THE CZECHO-SLOVAKS
When as a young man Disraeli first came forward in politics a proud and noble lord inquired, somewhat superciliously: “What is he?” In answer Disraeli wrote a pamphlet in which he sketched the scheme of his life. But then he was a young man. Many people now reading the name of “Czechoslovaks” in the Allies’ answer to President Wilson ask: “What are they?” They are an old nation which has engraved its history deep in the annals of Europe, and when the question is asked about them, the vision of the future can be substantiated by the facts of the past.
The first question that people ask on seeing that hyphenated name of a nation is whether they are one people or two. By many the question is asked in the best faith; by others with malevolent intent. As a matter of fact, the difference between these two branches of one single nation is mainly a difference in the enemy from whom they have suffered oppression and persecution in the past and are still suffering at the present day. Both speak the same language. The differences between Czech and Slovak are smaller than those existing between the German language as spoken, even by the educated classes, in Vienna, Munich, and Dresden. Slovak is, in fact, merely a more archaic form of Czech. But
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