144 LUDThe great bourgeois families were as rare, and as rich, as the ancient magna-
tial clans. The two often intermarried. Their success rested on the pullulating,
ant-like activities of lesser businessmen - the merchants, brokers, restaurateurs,
undertakers, insurance-agents, craftsmen — who serviced the life of the growing
towns. In Poland, this drobnomieszczanstwo or 'petty-bourgeoisie' was marked
by its strong Jewish element, by its inimitable 'jargon' and affectations, and by
its fierce social ambitions. Except in those few areas where the industrial prole-
tariat appeared in force, it provided the only sizeable barrier between the upper
classes and the peasant masses.
The category of government employees covered a multitude of sins. It ranged
from several thousand Russian 'service aristocrats' awarded land in Poland after
the Risings, to professors, schoolteachers, inspectors, civil servants, army
officers, policemen, clerks, and woodsmen in the state forests. Here, in view of
the intensely political nature of government service in the nineteenth century,
sharp divisions of attitude developed. The schoolteachers in particular headed
the movements for national revival, and as such bore the recriminations of their
'loyalist' colleagues.
In inverse proportion to the bureaucrats, the independent professions were
relatively sparse. Doctors, lawyers, journalists, and technical consultants had
frequently undergone a foreign education in France or Germany. Here, rivalry
between Jews and Gentiles was at its most acute.
The prominence of the bureaucracy also gave special meaning to the intelli-
gentsia. Unlike its counterparts in Western Europe, the intelligentsia could
never be equated, even broadly, with the 'educated classes', and a degree of
political disaffection was taken for granted. In Poland it developed after the
Partitions, and adopted the mantle of guardian of the national heritage. The
writers, critics, artists, and students at its core were drawn from various social
origins, but most typically from ex-nobility. The dominant Polish element was
joined by imitators and rivals in each of the non-Polish communities.^11
The role and status of the clergy also underwent important transformations.
In Russia and Austria the Catholic priest was controlled by the secular as well
as the ecclesiastical authorities. The suppression of many monastic and teach-
ing orders thrust the parish clergy into the forefront of educational, and hence
of political, conflicts. Even so, the clergy were one of the very few groups who
could fairly claim to have retained the substance of a separate estate.
Divergences among the middle stratum were considerable, therefore, and all
the component groups, defined on varying criteria of wealth, function, and sta-
tus, were bound to overlap. They were united only by their common desire to
be distinguished from the toiling masses. In so far as they flourished mainly in
the towns, they may be regarded as the urban partner of the landowning classes
in the countryside.
Once peasant labour was free to move from the countryside into the indus-
trial towns, the industrial proletariat grew rapidly. Although in numerical
terms, it did not match its counterparts in the countries of Western Europe, it