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Oesterreich,"* had thrown in their lot with the Hapsburg Monarchy and were hoping for a reunion of Austrian and Russian Poland under the auspices of Austria-Hungary. Only a negligible number of Russian Poles declared in favour of this so-called Austrian solution of the Polish question. The few who did so were mostly old revolutionaries who had fought for years against the Russian government before the day had come of the reconciliation of the two great Slav nations. The overwhelming majority of the adherents of the Austrian solution " were Galician Poles. In August, 1914, the official leaders of the Galician political parties decided to stand by Austria, and most of them stuck to their decision, especially if they remained in the part of the country which was not reached by the Russian armies. The capture of Lwow brought to light an amount of pro-Russian feeling among the Galician Poles which even men well acquainted with the country would hardly have expected. The leaders of the proAustrian Polish parties in Vienna constituted themselves, indeed, into a Supreme Polish National Committee." It had, however, at *"Ingratitude of the House of Austria."

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first the prudence and decency not to claim to represent anyone except the Austrian Poles. It proceeded to form military organizations which were to serve in connexion with the Austrian Army and which assumed the name of " Polish Legions," in memory of the famous Polish volunteer regiments that had fought under Napoleon I.

Austria had conceded since 1860, and still more since 1867, a considerable measure of freedom to the Galician Poles; it had endowed them practically with a monopoly of the government of Galicia, although the Ruthenians and Jews form together more than half of its population. This the concession of freedom to the Poles-was not due to any enthusiasm for the principle of liberty, but to the fact that the Germans, being a small minority within the Hapsburg Monarchy, could not keep to themselves all the power in the State. If there is too much of dependent provinces, wrote in 1768 an English statesman who favoured union with Ireland as a means for the coercion of America, the head grows too heavy for the body. To prevent that the Austrian Germans concluded in 1867 a partIn nership with the Magyars and the Poles.

was

the present war some Galician politicians put forward a programme of enlarging that combination. The Dual Monarchy was to be changed into a Tripartite State consisting of Austria, Hungary and Poland. The new Poland was to consist of Russian Poland and Galicia. The principle of nationality to be applied to the Poles, that of the status possidendi to the Ruthenians of East Galicia, and to the small Slav nations which were to be left to the tender mercies of the Austrian Germans. The new Poland was to be proclaimed on the entry of the Germanic armies into Warsaw. Prussia seems to have been assigned in that scheme the part of a charitable midwife. The taking of Warsaw was to be the Pentecost at which the pro-Austrian Poles expected the ghost of the many-tongued Monarchy to speak the Polish language. But Prince Leopold of Bavaria talked only the thick Munich variation of German, and in general had not much to say, which may have been an additional reason for his being chosen to be the figure-head at the entry into Warsaw. On the other hand, Herr von Cleinow, who was sent from Berlin to direct the Warsaw Press, talked like one truly "full of young wine.'

If it were merely for the fantastic politicians who had been spinning in Viennese coffee-houses political schemes of a type not unknown in Oriental bazaars, we might pass over lightly their disappointments. But there can be no doubt that much honest, warm, sincere feeling was to be found in the camp of the pro-Austrian Poles, just as there had been among those who, ranging themselves on the side of Napoleon I., opposed more than a century before Prince Adam Czartoryski's “Russian solution of the Polish question. In recognition of their sincere Polish patriotism, many of them, after 1815, were received into the service of Tsar Alexander I., and were given commissions in the army of the Kingdom of Poland which was then formed in connexion with Russia. Most of the Galician Poles who fought willingly against Slav Russia were brought up in Austrian schools, were saturated with the idea of the Austrian State, were fed since they were children

The speeches which Herr von Cleinow delivered to the Warsaw journalists in August, 1915, will go down to history. He instructed and he prophesied. He expounded the principles of the future: benign, but firm Prussian rule in Poland. Insensibly he encroached on the domain "des Allerhöchsten Herrn" (of the Supreme Master). A sudden dismissal from office cut short a promising career.

on the memories of 1830 and 1863, and filled with the fear of Russia. The sudden outbreak of the war had left them no time to reconsider their traditional position.

The period of Austrian reverses was comparatively uneventful and unimportant from the point of view of Austro-Polish relations. Promises were to be had for the asking, as they could not be put to the test of actions. Rumours were stimulated to the effect that Archduke Stephen, who owned estates in Galicia, spoke Polish, and had two Polish magnates for sonsin-law, was to be proclaimed King of Poland ; no such rumours were heard after the battles of Tarnow and Gorlice. When the luck of war turned in the East in favour of the Central Powers, the pro-Austrian Poles expected to see their hopes realized. But none of them materialized; no beginning was made of the reconstruction of Poland. In the first days of June a conference of the pro-Austrian Poles met at Piotrkow; it demanded that the Polish Legions, part of which had been sent to fight on the Bessarabian frontier, be united on Polish soil as the nucleus of a Polish army* ; that a Polish administration be built up in the occupied provinces of Russian Poland; and that the union of the whole of Russian Poland with Galicia under Austria be officially proclaimed. Their wishes might have been fulfilled had it depended on the Viennese Court; but how could the Austrian Government dare to assume an initiative concerning provinces that remained under German occupation when even at home it had to obey the commands of Berlin ? For almost two months no official reply was received from Vienna. Finally, on July 20, Baron Burian answered the memorandum of the Piotrkow Conference in a letter which contained a more or less polite refusal of all their demands. It ended with an unctuous appeal to the Poles to "look with confidence into the future" and the vague promise that "the great sacrifice which the Poles have brought in this war in blood and property for the Fatherland will certainly bear its fruits.” Only this colourless ending was allowed to appear in the Austrian Press; the part that mattered was carefully suppressed.

Meantime, parts of the Polish Legions were

* There is some grim humour in the sending of the Polish Legions to Bessarabia. Their spiritual ancestors had been sent in 1803 by Napoleon I. to conquer the freedom of their country by fighting . . . mutinous negroes in the island of San Domingo, where a large number of them perished of yellow fever.

and Germans took the place of Poles whose knowledge of the official language proved insufficient; this time no promise was even given concerning the future.

The Germanic Powers had, in the opinion of the pro-Austrian Poles, one more chance of regaining the shaken confidence of their Polish adherents. Hitherto, they said to the Viennese Government, the Austrian authorities, military as well as civil, seem to have been doing all they could to uproot the friendship for Austria among the anti-Russian parties, and to discredit those parties in the eyes of the Polish public opinion. But the taking of Warsaw will be the decisive moment for the attitude of the Poles. On the way in which the occupation of Warsaw will be made, and on that which will then be said, will depend the attitude of the capital and of the entire country. Let delegates from the Polish Committee precede the Germanic armies in their entry into Warsaw, and let the Polish Legions march at the head of the 'troops entering the city. Unless that is done, people will look back with sadness after the retreating Russians, and regard the orders of the armies of occupation in an indifferent spirit. Let also this be the moment for the proclamation of the union of Galicia and Russian Poland into a Polish kingdom under Austrian suzerainty.

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"To-day the German troops of the Army of Prince Leopold of Bavaria," says the Austrian official communiqué of August 5, entered the capital of Russian Poland.” Pas de rêveries, messieurs! The pro-Austrian Polish Committee thereupon published a manifesto in which laughter mingled with tears.

"Warsaw is liberated from the Russian chains! . . . The fact, however, that the entry into the capital of Poland did not take place in the way in which we would have wished it makes it necessary to examine and explain the fact from the political point of view." Ironical comments in the German Press thanked the Austrian Poles for that frank expression of their displeasure.

At first the Citizens' Committees which had been formed under the Russian administration were left the work of relief and even entrusted by the Germans with all matters relating to education. They decided to retain the teaching of the Russian language in the Polish schools, thereby signifying to the Germans their hopes for the future. Such things could not be tolerated by German administrators of the Vistula District" ("Ne parlez pas de la Pologne," wrote once Napoleon I. to Talleyrand asking him to delete an article on Poland from the official almanack; "historical reminiscences are out of place"). The Poles were soon to feel the hand of the German administrator.

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W

HEN war broke out between the Allies and Turkey in the autumn of 1914, a joint Franco-British squadron at once established an effective blockade of the Dardanelles. On November 3, 1914, the squadron bombarded at long range the forts at the entrance to the Dardanelles, in order to ascertain the range and to test their defences. The reconnaissance was inconclusive, and was not pressed. On December 13 Lieutenant Holbrook navigated a British submarine beneath the mine-field in the Straits. He succeeded in torpedoing the old but still useful Turkish battleship, the Messudiyeh, and for this heroic feat received the Victoria Cross.* During January, 1915, a decision was reached by the Allies to attack the Dardanelles in real earnest. The watching warships were increased in numbers, and by February a powerful fleet had been assembled. It included the then newest British super-Dreadnought, the Queen Elizabeth. The islands of Tenedos and Lemnos, near the entrance to the Dardanelles, were occupied, and the bay of Mudros, in the latter island, became the principal base for the operations which followed.

The original attempt to force a passage of the
* See Vol. III.,
P. 148.

OF

Dardanelles was made in exclusive reliance upon sea power. On February 19 the forts at the entrance to the Straits were bombarded, but not permanently silenced. Bad weather prevented a resumption of the attack until February 25, on which day the forts of Sedd-el-Bahr and Cape Helles, at the tip of the Gallipoli Peninsula, were temporarily overcome. The forts on the Asiatic side of the entrance were also bombarded. During the night British trawlers from the North Sea swept the Straits clear of mines for a distance of four miles, and next morning several British battleships entered and bombarded Fort Dardanos, which lay far within the Straits on the Asiatic side. Landing parties attempted to complete the destruction of the works on both sides of the entrance.

Rough weather again interrupted the attack until March 1, when it was once more resumed. On March 5 and on subsequent days several battleships steamed far up the Straits towards the Narrows, while others, including the Queen Elizabeth, sought to assist them by firing from the Gulf of Xeros clean over the Gallipoli Peninsula at the formidable forts of Kilid Bahr and Chanak. The results were not substantial. By this time a joint naval and military operation had been decided upon, and the transports