of offering resistance, would have saved Germany,
if she possibly could have been saved, in 1917. In the rushing torrent
that whirled her away to her fall, he found no pillar to which he
could cling.

Latterly his sight began to fail and give way. He suffered from
fatigue, and the conferences and councils lasting often for hours and
hours were beyond his strength.

CHAPTER IX

POLAND

1

By letters patent November 5, 1916, both the Emperors declared
Poland's existence as a Kingdom.

When I came into office, I found the situation to be that the Poles
were annoyed with my predecessor because, they declared, Germany had
wanted to cede the newly created kingdom of Poland to us, and Count
Burian had rejected the offer. Apparently there is some
misunderstanding in this version of the case, as Burian says it is not
correctly rendered.

There were three reasons that made the handling of the Polish question
one of the greatest difficulty. The first was the totally different
views of the case held by competent individuals of the Austro-Hungarian
Monarchy. While the Austrian Ministry was in favour of the so-called
Austro-Polish solution, Count Tisza was strongly opposed to it. His
standpoint was that the political structure of the Monarchy ought not
to undergo any change through the annexation of Poland, and that Poland
eventually might be joined to the Monarchy as an Austrian province, but
never as a partner in a tripartite Monarchy.

A letter that he wrote to me from Budapest on February 22, 1917, was
characteristic of his train of thought. It was as follows:

YOUR EXCELLENCY,--Far be it from me to raise a discussion on
questions which to-day are without actual value and most probably
will not assume any when peace is signed. On the other hand, I
wish to avoid the danger that might arise from mistaken
conclusions drawn from the fact that I accepted without protest
certain statements that appeared in the correspondence of our
diplomatic representatives.

Guided exclusively by this consideration, I beg to draw the
attention of Your Excellency to the fact that the so-called
Austro-Polish solution of the Polish question has repeatedly (as
in telegram Nr. 63 from Herr von Ugron) been referred to as the
"tripartite solution."

With reference to this appellation I am compelled to point out the
fact that in the first period of the war, at a time when the
Austro-Polish solution was