“The representatives of our landed aristocracy who now vie with the rabid Czech nationalists in their enthusiasm for Bohemian autonomy are almost without exception Germans. [In thus assuming the part of Czechs they make themselves as ridiculous as the gallant Junker von Krauthofer from the banks of the Vistula when he dons the embroidered Pekesche of the Poles with their white or red ‘Confederatka’ cap, and christens himself Pan Krutowski. Not one of them uses the Bohemian language in speaking to his equals; indeed few of them are able to read or understand it at all, while hardly a couple out of the whole lot could stand the test of pronouncing the famous vowelless shibboleth ‘Strcz prst skrz krk.’ (These words signify: Put your thumb down your throat.) They speak as their mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers spoke, they think and feel as their grandfathers and great-grandfathers thought and felt, that is to say, neither German nor Bohemian, but rather in as un-national and anti-national a spirit as their most intimate friends and allies, the Clericals and Ultramontanes.] “This history of Bohemia shortly before and after the battle of the White Mountain is well known, and so are the statesmen and military commanders who lent their aid to the Emperor and his Jesuits in the destruction of Bohemian independence, and in the sanguinary ‘Reformation’ that followed, as well as the intrigues of the Centralistic-Ultramontane Court party in Vienna, and in the vengeance which they wreaked and the rewards which they received. People remember the wholesale executions of those who were the guardians and administrators of Bohemian autonomy, the dragonnades under the guidance of the Jesuits which were intended to drive the Czechs, aristocracy, bourgeoisie, and peasantry within the pale of the One True Church, and, finally, the enormous confiscations by which the Imperial Treasury acquired 642 estates during the year in which the battle occurred. The Emperor, it is true, had occasional intervals of a milder temper, but was again and again persuaded to take violent measures by the bigoted hatred of his Jesuit confessor and of the Papal Legate, and to at least an equal degree by the covetousness of officials of high position, who were actually promised a large share of the confiscated property. Even Czechs, who had been guilty of no offence, were robbed of their estates on all sorts of pretexts. Almost all the landed aristocracy lost half their property, and many, including the wealthiest, their entire estates through the Commissions that were appointed by the Emperor in 1622 to raise the amount that had been expended in consequence of the insurrection.