THE BRITISH DEMANDS ON RUSSIA..
THE six points of Earl Russell's proposal by no means reconcile Liberals to the Polish policy he is pursuing. They seem to us just wide enough to render concession .exceedingly difficult, and just narrow enough to make it of no 'conceivable use. If rejected, they leave us no honourable alternative except to insist on acceptance—which is war; and if accepted, they provide no guarantee against further oppres- sion of Poland—which is not peace. Let us make the three wide assumptions—that Russia accepts them en bloc, that the National Government of Poland, which lately declared that its single object was "independence," consents to recall its own words, and that recalling them it retains its influence with the insurgents ; and, even in that excessively improbable case, what wilt Poland have gained? The Czar will have pledged himself to create a representative government, to select only Poles for office, to establish a fair conscription, to employ the Polish language, to grant a general amnesty, and to protect religious freedom. Considering that Prussia at this moment possesses every one of these advantages, they are not necessarily of much value, even when considered apart from existing facts. But, considered with them, they amount, with the exception of the amnesty already refused, absolutely to nothing. Poland has had all these things once before already, granted in honest faith, secured by treaty, guaranteed by all Europe in arms, and they have all been taken away. No constitution could be more liberal than the one of 1815, the Polish language has never been abolished, .and as for the employment of Poles, it was a Pole who devised the act of tyranny which has made even Conservatives speak as if ready for war. Poles are not pleased when their first- born are kidnapped by a Pole any more than when they are abducted by a Russian. There is no new guarantee that the Alexander of to-day will be more honest than the Alexander of 1815, that Constantine Nicolaivitch will be less of a tyrant than Constantine Paulovitch proved to be. All the Poles in the ancient kingdom are given up to the mercy of the Czar, to the ruffian who is deporting the nobles of Lithuania, or the incendiaries who are calling up peasants to massacre landlords in Volhynia. Congress-Poland will still remain united to Russia, and the Czar will still retain his indefinite powers as King. Not one guarantee for per- sonal freedom is so much as suggested. Poland will still be occupied by Russian troops, whose excesses are protected by the law which exempts soldiers from courts of justice, while the children of Poland are still condemned to serve at the furthest extremities of the empire. That the Russians will employ every power reserved as an instrument of terror is ertain, and there is nothing in the six points to prevent their sending all Polish regiments to do duty on the Amoor. The only guarantee worth a straw, the cantonment of the national army within the national boundary, is carefully omitted, and Poland is left dependent on a Power which to her has always been treacherous, and which will feel that its promises have this time been extorted by the menace of force. No free Press is demanded; it is as easy to punish complaint as crime ; and the instant the paper is signed the Government may commence with impunity to violate its pro- visions. What is to prevent it, except just such an insur- rection as these proposals are intended to pacify, or just such an intervention of the West as Earl Russell hopes to avert? The treaty proposed is, in fact, a mere repetition of that which was signed at Vienna, and the breach of which has for thirty-three years kept Europe on the verge of a general var. Take, on the other band, the far more probable supposition that the Czar rejects or evades the principal propositions. It will be exceedingly difficult, if he means to retain his autocratic power, to accept them even in seeming. The ruling classes of Russia, which include, be it remembered, the officers of the army, have reached that political stage at which the spectacle of a free government in one-third of the empire—constructed by the Sovereign who refuses free government in the other two-thirds—would stimulate them to frenzy. The exist- ing order of society could not endure a twelvemonth under such a pressure, and the dynasty would lose as much from its diplomatic defeat as it could fear to lose from war. Why, then, should it accept a position which, disguise it as we may, has something of humiliation for a Government whose pride is at least equal to that of any government in the world? By all reports, it is arming to meet any pos- sible eventuality, repairing Cronstadt, replenishing arsenals, ordering masses of troops into the provinces most exposed to attack by sea. Strengthened by the adhesion of the people, who, however discontented, are not unpatriotic, it may refuse point-blank, and how will the Foreign Office stand then ? If it has decided on war, it may, indeed, escape ridicule, for it can plead the otherwise blameable moderation of its own proposals, and the contrast between its gentle speech and its tremendous action will certainly not diminish the dignity of its attitude. But if, as Earl Russell affirms, it has determined nudes all circumstances to avoid war, it will stand convicted of having attempted interference without the power of securing respect, and must either proceed to the extremities which it has repudiated in ad- vance, or submit to leave the affair, and with it Europe, to the will of its great ally. For, it must be remembered, the :Ministry is not alone in this matter. If England; having joined France in a specific demand, retreats from enforcing that demand, Napoleon may well refuse to be dragged back by Earl Russell, or to encounter the ridicule which is so fatal in France. He is not bound to acknowledge that his despatches were only words, or to assume that when England demanded fulfilment of a treaty, she meant it should not be fulfilled. Is the Government prepared either to sacrifice the alliance which, while it lasts, keeps the ocean clear and limits the area of almost any disturbance, or to allow Napoleon to do the whole work and to fix on his own reward ? To go forward with France was wise, if we were going forward to the end ; but to go forward, and then desert her at a point where no critic among us can blame the Emperor for advancing, and so sacrifice our own honour, the future of Poland, and the French alliance in one triumphant blunder;—this certainly is no evidence of high diplomatic skill.
-We confess to a growing conviction that this question is leading to war, and that England, with all her efforts, may be unable to kegp out of the fray. Napoleon has other in- terests than ours, and is liable to a pressure no government in England can feel. It is easy for us to recede, for, at the worst, there is nothing at stake but a Ministry ; but it is not so easy for him, who, if once he incurs contempt, loses the hope of maintaining his dynasty. France has been highly excited by the continuance of the struggle, and will not hear without anger that diplomacy has only succeeded in displaying its own impotence to assist the one friend for whom France cares. Napoleon is not the kind of despot who can despise a national emotion, and his only door of escape is to throw the responsibility wholly on his " selfish " ally. There is not a doubt that he will, if be decides on inaction, take this course, indeed, he takes it now, and the result of three months diplomacy will then be the irrita- tion of Russia, the discredit of the Whig Ministry, the execution of Poland, the alienation of Napoleon, and the mingled contempt and distrust of the liberal classes of France. Those are not results which Governments are usually pre- pared to accept, and for us as for Napoleon the alternative of compelling respect by force seems most unpleasantly near. There may be ways of escape, but the preparation of armies in Russia and batteries of artillery in Paris, the hush which prevails on the Continent, and the silence enforced on the House of Commons, the frightfully vague and wide projects which the Austrian Press is discussing, and the strained ex- pectation which is beginning to manifest itself among the best informed politicians of Europe, are all symptoms which of late years have only preceded storms. We have no dread of a war to realize such an object, but we protest against a diplomacy which, if it succeeds, is only to secure to a frac- tion of Poland a trumpery shred of freedom, and which,: if it fails, will re-open all those vast sources of disturbance which the Peace of Paris was said to have closed.
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