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UNREST IN BOHEMIA
and Bukovina likewise sent their delegates, and the spokesman of the Slovaks of Hungary was the poet Hviezdoslav. About sixty Poles took part in the manifestation, mostly from Galicia, three from Silesia, and one from Posen. The Galician delegation included the ex-Minister, Deputy Glombiński; Count Dr. A. Skarbek; Deputies Tetmajer and Witoš; the Socialist leader, Moraczewski, whose father took part in the Panslav Congress of Prague in 1848; and many others. The Russians and the Lusatian Sorbs, although invited, could not come owing to the prohibition of the Austrian Government. During the manifestations, Dr. Kramář declared: “We have suffered so much that no danger and no threats can turn us from the path we have entered upon. Happily we see that all that we want is also desired by the whole world. We see that we are not alone. To-day we greet here representatives of all nations who suffered as we did. Our victory is their victory, and their victory is ours.” Deputy Radić assured the Czechs of Jugoslav solidarity, and Deputy Moraczewski expressed the gratitude of the Poles for the warm welcome and sympathy extended to his countrymen in Prague, and for the proclamation of the watchword “For your liberty and ours.”
The most striking speech during the main celebrations in the Pantheon of the Bohemian Museum was that of the Italian Deputy Conci, who, amid loud cheers, assured the Czechs of Italian sympathy, and declared that Italians and Czechs are united by the same fate: by common oppression and by the struggle for independence.
On 17 May all the foreign delegates and representatives of all Czech parties passed a resolution which reads as follows:—
“The representatives of Slav and Latin nations who, for centuries past, have been suffering under foreign oppression, assembled in Prague, this seventeenth day of May, 1918, have united in a common desire to do all in their power in order to assure full liberty and independence to their respective nations after this terrible war. They are agreed that a better future of their nations will be founded and assured by the world democracy, by a real and sovereign national people’s government, and by a universal League of Nations, endowed with the necessary authority.
“They reject emphatically all steps of the Government taken without the consent of the peoples. They are convinced that the peace which they, together with all other democratic parties and nations are striving for, will only then be a just and lasting peace if it liberates the world from the predominance of one nation over another and thus enables all nations to defend themselves against aggressive imperialism by means of liberty and equality of nations. All nations represented are determined to help each other, since the victory of one is also the victory of the other, and is not only in the interests of the nations concerned but in the interests of civilisation, of fraternity and equality of nations and of true humanity.”
Awe-struck by this significant event, Vienna again began to resort to terrorism. According to the Dělnické Listy of 22 May, immediately after the manifestations, the Prague police issued and placarded all over the city an order saying that, owing to events of a treasonable character which recently occurred, all public meetings and processions were prohibited, as well as the wearing of the Slav tricolour. The National Theatre was
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