The purpose of the proclamation was probably, above all, to prevent a revolt in Russian Poland the moment hostile troops invaded it. On the Austrian Poles the manifesto seems to have failed to produce its effect. As these Poles enjoy full autonomy in Galicia, and for a century have witnessed the severity and cruelty with which their kinsmen in Russian Poland have been oppressed, they received the proclamation with loud vows of faithfulness to the house of Hapsburg; nay, all the _sokol_ societies which in time of peace (keeping a decision in view) had trained their members in games and the use of arms, placed themselves as Polish legions at the disposal of the Government against the Russians. But that was not all. The Ruthenian inhabitants of Galicia, one-half the population of the country, founded _a League for the Release of Ukraine_ and flooded Europe from the 25th of August with notifications and descriptions hostile to Russia. The founders did not withhold their names. They are D. Donzow, W. Doroschenko, M. Melenewsky, A. Skoropyss-Joltuchowsky, N. Zalizniak and A. Zuk.
And it has very soon proved that, in spite of the proclamation of the independence of Poland, the Czar, at any rate, includes East Galicia in Poland as little as the inhabitants are regarded or treated as Poles or Ruthenians. The Russians were hardly in Lemberg, before this town and the whole of East Galicia were called in the orders of the day old Russian land and the inhabitants described as Russians, whom their brothers had now come to set free.
What impression the imperial manifesto made in Posen can scarcely be proved, as each hostile remark against Prussia would have been punished as high treason.
The German Emperor has, however, no less than the Russian Czar, been courting the favor of the Poles and trying to win them through promises. One month after the issue of the Czar's manifesto, a proclamation from von Morgen, the German Lieutenant General, was displayed in the Governments of Lomza and Warsaw. In this the following sentences are to be found: "Arise and drive away with me those Russian barbarians who made you slaves; drive them out of your beautiful country, which shall now regain her political and religious liberty. That is the will of my mighty and gracious King." Knowing the passion with which the Poles have hitherto been driven away from their soil and persecuted because of their language, we learn from this proclamation that the German Government has felt the necessity of outbidding the Czar.