[Footnote 18: "The increase of crime occasioned by the artifices of the police, who thereby gained their livelihood, rendered an especial statute, prohibitory of such measures, necessary in the new legislature. Even the passing stranger perceived the disastrous effect of their intrigues upon the open, honest character and the social habits of the Viennese. The police began gradually to be considered as a necessary part of the machine of government, a counterbalance to or a remedy for the faults committed by other branches of the administration. Large sums, the want of which was heavily felt in the national education and in the army, were expended on this arsenal of poisoned weapons."--_Hormayr's Pocket-Book_, 1832. Thugut is described as a diminutive, hunchbacked old man, with a face resembling the mask of a fawn and with an almost satanic expression.]
CCXLVIII. Loss of the Left Bank of the Rhine
The object of the Prussian king was either to extend his conquests westward or, at all events, to prevent the advance of Austria. The war with France claimed his utmost attention, and, in order to guard his rear, he again attempted to convert Poland into a bulwark against Russia.
His ambassador, Lucchesini, drove Stackelberg, the Russian envoy, out of Warsaw, and promised mountains of gold to the Poles, who dissolved the perpetual council associated by Russia with the sovereign, freed themselves from the Russian guarantee; aided by Prussia, compelled the Russian troops to evacuate the country; devised a constitution, which they laid before the cabinets of London and Berlin; concluded an offensive and defensive alliance with Prussia on the 29th of March, 1790, and, on the 3d of May, 1791, carried into effect the new constitution ratified by England and Prussia, and approved of by the emperor Leopold. During the conference, held at Pilnitz, the indivisibility of Poland was expressly mentioned. The constitution was monarchical. Poland was, for the future, to be a hereditary instead of an elective monarchy, and, on the death of Poniatowsky, the crown was to fall to Saxony. The modification of the peasants' dues and the power conceded to the serf of making a private agreement with his lord also gave the monarchy a support against the aristocracy.