The Fall of the Two Kingdoms

The Poles, a divided nation.--The three partitions.--Wars and revolts
as a result.--The disappearance of Lithuania.--The growing power of
the king of France.--An extravagant and corrupt court.--Peasants
cruelly taxed and oppressed.--Bankruptcy at last.--The meeting of the
three estates.--The third estate defies the king.--The fall of the
Bastille.--The flight and capture of the king.--The king
beheaded.--Other kings alarmed.--Valmy saves the revolution.--The
reign of terror.


In the flat country to the northeast of Austria-Hungary and east of
Prussia lay the kingdom of Poland, the largest country in Europe with
the exception of Russia. The Poles, as has been said before, were a
Slavic people, distant cousins of the Russians and Bohemians. They had
a strong nobility or upper class, but these nobles were jealous of
each other, and as a result, the country was torn apart by many
warring factions. The condition of the working class was very
miserable. The nobles did not allow them any privileges. They were
serfs, that is to say, practically slaves, who had to give up to their
masters the greater part of the crops that they raised. In the council
of the Polish nobles, no law could be passed if a single nobleman
opposed it. As a result of this jealousy between factions, the Poles
could not be induced to obey any one leader, and thus, divided, were
easy to conquer.

Frederick the Great, regretting the fact that he was separated from
his land in East Prussia by the county of West Prussia, which was part