Marshal Pilsudski was a strange mixture of charac- teristics and
emotions. Despite the tension with Lithuania he had always a latent affection for that small country because he was born there. A story I was told when I was last in Warsaw illustrates that well. In 1920, in the indeterminate fighting that was in progress between Russia and Poland, the Lithuanians were helping the Russians, but just avoiding open hostilities with Poland. At last the Poles' chance came. A 'Lithuanian force definitely and indisputably violated Polish territory. Retaliation, which would be crushing, was justified. The Foreign Minister hurried to Pilsudski with the news. His staff waited at the Foreign Office—hour after hour. At last, in the early morning, the Minister returned with tears of anger and disappointment in his eyes. " The damned old fool is going to put it before the League of Nations," he said. And the damned old fool did. Unfortunately the Vilna coup came a few weeks later and ruined the settlement which the League might have reached. What Pilsudski's responsibility for that was has never been precisely fixed.
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