Thomas Capek

Bohemia under Hapsburg Misrule Thomas Capek

The object of this volume is to make Bohemia and her people better known to the English-speaking world. The average Englishman's and American's knowledge of Bohemia is very vague. It is only within recent years that Anglo-American writers have begun to take a deeper interest in her people. Among the more prominent students of Bohemian contemporary life should be mentioned: Will S. Monroe, Emily G. Balch, and Herbert Adolphus Miller, in the United States; and A. R. Colquhoun, Richard J. Kelly, F. P. Marchant, James Baker, Wickham H. Steed, Charles Edmund Maurice, W. R. Morfill, and R. W. Seton-Watson in England. Count Lützow has written in English a number of works on Bohemian matters. While it is yet too early to foresee the precise results of the Great War, one may judge of coming events by the shadows they cast before them. A close observer of the Austrian shadows is justified in thinking that the Bohemian people, so long suppressed, stand on the threshold of a new destiny. This destiny points to the restoration of their ancient freedom. If the Allies win-and every loyal[8] son of the Land of Hus fervently wishes that their arms might prevail, notwithstanding the fact that Bohemian soldiers are constrained to fight for the cause of the two Kaisers-Bohemia is certain to re-enter the family of self-governing European nations. The proclamation which the Russian Generalissimo addressed to the Poles may be said to apply with equal force to the Bohemians: "The hour has sounded when the sacred dream of your fathers may be realized.... Bohemia will be born again, free in her religion, her language, and autonomous.... The dawn of a new life begins for you.... In this glorious dawn is seen the sign of the cross, the symbol of suffering and the resurrection of a people."