Page:Constitutional Charter of the Kingdom of Poland, In the Year 1815.pdf/42



Although united, the kingdom of Poland, not being incorporated, ought not to have lost its separate and distinct existence, and the national colour of its legislation and government. This distinct and national existence is stipulated by the treaties of 1815, of which the charter is only the fulfilment. Nevertheless, in consequence of the arbitrary measures which were adopted every day, the Russian spirit was introduced into every part of the social body. Whenever new regulations were to be made, the recollections, the wishes, and the local necessities of the nation were set aside, and every thing was to be modelled upon what existed in Russia, or to be referred to the grand duke or to the Russian commissioner, Mr. Nowosylsoff, a man notorious for his hatred towards every thing Polish.

The constitution acknowledges no other method of replacing the king when absent, than by the appointment of a lieutenant. The emperor Alexander had conferred this office upon the old general Zaionczek, but the grand duke Constantine as commander-in-chief of the army was placed by his side. Conformably to the regulations which his imperial Highness had sworn to observe, the grand duke should have been subordinate to the lieutenant, but all considerations of this nature being a mere sport to his imperial Highness, the very individual who had acknowledged his incapacity to govern an empire despotically, and who for that very reason had resigned his throne to his younger brother, considered himself, nevertheless, sufficiently qualified to govern a constitutional kingdom. He surrounded himself with Russian counsellors, the chief of whom was Mr. Nowosylsoff. The lieutenant and his council were