stigator, and he secured impunity for his crime by obtaining the complicity of Russia and Austria, of Maria Theresa and Catherine "the Great." To use the cynical phrase of Frederic, "the three Sovereigns partook of the Eucharistic body of Poland." The three murderers of the Polish nation have tried to justify themselves, and they have justified themselves by slandering the Poles. Even thus, in Imperial Rome, the public executioner dishonoured his victim before execution. We are told that the Poles fully deserved their fate. We are told that they were a prey to the Jesuits, or that they were a prey to anarchy, or that they were a prey to an unruly aristocracy. We have been long familiar in the past with similar arguments on the Irish Question, and in both controversies the arguments have about equal value. It is quite true that Poland was a prey to anarchy, but that anarchy was largely caused by the intrigues of her mighty neighbours. It is quite true that after playing an important part in European culture, after resisting the Tartar and the Turk, the Polish aristocracy oppressed the people whom they had originally saved. But, alas! the oppression of the people by a tyrannical aristocracy is not a phenomenon peculiar
