewuski, and Branicki were its leaders.

The Empress of Russia sent an army into Poland in support of the new Confederation, and made war against those Poles who were in favour of the new constitution. Only then did the Poles seriously think of vigorous counter measures. The Diet decreed that the Polish Army should be placed on a war footing, and a loan of 33,000,000 florins was arranged for. However, when the Prussian Ambassador was asked to state what assistance the King, his master, would give in accordance with his pledges contained in the Treaty of Alliance of 1790-according to Articles 3 and 4 he was to furnish the Republic with 18,000 men, and in case of need with 30,000 men-he gave an evasive answer which threw the patriotic party into despair.

The refusal of the Polish Diet to sanction a commercial proposal by which Poland would have abandoned the towns of Danzig and Thorn to Prussia had angered that monarch against the Poles, and the Empress of Russia did not find it difficult to obtain the Prussian King's consent to another partition of the country. The aversion which the sovereigns felt against everything which resembled the French Revolution, with which, however, the events in Poland, where King and nation acted in harmony, had nothing in common except appearances, strongly influenced the Berlin Court and caused it to break the engagements which it had contracted with the Republic.

The Poles understood the danger of their position. Their enthusiasm cooled, and the whole Diet was seized with a feeling of consternation. Having to rely on their