I reported the latest events at home, especially the meetings of the “Maffia,” and I suggested what course our further work might take. The news that Dr. Soukup was taking part in our movement as a representative of the Social Democrats caused great satisfaction. It was suggested that we could now send couriers direct to Dr. Soukup, and Mme. Linhart was sent to Prague with a message for him. Unfortunately she was caught and this led to the arrest of a large number of persons, including Mme. Linhart herself, Hájek and his wife, Cyril Dušek, Miss Sychrava, Miss Olič, Dr. Alice Masaryk, and my wife. This was the first time our plans had been discovered since we had started our movement. (The second and last discovery occurred on October 21, 1918, when the authorities in Vienna had neither the time nor the opportunity to attend to persecutions.)
Bit by bit we learned about these wholesale arrests. We obtained the first news on November 19, 1915, in the form of vague newspaper reports sent by way of Switzerland in accordance with our pre-arranged code. I learned more about it on November 23rd during my visit to London when Masaryk received a letter from Dr. B. Štěpánek containing a detailed account of the whole affair. Dr. Štěpánek, whose letter had been sent from Amsterdam, informed us at the same time that he was returning to Holland at Christmas and that he would like to meet someone there for an interchange of news.
In giving an account of our secret communications I must avoid anticipating events. In order, however, not to have to return to the “Maffia,” I will at once give as much of its subsequent history as concerns myself, and falls within the scope of the present work.
The proposed meeting with Dr. Štěpánek took place on Christmas Day, 1915, at the Hôtel Krasnopolski, at Amsterdam. We spent the day together and exchanged views. For us who were living abroad this was of great value, as after the arrests in Prague our communications via Switzerland had to stop for some time, and my meeting with Dr. Štěpánek represented the opening of a new set of communications. These he promised to maintain by way of Holland, and indicated that I might expect further news either on the arrival of the Czech Quartet or during the visit of the author, Jaroslav Kvapil. The latter did actually bring us news on several occasions.
In the course of the year 1916 we had only occasional com-
