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In these and other respects the Little Russians, South Russians, Ruthenes, or Khokhly, as they are variously designated, differ from the Great Russians of the North, who form the predominant factor in the Empire, and who have given to that wonderful structure its essential characteristics.
This is partially due to the encouragement given by the Austrian Government to the Ruthenes in Galicia, but also to the disintegrating effect of universal suffrage upon the Polish political parties, the growth of democratic tendencies at the expense of the Austrophil nobility, and the consequent increased influence of the Poles of Warsaw.
The population consists for the most part of Germans, Ruthenes, Rumanians, and Poles. Among these are 21,000 Jews and there are also a number of Armenians and gypsies.
In other cases it was the quarrels artificially fomented by Austria between her subject nations, notably between the Poles and Ruthenes and between the Yugoslavs and Italians. Finally, the Poles lacked a definite international point of view. They were justly sceptical of Slav solidarity seeing that they were oppressed by a government which claimed to represent a great Slav nation.
On November 15, the parliament was summoned to Kremsier, in which the Czechs, Ruthenes, Yugoslavs and some Poles formed a Slav bloc of 120 members. On December 2, Francis Joseph ascended the throne, and a constitution was proposed by a parliamentary committee of which Rieger was a member.
At the same time the Slavs made a proposal in the Austro-Hungarian Delegations, insisting that the peace negotiations with Russia should be conducted by a committee selected from both parliaments on the basis of nationality, and consisting of twelve Germans, ten Magyars, ten Czecho-Slovaks, seven Yugoslavs, five Poles, four Ruthenes, three Rumanians and one Italian.
Even so, it is a surprise to find a population so accommodating. "The people in this part of Austria are Poles, Ruthenes and Jews. Polish belongs to the same family of languages as Russian, and the Poles are Slavs. So are the Ruthenes, whose speech is almost identical with that of southwestern Russia.
During the speech from the throne the Czechs demonstratively left the hall. On the same day the Bohemian Union, the Yugoslav Club and the Ruthenes issued a protest against the government having published a distorted version of the Russian peace offer. Their declaration naturally exasperated the Germans and the government.
Incidentally much will depend upon the attitude adopted by the Russian Government towards its new Catholic subjects. Its relations with the Vatican will require to be placed upon an entirely new footing, and due respect must be accorded to the Uniate Catholic Church of the four million Ruthenes of Galicia.
At the same time Austria has done all in her power to create misunderstandings between the Slavs and Italians, just as she tried to create dissensions between Poles and Ruthenes in Galicia, and between Poles and Czechs in Silesia, well knowing that the dominant races, the Germans and Magyars, would profit thereby.
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