Page:The New Europe - Volume 3.djvu/286

 and national union could come only from the complete break-up of Austria-Hungary.

Then suddenly, in the third year of the war, the miracle of the Russian Revolution changed all the values in East European politics. Will the Poles draw the consequences from what has happened? Will they recognise that their own liberty can be firmly re-established only if the same principle of self-determination which Russia has conceded to them is extended also to the Czecho-Slovaks and Jugoslavs? Will they recognise that their indifference towards these nations, if explicable and excusable in the past, would now be a crime towards liberty and a menace to their own future? Will they rally to the cause of democracy, or will they intrigue for peace on an iniquitous basis, maintaining and even strengthening the German dominion over Austria and the Magyar rule in Hungary, satisfied if only their own independence can be bought at this price? That is the question which they will have to answer during the coming months. Anyone who understands their present position, their endeavours to build up a government and an army, the necessity for doing so in a country under Austrian and German occupation, can realise the enormous difficulties with which they are confronted. But the Poles must also understand to the full their responsibility to the world at large and to the liberty of other nations, and give up the game of reactionary Realpolitik through which, in the past, the honourable name of Pole has only too often been unworthily associated in the political life of Austria and Russia, with the sad activities of the unprincipled politician. Author:Panther.

months ago we drew attention to the intrigues centring round the persons of the exiled King Nicholas of Montenegro and his treacherous son Prince Mirko, now in Vienna (, Vol. II., No. 19, 22 Feb. 1917). Certain underground overtures to Vienna, conducted through agents in Switzerland, gave rise to rumours of the formation of a Southern Slav vassal state for the benefit of Mirko, as an annexe to the Habsburg dominions. King Nicholas officially denied the existence of all secret negotiations