Principles of the Revolution.--THE FIRST NIGHT.--Attack on the Barracks of the Russian Cavalry.--Their Dispersion.--Attempt to secure the person of the Grand Duke.--Capture of Russian general officers and spies.--Actions with detached bodies of Russian cavalry.--Two companies of Polish light-infantry join the patriots.--Death of Potocki and Trembicki.--The Russian infantry attacked and dispersed.--Armament and assembling of the people.--Detachments sent to Praga. It is undeniable that the history of our nation abounds in heroic acts and glorious passages. Need we instance the times of Boleslaw, Casimir, Jagelo, Augustus of Warna, and Sobieski; or the deeds of our renowned generals Czarnecki, Chodkiewicz, Tarnowski, Sapieha, Kosciusko, and Poniatowski? Yet, in our whole history, nothing transcends this last revolution; and indeed few more memorable events have ever occurred. Its plan was based on the purest motives, and this constitutes its peculiar character. Those true sons of Poland, Wysocki and Schlegel, had no other design than to regenerate public morals and the national character, which had already begun to deteriorate under Russian influence; though, perhaps, there may have mingled with these another impulse--that of vengeance for the ignominy to which we were subjected. These feelings were shared by the whole nation--certainly a rare instance in history. Inspired by the example of the brave, even the wavering joined in upholding the good cause to support which the sword was drawn. It was this unanimity which emboldened us, small as our numbers were, to meet that colossal power dreaded by all Europe. We were not animated to this unequal struggle by any vain desire of conquest, but by a resolution to shake off a yoke so disgraceful, and by the wish to preserve our civilization, and to extend it even to Russia. In drawing the sword, every Pole had in view not only the freedom of his own country, but that of his Sarmatian brethren also. The Poles believed that Russia still remembered those martyrs of liberty, Pestel, Bestuzew, Morawiew, Kachowski, and Releiew, who suffered an ignominious death, and more than five hundred others who were sent in chains to Siberia. We believed they would bear in mind, that, in 1824, they themselves summoned us to fight, side by side, with them against despotism. Their words were still in our memory--'Poles, help us in our holy cause! Unite your hearts with ours! Are we not brethren?' Unworthy nation--soothed by the momentary blandishments of the autocrat, who scattered his decorations with a lavish hand, they forgot their own past sufferings and the future that awaits them. They suffered themselves to be led against those who were in arms for the liberty of both nations. At the very time when the funeral rites of those who had died in battle, Russians as well as Poles, were being celebrated in Warsaw and all the provinces, they burned our villages, and murdered our fathers and brothers.