The Sun.
London, England, 1846-03-13 00:00:00

POLAND.

The following notice of the extent and population of
the different provinces which constituted the ancient
republic of Poland will be read with interest at a moment
when their inhabitants are making an effort to become
independent of their present rulers. Gallicia, which now
belongs to Austria, has an extent of 1,580 geographical
miles, and a population of 4,797,243, nearly all Poles.
About 2,ooo,oooprofess the United Greek religion, about
the same number are Roman Catholics. There are
rather more than 250,000 schismatic Greeks,
30,000 Protestants, and 283,345 Jews. The re-
public of which Cracow is the capital has about 21
geographical square miles, and 145,787 inhabitants.
The territory and the town form a republic, under the
protectorate of Austria, Russia, and Prussia. The
Grand Duchy of Posen, which forms part of the Prus-
sian monarchy, has a superficies of 536 square geogra-
phical miles ; a population of 1,290,187, of whom
372,789 profess the Prussian Evangelical religion, and
are chiefly Germans by origin and in language. There
are 783,916 Roman Catholics, who are nearly all Poles.
The Jews are in number 77,102. Prussia has also
other populations of Polish origin in Silesia, and
eastern and western Prussia, from Dantzic to the
frontiers of Russia ; but as they have been sepa-
rated from the other Polish people for more than a
century, it is not supposed that they will take any part
in the insurrection. The ancient provinces of Lithuania,
White Russia, and Samogitia, term the Russian Go-
vernments of Wilna, Witepsk, Grodno, Kowno, Minsk.
and Mohilew. Their population is 4,978,369.
These countries have for four years been suffering
from scarcity of proyisions, and the people are,
therefore, in a state of great excitement. The
nobles and a portion of the people are
Roman Catholic • the rest, who were formerly of
the United Greek Church, have now become, 133
choice or force, members of the Schismatic Greek
Church, but a great number of the peasantry have
refused to acknowledge the Russian bishops whe
were appointed to succeed their priests. There are
also a few thousand Poles in tho Russo-German
Governments of Courland and Livonia. In the
Ukraine and Little Russia, viz., the Governments of
Volhynia, Kieff, Poltava, Kurks, &c., the nobles pro-
fess the Roman Catholic faith, but the people now profess
the same religion as the Russians. The population of
these Governments, which are of great extent, amount,
to eight millions. What is called the kingdom of Poland.
and which is under the authority of Gen. Paskewitch, is
also of considerable extent, and has a population of
4,769,790. Thus there are in—
Gallicia
Cracow ....... 145,787
The Grand Duchy or Posen 1,290,187
Lithuania 4,978,369
Little Russia
The Kingdom of Poland

Giving a total of 23,981,376
The population of Russia is 63 millions, that of Austria
37 millions, and tl44t of Prussia 16 millions, indepen-
dently of the population of the diffeient pi evinces of
ancient Poland.

THE AMERICAN QUESTION.
The Journal des Debats has the following sensible remarks
on the long-pending Oregon dispute :—"lt is not easy to form
an idea of the object which President Polk and his coun-
cillors propose to themselves. On one side, they reject arbi-
tration ; on the other, they adopt in their arguments such
premises as render it no longer possible to negotiate; for the
President always sets out from this idea, that the whole of
the territory reverts to the Union, and that England has no
right to retaiu the smallest portion of it. Now, to propose
to a power purely and simply to abandon a territory that it
now occupies by common consent, is to tell it that no nego-
tiation will be entered into. To speak of one's love for peace
whilst putting forward such pretensions, is like talking non-
sense. The dispatches of Mr. Buchanan will be quite unin
telligible to European niplomatists. In order to possess a
key to this mystery, to try and measure the exact bearing of
what President, Polk is doing, the best way is to go back to
his inauguration 'Message.' In that document was produced
with eclat the doctrine that Europe has nothing to do with
the affairs of America, and that no new European establish-
ment can be tolerated on the new continent, especially in
North America. The President, no doubt, considers that, in
the present state of things, under the system of joint-occu-
pation, England has, strictly speaking, no establishment in
Oregon. There exists in that territory, in fact, neither town
nor fortress. All is reduced to a hunt for peltries, organised
on a large scale, under the direction of the Hudson's Bay
Company, and a few post for the purpose of trafficking with
the savages. The moment, on the contrary, the English
were placed in exclusive possession of a portion of the Oregon
they would found a colony there—a political and com-
mercial centre of action : that is to say, just what the
first magistrate of the Union has declared intolerable.
Consequently, the Oregon must wholly revert to
the Union. Such appears to be the object of his efforts—
the tendency of his arguments. This is what he will have,
no matter at what price, without being stopped by the news
communicated to his Government by the American
Envoy in London (Mr. M•Lane), that the English
Government is perfectly prepared to make war imme-
diately upon the United States, and to strike great
blows at the first outbreak of hostilities ; and that it is
impossible not to perceive that the immense maritime pre-
parations of Great Britain have at lea,t an indirect relation
to the chances of rupture between that power and the Ame-
rican Union. If such be President Polk's idea, will the
American people follow it up? Every day informs us that
the most eminent men are making manifestations in favour
of the cause of peace. The last arrival brought two docu-
ments, one by Mr. Rivers, formerly ambassador at Paris,
who has long represented the state of Virginia in the Fe-
deral Senate with much distinction; the other by Mr. Gal-
latin, an illustrious veteran, who has resumed his pen at the
age of 85, and descended into the arena to implore his fellow-
' citizens not to precipitate themselves into the abyss that
is being dug beneath their feet. The very amount of the
majority that voted the resolution' of the House of Re-
presentatives seems of a nature to give every security.
This majority, nevertheless, includes a considerable
number of orakes, who have claimed for the United
States the Whole of. the Oiegon territory, and the
excellent paper of Mr. Gallatin appears to us to de.
monstrate very clearly that the single act of the de-
nunciation of the convention of 1827 would render the
maintenance of peace extremely problematical; and, in fact,
the moment the United States have put a period to the joint
occupation, during which every permanent establishment is
prohibited and impossible, they will plant their standard in
all points where American citizens are to be found, that is,
every where. They will execute justice, they will organise
a government, they will levy customs' duties, they will per-
form acts of exclusive sovereignty—they will do it a thou-
sand times for one. They will thus reduce England to the
'alternative of evacuating the Oregon altogether, or making
war for the maintenance of her rights in that quarter; and,
after the vast preparations that she is making, and which
Mr. M'Lane has sufficiently characterised, im ould England
take the first part or the second? Thus, the vote of the
House of Representatives is, at the bottom, an offensive one.
and if it were thought that the Senate would adopt the same
measure, war must be expected. We persevere in hoping
that the Senate will resist the fatal impulse to which the
House of Representatives has yielded, more perhaps than it
itself imagines; and all the acts which it has hitherto per-
formed confirm usin that hope."