Europe—whither bound? (Quo vadis Europa?) : $b being letters of travel from the capitals of Europe in the year 1921Graham, Stephen
History
Europe—whither bound? (Quo vadis Europa?) : $b being letters of travel from the capitals of Europe in the year 1921
Graham, Stephen
Europe -- Description and travel
As regards Belgrade, when prosperity returns we may see the growth of a
fine new city, not a complete town-planned Austrian city, supplied as
it were whole and in every part from a department store, but something
expressive of a new people. All these buildings we look upon to-day
are bound to pass into obscurity. The rising pillars of the
Skupstchina, Serbia's new Parliament House at the foot of Kossovo
Street, point to the future of some great new State.
The Croats say "When you go to Zagreb you will see the difference. Ah,
there is a city; there is civilization." They kiss their hands to show
what they mean. The Croats are Home Rulers. Like the Irish, they are
Catholics. Some of them look forward to the transfer of the capital to
Zagreb, and the changing of the letters of the kingdom to H.S.S. and
putting Hrvats first. Croats insist on the title Jugo-Slavia; Serbs
are inclined to drop it and revert to the name Serbia. The Germans
during the war are said to have promised the Croats to form the German
counterpart of the Allies' idea of Jugo-Slavia, and had Germany and
Austria won, a new constituent of Central Europe was to have been
inaugurated with its capital of Zagreb. The name Jugo-Slavia was
familiar to the Croats and popular with them before the Serbs adopted
it. The Croats think that because they are more educated than the
Serbs they should be the dominant party in the government of the new
State. The quarrel is aggravated by religious difference, Croats being
Roman Catholics and Serbs Orthodox. A number of the separatist
leaders, the chief of whom is Radic, an ex-bookseller, languish in
gaol. These are evidently self-centred people. If they think that
Europe would tolerate another independent Slav State with passports,
frontiers, tariffs, armies, and the rest, surely they are mad. And if
on the other hand, they would like to revert to ruined Austria and have
the value of all their money reduced ten times, surely they are not
very sane. Or if they think that they who suffered little should reap
the major benefits of the war-victory, they are certainly pitiable
egoists.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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