Being there as a
stranger in that tense atmosphere, which was yet not unfamiliar to me, I
was not very anxious to parade my wisdom, especially after it had been
pointed out in answer to my cautious arguments that, if life has its
values worth fighting for, death, too, has that in it which can make it
worthy or unworthy.
Out of the mental and moral trouble into which the grouping of the Powers
at the beginning of war had thrown the counsels of Poland there emerged
at last the decision that the Polish Legions, a peace organisation in
Galicia directed by Pilsudski (afterwards given the rank of General, and
now apparently the Chief of the Government in Warsaw), should take the
field against the Russians. In reality it did not matter against which
partner in the "Crime" Polish resentment should be directed. There was
little to choose between the methods of Russian barbarism, which were
both crude and rotten, and the cultivated brutality tinged with contempt
of Germany's superficial, grinding civilisation. There was nothing to
choose between them. Both were hateful, and the direction of the Polish
effort was naturally governed by Austria's tolerant attitude, which had
connived for years at the semi-secret organisation of the Polish Legions.
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