Omaha daily bee., 1888-12-10
RrSSLA,s RELENrLESS n1rRED.

hJ 'oNfft - LlI. IIII-N 1 iEy.cC II Il hED.
A London paper is responsible for the
statement that under the pretense of
military defensive operations the city
of Warsaw, the capital of Poland-when
there was Poland--is to be reduced to
fortress. All buildings save those
within the military enceinte are to be
destroyed, and the total population,
numbering nearly four hundred thous-
and souls, is to be expelled, with the
exception of some twenty or thirty
thousand peasants, presumably of Rus
sian origin. Every Pole and every Jew
is to be driven forth, and no provision
whatever will be made to feed them or
to afford them transportation, but they
arc to care for themselves. This simply
means that they are to die OF starvation.
of cold and of exhaustion, for it is inn
possible that such multitudes could find
shelter in the neighborhood, and it is
certain that if they are expelled the
railroad authorities will not even sell
them tickets to other cities. They are
not only to be robbed of all that they
possess, but they are TO be expelled un
der conditions which will insure their
perishing. Russia is greedy to hear of
the annihilation of Warsaw.
1t seems impossible to doubt that the
impending campaign against Austria is
rs much for the purpose Of destroying
the Polish element in the dual king
dom as in resentment of Austrian
rivalry in the Balkan peninsula. One
hundred thousand cavalry and three
hundred thousand infantry are echel-
onned against the Galician frontier
waiting for the nod of the white czar to
commence a career OF conquest and ra-
pine. The Austrian government has
found among the Czechs of Bohemia
and Moravia and the Lechs of Galcia
an admirable counterpoise to the over
weening influence of the Magyar IN the
national diet. And this sudden renais-
sance of the Polish element has been
| viewed with bitter hostility by the Rus
slams whose Pan-slavism exclude the
| C2echs aud Lechs because these have
ever been rivals whose influence was
greater than their own in many quar-
| tiers. The Americans will have diff
Guilty in comprehending the peculiar
| character of Pan -slavism, which is an
| effort TO unite in the bonds
of common sympathy all
| who speak any.dialect OF the Slavonic
tongue The Slavons will not rally
round common center, but insist on
rallying round two centers, one of
| which is the Polono-B Bohemian, ana the
| ther the Russian. The dialect of the
sacred books is actually Serbian, but
| the Serbians nevertheless do not expect
other Sayonic nations to rally around
| them. Nor will they rally TO the Rus
SLAMS, although of the same church and
| using the same liturgy, but make
| common cause with the Austrians,
which is tautamount to making common
cause with the Polono- Bohemian, who
are Catholics and Protestants These
| sympathies and repugnances are incom-
| prehensible to outsiders, but they are
among the strongest features of the Sla-
| vonic nature. And yet the white czar
| proposes to smother them by ukases.
| He might'as we'll issue ul1ases against
| friction, gravitaiion and cohesion.
Russia Is very desirous of having the
moral support of the United States in
| the coming conflict But how can
| Americans extend it to nation whose
| treatment of the Poles shocks tho moral
| consciousness of mankind