It is, doubtless, a legitimate grievance that a highly cultured people, as the Poles are, should be governed by semi-barbarous Russians; but, on the other hand, the superior intelligence of the Poles found its full value in Russia. They were rapidly gaining posts of trust and emolument in the imperial service, and I have heard it said, by a person eminently qualified to judge, that if they had but postponed their insurrection for ten years, they would then have had no cause to rebel, because by that time they would have virtually governed Russia as much as Russia governs Poland. If the Poles had possessed the practical philosophy of the Chinese, they might have overcome their conquerors by a process somewhat analogous to that by which the latter people have successively out-civilised the various Tartar powers, and overrun their territories. But they cast to the winds their opportunities, and committed their destiny to the hazard of a desperate venture, in which success was, humanly speaking, impossible. The only result, indeed, that could reasonably have been expected from this fatal enterprise was that the old relations between the two countries should be replaced on the footing of a rigorous despotism on the one hand, and absolute subjection on the other. Without attempting to extenuate the severities, often arbitrary, and cruelly unjust, that have been practised on the Poles by the Russian officials in the later stages of the insurrection, due allowance should be made for the exaggerations inseparable from one-sided accounts, especially in times of great excitement. And it is reasonable that their fair share of responsibility for the blood that has been needlessly shed, should be borne by the leaders of the movement, who with suicidal rashness plunged their country into a war, which a little calm reflection might have shown them was hopeless from the beginning. It is well also to note that, since the rebellion has been finally put down, the Russian government has evinced no vindictive feeling towards the subjugated Poles; but, on the contrary, has set itself to improve their condition by the establishment of many liberal measures, social and educational, the progress of which was interrupted by the outbreak of the insurrection. But supposing even that the insurrection had been successful, what substantial advantage would have accrued to Poland? A return to the conditions existing before the partition, the hostile factions and the confederations more tyrannical even than Russia, would not have been a great improvement. And Poland would then have been a small, weak, and poor kingdom, surrounded by three powerful enemies, who would never want a _casus belli_. How long would the kingdom have been likely to maintain its existence under such conditions? CHAPTER XXII. KAZAN TO PETERSBURG.