Pilsudski Playful

Marshal Josef Pilsudski, in his youth the shaggiest of rampant Socialists, later the organizer of armies which freed Poland during the World War, at present Dictator, Premier and War Minister of the Polish Republic, began seriously to consider last week whether a crown would not well become his politically feverish brow.

He had just been assured by Polish monarchists assembled near Nieswiez on the estate of Prince Albrecht Radziwill that Poland needs a monarch. The Marshal, impulsive, quick as a Bengal tiger to pounce on what he desires, surprised everyone by returning to Warsaw without actually taking steps to order a crown.

From his sufficiently regal abode, the Belvedere Palace, Pilsudski decided to amuse himself a little longer by playing cat and mice with the disorganized and virtually impotent Sejm (Parliament).

With playful malice he issued a decree that all members of the Sejm must stand during the reading of whatever proclamations he may send to them. The Deputies immediately expressed indignation, and indicated their refusal to ratify the decree unless Marshal Pilsudski would agree to come and read his own proclamation standing before them. Tiger cat Pilsudski, no doubt secretly intrigued by the defiance of his mice, turned the incident into high comedy by commanding the First Lancers Regiment to march twice around the Parliament Building in full war regalia. Having thus shown his physical encirclement of and contempt for the parliamentarians Pilsudski called off his troops, last week, retired into his palace, brooded upon whether to take in deadly earnest the jest of Opposition news organs which satirically hailed him as: "PILSUDSKI AUGUSTUS, IMPERATOR ET REX."