We now come to a more detailed consideration of the question of Lithuania, which the author of our document claims for inclusion in the new state. Historically the whole of Lithuania formed part of the ancient republic of Poland up to the time of the partitions, and roughly consisted of the following provinces, viz., Kovno, Vilna, Grodno, Minsk, Vitebsk and Mohilec. Out of these no claim, quite naturally, is put forward with regard to Vitebsk and Mohileff, where the percentage of Polish population is so small as to be completely negligible, for in Vitebsk Poles number only 50,000 out of a total of close on one million and a half inhabitants, while in Mohileff the percentage of Poles is but a third of that in Vitebsk, for in Mohileff there are but 18,000 Poles in a population of nearly 1,600,000. Thus out of “Lithuania,” as considered as a part of the ancient Republic, all are agreed to omit Vitebsk and Mohileff altogether, for the obvious reason that they are not Polish at all. Ethnographically the overwhelming majority of their inhabitants are White Russians, a race closely allied in blood and in language to Russia proper. There remain, therefore, on our author’s claim to Lithuania for the new united Poland, the provinces of Kovno, Vilna, Grodno and Minsk. Of Minsk he claims the “greater part,” as also of another Russian province Volhynia. Since he separates the claim for Minsk and Volhynia from the claim for “Lithuania,” we will follow his grouping, and understand by the term “Lithuania” the three provinces of Kovno, Vilna and Grodno. His argument is that they once belonged to the Polish republic (which everybody allows), and so, on historical grounds, should be returned to it, and he supplements this by the consideration that the Lithuanians, at any rate, out of the inhabiting populations are co-religionists with the Poles. But the real reason on which his case rests, and for which (apart from the Mittel-Europa question) the Powers of the Entente have all declared themselves in favour of a united and independent Poland, is not a matter of history (otherwise England might claim Calais) or of creed (otherwise she might claim Protestant Germany), but of race. The cause that underlies the justice of a united Poland is the right of nations, small or great, to exist, and ethnographically this demand for the annexation of Lithuania, and the greater part of Minsk and Volhynia, utterly breaks down.