privately among those whose business it is to deal with Polish affairs, it is necessary to go into these aims in a detailed manner, and also to indicate the different shades of opinion through which M. Dmowski himself has passed. It says nothing against a serious and exceedingly shrewd politician as M. Dmowski undoubtedly is, that his opinions have changed, and that in these changes he has carried a solid and unsplit party with him, but it is important to recognise that the aims of the National Democrats to-day are not what they were in August, 1914, and to state the causes which led to this change. That they have been not only misunderstood but misconstrued is an additional reason for doing this. Since the outbreak of the war the National Democrats have taken no share whatever in party politics, but have devoted themselves entirely to the realization of their national aims. We will state first the programme as it stands to-day, and the grounds on which it is based. The proposal is to restore to the new Polish State the great majority of the territories that once belonged to the Ancient Republic before its partitions. The claims on which this proposal are based are: (I) historical, (II) ethnographical, (III) religious. But though the historical basis is completely valid, for it is a mere matter of fact that all and more than the National Democrats claim did once belong to the Ancient Republic, the ethnographical and religious claims do not so uniformly coincide with it or with each other. Very often both are commensurate with the historical basis, but sometimes, as we shall see, not both, but only one of them covers the historical field. The historical field again in certain instances, stretches itself out alone, and gets no support from ethnographical or religious considerations.