Sick Lion

A kinetic surprise lurks always up the faded, military coat-sleeve of Josef Pilsudski, beloved Marshal of Poland, resolute Dictator, quixotic Prime Minister.

Last week, however, Deputies of the Opposition felt safe. Pilsudski was sick. They knew that he had been too ill to receive the King of Afghanistan six weeks ago (TIME, May 14), and had lain abed ever since, some said paralyzed. Therefore the Polish Sejm (Parliament) rang with furious denunciations of the Cabinet's Budget Bill. This time there seemed no hope that it could be saved by a sudden, dramatic appearance of National Hero Pilsudski.

An appeal to the Opposition by puppet-President Ignatz Moscicki was ignored. A story gained credence that the sick Lion of Poland had fallen victim to delusions of persecution, had shot his own gardener, was raving, confined in a straitjacket.

Then, with the budget about to be voted down, came, as in Polish fairy tales, the surprise. A door behind the Tribune of the Sejm flew open. Once more the frayed field uniform, the old sword, the drooping ferocious mustachios: PILSUDSKI!

The Marshal, himself again, had characteristically concealed his convalescence until the last dramatic moment. Impressionable Polish Deputies, stirred once more by the mere presence of him whose glory is that he led Poland to independence from

Russia, shortly voted through the Budget. A second striking result of the Dictator's sudden abandonment of the role of "Possum" was the sending, last week, of three Polish light cruisers to anchor threateningly in the port of the famed Free City of Danzig. Polish cargo ships, it was alleged, have recently been denied adequate anchorage and docking facilities by Danzigers.