THE SAXON ERA 375the Republic from north to south, occupying Wilno, Warsaw, and Cracow.
After breaking the Polish cavalry in the one set battle, fought at Kliszow on 19
June 1702, he found that Augustus had doubled back on a roundabout route to
Pomerania. In 1703, the Sejm made provision for expanding the Republic's
forces; but their expectations were dashed by a second Swedish victory at
Pultusk, and by the outbreak of Palej's rebellion in Ukraine. In 1704, Augustus
was faced in the Republic by the Swedish-sponsored Confederation of Warsaw
which produced its own claimant to the throne in the person of a nobleman of
Wielkopolska, Stanislaw Leszczynski (1677—1766). The pro-Saxon
Confederation of Sandomierz relied heavily on Russian auxiliaries. Augustus
took evasive action against the Swedes by retreating to Lwow, before advancing
once more to Warsaw. In 1706, Charles XII determined to put an end to the
comedy by marching into the heart of Saxony. At the Treaty of Altranstadt he
obliged Augustus among other things to renounce the Polish throne in favour of
Leszczyriski; but then learned that the Russians and the Confederates of
Sandomierz had succeeded in redressing the balance by defeating a secondary
Swedish army at Kalisz.
After seven campaigns, it was clear that no satisfactory verdict would be
obtained without an invasion of Russia. After a year's preparations, Charles XII
set off eastwards from Grodno in January 1708, leaving Leszczynski with
General Krassau to hold his bases in the Republic. In the campaign of 1708-9,
which led to the epoch-making Russian triumph at Poltava, a conspicuous part
was played both by Polish peasants who harassed the Swedish columns and by
the Confederates of Sandomierz, who prevented any reinforcements reaching
the beleaguered Swedes. Poltava put an end to the Swedish party in the
Republic. Leszczyriski and Krassau were pursued to Stettin. The Confederation
of Warsaw was disbanded. In 1710, Augustus returned in triumph. The Saxon
monarchy was restored.
Yet the Republic's troubles continued. The reintroduction of the Saxon
Guard and their brutal impositions rekindled the animosity of a people who had
been schooled to think of all foreign troops as the instruments of royal tyranny.
In November 1715, the Polish nobility found common cause once more in the
General Confederation of Tarnogrod which swore to expel the Saxons lock,
stock, and barrel. For a time, it looked as though they would succeed. Augustus,
having lost Poznari, was being pushed back towards Saxony, when a sense of
cold reality was suddenly injected into the situation by the appearance of a
Russian Army. The Tsar, irritated by the squabbles of his Saxon and Polish
clients, was threatening in no uncertain terms to knock their heads together. By
offering to arbitrate in their dispute, he stood to gain a permanent grip on Polish
affairs. After seventeen years of punishing warfare, the battered Republic was
exhausted, and divided against itself. Such was the setting of the notorious Silent
Sejm of 1717.
Peter the Great's policy to Poland-Lithuania had matured over the two
decades of the Northern War. The first stage, of putting his Saxon client into a