Prince Sapieha and Marshal Pilsudsky negotiated a secret treaty with France on that occasion--not with the Allies as a whole, but with France. As a seasonal fruit of that treaty came the Silesian adventure supported by France. The disarming of the population in Upper Silesia, conducted under French auspices, had taken the arms away from the Germans but left arms with the Poles. Added to that, guns, machine-guns, rifles, and ammunition, were run over into the plebiscite area, and a mercenary "insurrectionary" army was raised, partly from the local Polish population and partly from Poland proper. An army which the French Government held to be capable of intimidating the League of Nations garrison of ten thousand fully equipped men, was thus improvised. The supposition is that interested parties connived at its improvisation. It could not otherwise have sprung spontaneously into being. After the first week of the rising, many of the insurgents began to desert the leader Korfanty on the ground that their wages were not high enough. Much money had to be spent in the affair. It might be asked what interest has France to support Poland--is it sentiment? Many will attribute it to a French quixoticism, which in truth does not exist. France will be ready to drop Pilsudsky, as she has dropped Wrangel, when it suits her. But the French programme for Europe includes the complete dismantling of the German Empire, and by taking away Upper Silesia from Germany another great victory would be won in the war after the war. Therefore it has been worth while. And to this end France proceeds not openly but in the old-fashioned channels of secret intrigue. The favourite device is the arranging of a _coup_ and then the presentation of the _fait accompli_, accompanied by a manipulation of the press. It is almost unnecessary to say in English that this sort of procedure has greatly damaged international understanding and good-will.