NEW POLAND.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 5 November 1925, Page 10

NEW POLAND.

COUNTRY THAT CANNOT BE

IGNORED

It is no small thing to have set up in Europe a Power with territories greater than those of Italy and. a population greater than Spain, says the Daily Mail. This is what we and our Allies in the Great War did when we restored the independence of the Polish nation. The deed was so tremendous that we have hardly yet realised what we have done. But it is obvious that a country of this size, with 27,000,000 inhabitants, is a factor in Europe which the manufacturer can no more ignore than the politician. Three years have gone by since I was here, and during that time most of the information I have had about Poland has been derived from the German newspapers. They give the impression that the Poles are . a feckless people Who live in a hopeless state of muddle and misery. Consequently I expected when I got out of the train at Posen to find that since the Germans went away the city had become dilapidated, disorganised, and impoverished. A smart young chaiiffeur drove me swiftly in an open taxicab along the perfect roads to the Bazar Hotel in the chief square. It was agreeable to discover that taxicab fares were cheaper than in Berlin, and to get into a comfortable bed in a fastidiously clean room. I awoke early to the music of a military band and electric tramway cars, jumped out of bed and went to the open window. On came the soldiers in khaki, a fine body of men, with their merry band. Girls and m'en on their way to work in shops and offices got out of the tramway cars. Boys and girls with satchels were going to school, and servants and housewives with baskets to market. And the slim, pretty girls in summery frocks, the midinettes and typists and shop girls of Poznan to give the city the ancient name which has been restored to it, kept me a quarter of an hour at the window. Talking to people , in the town, I began to understand why. the Germans write such nasty things about the Pioles. When the German official left Poznan they were convinced that the organisation of the town would collapse, and they are annoyed that it has not.

There is not a cleaner and brighter town in Europe. The population has increased from 157,000 to nearly 200,000, and everybody is working. Poznan possesses a gloomy castle of granite and sandstone which the ex-Kaiser built when he bestowed the title of Imperial residence on the city. He made a grand speech when he came to his new home for the first time, and expressed the hope that the city would ever be a centre of German culture. The poor man’s hopes have been disappointed. Part of his castle is used for the new Polish university, and in two davs I heard nothing hut the soft twittering of Polish in the streets. One hundred and fifty years of Prussian rule have failed to crush this tenacious people. The Poles have not avenged themselves. There are German schools for Germans, who number 5 per cent of the population. / Germany will be neither strong enough nor rich- enough to attempt to get back Poznan for many years to come and the Poles are confident in their ability to defend their home and the cradle of their race.