The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-02-15
Says Poland Has Nothing to Do
With War.
But IS USED As COCKPIT
And Furnishes 1900, 900 Men to
Both Sides.
Thousands of Destitute Women
and Children Perish Daily.

Berne, Feb. 15.-Henri SienkieWiez.
Berne, Feb. 15.-Henrik Sienkiewicz.
author of ''Quo Vadis," is, like tens
of thousands of his compatriots,
refugee, driven from home by the war.
He is now at Vevey with the members
of the committee for the relief of VIC
Tins of the war in Poland. of which
he is president and Ignace Paderewski
is vice president. The latter will visit
New York in connection with the Pol
ish work.
No more appalling picture of death.
destruction and devastation has ever
been drawn than that outlined by
Sienkiewicz, who declares it is unique
in history. He says:
No Cause to Fight.
POLAND has nothing to do with the
war. She has been conquered and
partitioned. She is not one of the
belligerent nations-yet million and
a half of her sons are fighting fratri-
cidal battles in the armies of three
different warning states. Our country
Europe and is devastated from end to
end, three-quarters of a million men
bearing arms for Germany or Austria.
Think what this means! When
the order for a charge is given hOrdes
of soldiers rush on each other. When
they get within striking distance and
commence cutting one another down
they find the language in which they
are uttering their imprecations is their
common. natal tongue 1t frequently
happens that when the Red Cross
nurses go to collect the wounded they
lift from a heap one man in a German
uniform; another in an Austrian and
a third in a Russian-but all three
of them Poles.
Misery Is Great.
'"rhe misery is really very great in
the kingdom. In Poland alone there
a I vii hpprv Nn6
sands of chapels and churches dam
aged or destroyed. Nine out of Po-
lands ter provinces have been occu-
pied by Germans who seized every
thing they found. even to peasants
chickens. The homeless villagers
sought shelter in the forests. where
women and children are now dying of
cold and hunger by the thousands
daily. y
..In the whole 100000 square kilo-
meters of territory in the possession of
German and Austrian troops, not one
grain of corn, not scrap of meat nor
drop of milk remained for the civil
population. The material losses are
estimated at one billion rubles. Agri-
culture has been ruined and. every in
dustry destroyed. Four hundred thou
sand workers have lost their means OF
livelihood. -
Conditions in Galicia-
THE state of affairs in Galicia is
JUST as OTedOIul, tOO"IOT from Inc
civil population there the Russians
Communicated 100000 horses and two
million horned cattle and seized all
the corn. leaving that once rich coun-
try as barren a desert More than
one million inhabitants sought refuge
in other parts of Austria in sheer
restitution.
Il was at my home in Oblegoreik
under the government of Kielce dur
ing the early part of the war working
on a new novel. 1 had to interrupt it
and leave all my books and docu-
ments. The last news 1 heard Of my
home was that trenches were being
dug around it, even in the garden.
Leaving my home 1 made my way
to Vienna where it was reported that
1 had been arrested by the Austrians.
This is not true. After some difficulty
the Austrians accorded me a permit
to come here to Switzerland.
There has been committee for
the relief of Polish distress created in
Berlin, of which the United States
ambassador is a member-but Ameri-
ca can sell no more corn and Russia
would not sell it to the Berlin COM
mittee for fear it might be used to
feed German troops. 1t is only to our
committee established in neutral
Switzerland that the Russians are
likely to supply corn"