These men are brave, hardy, and, as you have seen, free, equal, and allowed more rights than the citizens of any republic before or since.[31] But leave now this magnificent body--stretching over those vast plains beyond eye-reach. Tear yourselves away from the brave show--the flash of jeweled sabres and crosiers--the glitter of gilded trappings--the curvetings of noble horses between tents of silk and banners of gold-thread. Go out into the country from which these splendid freemen come. Here is indeed a revelation! Here is a body of men whom history has forgotten. Strangely indeed--for it is a body far larger than that assembled upon the plains of Volo. _There_ were, perhaps, a hundred thousand; _here_ are millions. These millions are Christians, but they are wretchedly clad and bent with labor. They are indeed stupid,--unkempt,--degraded,--often knavish,--but they love their country,--toil for her,--suffer for her. To them, in times of national struggles, all the weariness,--to them, in times of national triumphs, none of the honor. These are the _serfs_ of those brilliant beings prancing and caracoling and flashing on yonder plain of Volo--to the applauding universe. Evidently then, there has been a mistake here. History and poetry have forgotten to mention a fact supremely important. The _people_ of Poland are, after all, _not_ free--_not_ equal. The voting is not voting by the _people_. Freedom and the suffrage are for _serf-owners_,--equality is between _them_. No one can deny that in this governing class were many, very many noble specimens of manhood--yielding ease and life for ideas--readily. Emperor Henry the Fifth of Germany had tried in vain to overcome them by war. When the Polish ambassador came into his presence, the Emperor pointed to his weapon, and said, "I could not overcome your nobility with _these_;"--then pointing to an open chest filled with gold, he said, "but I will conquer them with _this_." The ambassador wore the chains and jewels befitting his rank. Straitway he takes off every ornament, and flings all into the Emperor's chest together. Yet myriads of such men could not have averted ruin. Polish history proved it day by day. It was not that these nobles were especially barbarous,--it was not that they were effeminate. _It was simply that they maintained one caste above another--allowing a distinction in civil and political rights._ The system gave its usual luxuriant fruitage of curses. _First_ in the _material_ condition. Labor and trade were despised. If, in the useful class, a genius arose, the first exercise of his genius was to get himself out of the useful class. Labor was left to serfs; trade was left to Jews. Cities were contemptible in all that does a city honor. Villages were huddles. The idea thus implanted remains. Of all countries, called civilized, Poland seems to-day, materially, the most hopeless.[32]