This morning I had an interview with Witos, the Prime Minister of Poland. If anyone suspects Poland of Imperialistic aims, Witos is the answer and the direct negation. He is a Galician peasant, who had his little farm near Cracow. He first began to be heard from as a protesting voice against oppression, when Galicia was under Austrian domination. As oppression multiplied his voice grew, always protesting in defence of the under-dog. It was five years ago, after Russian Poland had been occupied by Germany, that he became representative of the Polish nation and leapt to the stature of a life-sized patriot. Today he is the Abraham Lincoln of Poland, a man of the people whose integrity is unpurchaseable. But his integrity without sanity would be worthless; it is his shrewd common sense that is saving the situation. He has his knife out for nobody except rogues and robbers. If he ever had class hatred, he has forgotten it.

He chooses princes, Jews and common men as his advisors—people who were formerly intolerant of each other. His democratic simplicity leavens the lump. He values neither race, nor birth; the demands that he makes are intrinsic merit and enthusiasm for humanity.

He resides in the magnificent palace which belonged to the Civil Governor of Warsaw, when Warsaw was a part of Russian Poland. It was formerly the home of Madame Lubinoff, whose sacrifices to save the Russian refugees I have already described. A palace as the residence of a peasant Premier seems to mar the picture of his altruism; the unfavorable impression is corrected the moment you have seen the palace.

I don't know what they were doing with the lower part of it; it looked as if they were ploughing up the tesselated pavements and getting ready to plant potatoes. One rubbed shoulders with labourers and stumbled over mounds of earth in an endeavour to find an entrance. There were no armed guards. There were no military challenges—no gorgeous uniforms and flashing bayonets. Of whatever Witos may be afraid—and every man is afraid of something—it was evident that he has no dread of assassination.

At last we pushed open a narrow door where a shabby porter relieved us of our hats. When we asked for directions, he jerked his thumb casually, indicating a marble staircase. Accepting his advice we found ourselves in a lofty chamber, stripped of all decoration and furniture. There we were met by a Government clerk, who ushered us into an empty ball-room and requested us to wait.

It was a palace, yes; but lacking in splendour. Nothing but the husk remained. In imagining the gay scenes that it had witnessed, the pomps and pageants, the triumphs and envies, the vanished glitter of bombastic lavishness, one experienced the kind of pity a faded beauty inspires when her coquetry has been made dreadful by old age.

Would we come? The Government clerk was beckoning. As we followed him across the naked expanse of dance-floor there was something intimidating about those echoing vacancies. One thought of the women who had queened it there—the flash of their eyes, luring adoration, the glide of their dainty feet and the quick in-take of their breath. Where were they? Waiting their turn at Madame Lubinoff's soup-kitchen, mouldering in Bolshevist prisons or dead, which was happier.

In the smaller room which we entered a man, quite unremarkable at first sight, was seated at a desk. He was the kind of man that you may see by the thousand anywhere from Ellis Island to San Francisco. His face was bony and lined from exposure. He was gone at the knees with overwork. His hands were disfigured with manual labour. He wore the high leather boots of a peasant. His suit was of a cheap shoddy material—tobacco coloured, the kind that shrinks and wrinkles in the rain and sun. In all outward aspects he was a common man—common in his voice, his gestures, his attire. His shirt was rough with a turn down collar; he wore no tie, so one saw the stud. He was the common man of Poland, guiding the nation's destinies. One remembered Lincoln's saying, that God must have loved the common people very much because He had made so many of them.

He left his desk and came towards us with a lagging step. With the exactness of simplicity and a curious glance of wonder, he shook our hands each in turn uncordially. Then he signed to us to seat ourselves at a round table.

The conversation which ensued, if it can be called a conversation, proceeded through an interpreter as Witos speaks only Polish. When he understood the nature of my errand, he requested that I would ask him questions, so I led off by asking him to assure me that Poland harboured no plans for territorial aggression. His eyes narrowed; then he hid them, looking down at the table and rapping with his knuckles. If I would submit that question to him in writing, by tomorrow he would write me back an answer. Then I asked him my next question. What was the most constructive assistance that nations friendly to Poland could render? Again he would like me to write my question and give him time to write an answer in return.

His reply was the same to everything I asked. He was still the peasant at heart, wise, kindly, fully conscious of his disadvantages and a little distrustful of anyone who approached him professing benevolent friendliness. He was clever enough to know the limitations of his cleverness. He was cautious almost to the point of being unenterprising. He was so natively shrewd, that he would rather appear stupid than run the risk of being trapped. He would answer any question, yes. But he refused to be jockeyed into answering in a moment. Interpreters are unreliable and so are interviewers. When he spoke, he always spoke the truth. A lie was a thing abhorrent to him. He had arrived at his present position of trust not through brilliance, which is a comparatively frequent talent; but through courageous honesty, which usually gets murdered before it has the chance to utter itself.

So I promised to write him my questions. But upon reflection I believe that that is unnecessary. What I wanted to obtain from him was an assurance that Poland wants peace within her borders and is not ambitious to grab territory. Witos answered me more emphatically by his truthfulness and his shrewdness than if he had swamped me with arguments and words. Such a man, so common; so honest, so representative of the workers who suffer, will be the last to lead his nation into rash, imperialistic adventures.