vered Lithuania from the
Russian yoke, it was before they had subjugated Russia. That, in this
manner, it was natural for the first to receive a victorious and certain
freedom with transport; and equally natural for the last to receive an
uncertain and dangerous liberty with gravity; that a benefit was not
purchased with the same air as if it were gratuitously accepted; that
six years back, at Warsaw, there was nothing to be done but to prepare
festivals; while at Wilna, where the whole power of Russia had just been
exhibited, where its army was known to be untouched, and the motives of
its retreat understood, it was for battles that preparation was to be
made.

"And with what means? Why was not that liberty offered to them in 1807?
Lithuania was then rich and populous. Since that time the continental
system, by sealing up the only vent for its productions, had
impoverished it, while Russian foresight had depopulated it of recruits,
and more recently of a multitude of nobles, peasants, waggons, and
cattle, which the Russian army had carried away with it."

To these causes they added "the famine resulting from the severity of
the season in 1811, and the damage to which the over-rich wheats of
those countries are subject. But why not make an appeal to the provinces
of the south? In that quarter there were men, horses, and provisions of
all kinds. They had nothing to do but to drive away Tormasof and his
army from them. Schwartzenberg was, perhaps, marching in that direction;
but was it to the Austrians, the uneasy usurpers of Gallicia, that they
ought to confide the liberation of Volhynia? Would they station liberty
so near slavery? Why did not they send Frenchmen and Poles there? But
then it would be necessary to halt, to carry on a more methodical war,
and allow time for organization; while Napoleon, doubtless urged by his
distance from his own territory, by the daily expense of provisioning
his immense army, depending on that alone, and hurrying after victory,
sacrificed every thing to the hope of finishing the war at a single
blow."

Here the speakers were interrupted: these reasons, though true,
appeared insufficient excuses. "They concealed the most powerful cause
of the immobility of their countrymen; it was to be discovered in the
interested attachment of their grandees to the crafty policy of Russia,
which flattered their self-love, respected their customs, and secured
their right over the peasants, whom the F