If a modern “electronic brain” were fed data about every statesman of the twentieth century and then asked to pick out the two men most completely opposite and uncongenial, it would without a moment’s hesitation settle on Józef Pilsudski and Ignace Jan Paderewski. Even before their meeting each man had a fairly good idea of what the other man was like. Now for the first time they could size each other up in person. Pilsudski, eying Paderewski’s elegant clothes and quietly assured manner, recalled that this man was the darling of a capitalistic society in whose image he would try to rebuild Poland. Paderewski, noting the Marshal’s rough, purposely shabby uniform, drooping mustaches, and abrupt, nervous behavior, remembered that this bold revolutionary had spent most of his adult life in prison, or in hiding, or in working under cover, always in the shadows of conspiracy. He was the sort of man who would stop at nothing, including murder, to gain his objective because he firmly believed that if the end was good, then the means were unimportant. Yet there was one point of agreement between them, Paderewski reflected, and surely it was a strong enough basis for cooperation. Each man, in his own way, loved his country and would gladly have given his life for her. By the end of the exhausting interview Paderewski had come to the conclusion that this was not enough. Pilsudski remained absolutely unshaken in his refusal to have anything to do with Dmowski’s Committee. Poland, he believed, belonged to the proletariat—the working man—alone. He would not admit that any other class of people had any right to be represented in the new government. As to the question of Allied recognition, he simply brushed it aside. He could take care of Poland all by himself, he seemed to imply. It was a frustrating two hours. The next day Paderewski left for Cracow, convinced that his mission had failed. But at three o’clock on the morning after his arrival, he was roused from sleep by a special messenger from Pilsudski. The Marshal, he was informed, requested his immediate return to Warsaw for further negotiations. What could have happened, Paderewski thought, to change Pilsudski’s mind even to this small extent? What had happened was this: on January 4, representatives of the American Relief Administration had arrived in Warsaw to study conditions and to discuss terms with Pilsudski. The starving people of Europe had good reason to be familiar with the heroic work of the A.R.A. which had already saved millions of lives during that cruel winter of armistice.