Page:Constitutional Charter of the Kingdom of Poland, In the Year 1815.pdf/55

 sovereigns, to whom the Polish provinces had been assigned, reduced the Polish question to a mere discussion of the limits and boundaries to be observed—a question which the three powers concerned, discussed amongst themselves, and with which France (being excluded from the former treaties on the subject) had nothing to do, she had no other part to take than to offer to support what appeared to be the most equitable claims, and to hope that the three powers might arrange the matter to their own satisfaction.”

The Emperor Alexander opposed the re-establishment of Poland under a dynasty of its own, and pleaded for the union of the duchy of Warsaw with the Russian Empire. As his troops were at that moment in possession of the country, it was impossible to insist upon the entire restoration of Poland. Lord Castlereagh then proposed that the duchy of Warsaw should be divided amongst Russia, Austria, and Prussia, conformably to the second article of the treaty of Reichenbach. Austria, also, seeing the necessity of yielding as to the entire restoration of Poland, demanded the execution of the same treaty.

The less resistance was made on this point, because the Emperor Alexander had announced his intention of forming a kingdom of Poland with a distinct national existence, although dependant on Russia. As far back as in the year 1812, when Alexander was in danger from Napoleon, he had promised the re-establishment of Poland to the inhabitants of Polish provinces, which had been engrossed by Russia. He had employed Mr. Oginski, a Pole, and a senator of the Empire, to draw up a constitution for the eight governments of the empire, inhabited by the Poles; proposing to organize these provinces into a duchy or kingdom of Lithuania; all which was to have been accomplished before the opening of the campaign in 1812. These promises the emperor repeated at the close of the same year, when he left the country to follow his victorious troops. They were again repeated at Paris, and at Vienna, to many Poles and Lithuanians, and amongst the rest to the illustrious