George Matulaitis Journal

326 the League of Nations that they will always be loyal to General ÷ eligowski. April 2 General ÷ eligowski and his adjutant Mr. Prystor 1 returned my visit. The latter is Pi = sudski’s trusted man and ÷ eligowski’s guardian angel. They say that Mr. Prystor runs the whole show here, and the Polish “endeks” make fun of him: they have nicknamed Central Lithuania “Prystoria.” Both of them asked me to act as mediator between them and Kaunas. They said that because of the inflexible attitude of the Lithuanian government in Kaunas, many of our supporters are defecting. We are losing ground. They cannot believe that it is impossible to come to an agreement with Kaunas. I answered: “Officially, the Lithuanians cannot and do not wish to negotiate at this time when they have already begun discussing the issues with Warsaw with the mediation of the League of Nations.” “Let them negotiate,” said Mr. Prystor, “but we can also have our own negotiations at the same time.” “I am of the opinion that it is necessary to negotiate and to find some common ground, for after all we shall have to live together,” I responded. As I had promised Mr. Witold Abramowicz, I did try to act as mediator. I spoke with Mr. Jonynas and Mr. Bir i ka. Both acknowledged that it would be useful for the representatives of both parties to have discussions alongside the official negotiations. Consequently, the delegates of the Lithuanian Social Democrats and also of the Socialist Populists arrived in Vilnius. Now someone from here should go to Kaunas to return the visit. We also made efforts to invite the delegates of the Christian Democrats to come here, and Father Viskantas worked on it. Mr. Jonynas, who has just gone to Kaunas, took the letters of invitation with him. In this way I am acting as mediator and making every effort to bring these nations that are in conflict to the negotiating table and, I hope, to an agreement. Perhaps when they 1 Aleksander Prystor: a well-known Polish politician delegated by Marshal Pi = sudski to supervise political activities in Central Lithuania.