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
Every one blames some one else in this part of the world. There are
bugs in the railway-carriages--the German soldiers brought them; they
were not there before. The trains go slowly--the Hungarian engine
drivers have ruined all the locomotives by making big fires with little
water in the boilers; contractors seem to take bribes--these are
Hungarians, "They'd sell their souls for a dinar." "Look, look," says
a Magyar officer, pointing to the dirt on Subotitsa station. "You
never could see that in the old days. I used to be here with my
regiment. It was as pretty and clean a place as you could find in
Hungary."
Nearing the frontier you pass in review a very sad sight, and that is,
several hundred locomotives rusted to their very depths and eaten out
with bad weather and neglect. "These are the locomotives we
surrendered to the Serbs after the Armistice," says a Hungarian. "The
Serbs could not use them. They have no engineers--no shops for their
repair. We wouldn't have minded if the engines were used, but it makes
us sick to think of such waste."
On the other hand, perhaps, the Hungarians in their malice surrendered
the engines with their boilers burnt out and with other vital defects.
One side or the other, or both, is to blame. But whatever the judgment
might be, the engines remain in their rust--these useful iron servants
of humanity have perished. They are symbols of a spoliatory peace.
Serbia discourages travel to Hungary. Hungary for her part bristles
with spears. Above the passport window on the Danube quay at Budapest
you read:
I BELIEVE IN ONE GOD.
I BELIEVE IN GOD'S ETERNAL JUSTICE.
I BELIEVE IN THE RESURRECTION OF HUNGARY.
--a dangerous creed.
Dr. M----, first assistant at the University of Vienna, now made a
Czech subject against his will, put the matter well: "Bismarck was a
man of genius, but he made a great mistake in taking Alsace and
Lorraine. And Clemenceau was a great man, greater for instance than
Lloyd George; I treated him for twelve years, I know his character
well, but he outdid Bismarck by making a whole series of
Alsace-Lorraines in Europe. It means a century of wars to put it
right."
"There would be war now," said Von K----, an ex-Captain of the 3rd
Hussars. "But we shudder to take the responsibility of plunging Europe
once more into the bath of blood."
The 3rd Hussars is called the Dead Regiment now. It was reduced to
five officers and a hundred and thirty-seven men in the war. It was
resolved not to recruit for it again, but to leave it as it was left,
and it paraded before the King at Budapest in its original formation,
showing all the gaps. "It was tremendously impressive," said the
Captain--"one man here, two there, three only on the right wing. Many
of us who had come through all that hell with dry eyes wept like
children in the parade.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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