In 1772 under the last feeble king Stanislaus Augustus (1764-1795), the first actual partition of Poland took place, when about a third of her territories were seized by Prussia, Austria, and Russia, the respective shares of the spoil being Prussia 13,415 square miles, Austria 27,000 square miles, Russia 42,000 square miles.
A second division between Russia and Prussia took place in 1793. Prussia received nearly all the present province of Posen, and the western part of what is now Russian Poland; Russia received all the territory east of about long. 44°. A third division between Russia, Prussia, and Austria occurred in 1795. Prussia took a large part of the present Russian Poland, including Warsaw; Austria received part of the present Russian Poland between the Bug, Vistula, and Pilica; and Russia received all the remainder, situated east of the Niemen and Bug.
An insurrection under Koszciusko had taken place in 1794, but he was defeated at the battle of Maciejowice and taken prisoner. Suvorov (Suwarrow), the Russian general, took Warsaw, and the Polish monarchy was at an end. King Stanislaus resigned his crown, and died at Petrograd in 1798.
Part of Poland was formed by Napoleon into the duchy of Warsaw. The Congress of Vienna in 1815 made a resettlement of the territory, creating a kingdom of Poland, under Russian rule, with a constitution. An insurrection which began in November, 1830, was suppressed in September, 1831; the constitution was abolished in 1832. From this time the independence of Poland was suppressed, and in 1832 it was declared an integral part of the Russian empire, with a separate administration, headed by a viceroy chosen by the Czar. On November 6, 1848, the republic of Cracow became Austrian; and the subsequent rebellion against Russian rule in 1863 only brought further humiliation on Polish hopes and aspirations.
During the European war Poland, in 1914, first suffered invasion and devastation by the Russian armies, and during the two following years was completely overrun by the Austro-German armies, and placed under the military rule of the latter. The proclamation of Poland as a new independent kingdom took effect in 1916.
PORTUGAL
PORTUGAL (named from Portus Cale, the Roman name of Oporto), a republic of Europe, lying between Spain and the Atlantic, on the west side of the Iberian Peninsula, is three hundred and fifty miles in length and varies in width from seventy to one hundred and forty miles. The area is 36,038 square miles—a little larger than Ireland.
Surface and Climate.—The coast is mostly low and flat, except immediately north and south of the mouth of the Tagus, and at Cape St. Vincent. The north of Portugal is diversified by spurs (five thousand feet) of the mountains of Spanish Galicia. The Sierra da Estrella (six thousand five hundred and forty feet) is a westward continuation of the Spanish Sierra Guadarrama system. The Sierra Morena is continued westwards in southern Portugal.
The principal rivers of the country—the Guadiana in the south, the Tagus in the center, and the Douro and Minho in the north—are [561] simply the lower courses of Spanish rivers; but the Mondego has its sources in the country.
The vicinity to the ocean tempers the climate and exempts it from the dry heat of Spain. The inequalities of the surface produce, however, diversities of climate; for, while snow falls abundantly on the mountains in the northern provinces, it is never seen in the southern lowlands. Rain falls abundantly throughout the year.