Salt Lake Tribune | 1918-12-20 | Page 15 | Slovaks Laud Wilson's Work

SLOVAKS LAUD WILSGfS WORK Recently Liberated People" Praise President as Their Savior. By HAROLD WILLIAMS. (New York Times-Chicago Tribune Cable. Copyright.) BERNE, Dec. 19. It Is a relief to return re-turn from watching the gloomy developments develop-ments in defeated Germany and to sea the joy of the liberated peoples that are now founding new states amid the ruins of the central empires. There are the Slovaks, for Instance, that people of peasants and snepherds in the hill country of northern Hungary, who, after maintaining their nationality intact throughout 1000 years of Magyar rule, now find themselves liberated as by a miracle and united to their Czech kinsmen of Bohemia and Moravia in a free Czecho-Slovak republic. One great meeting was held at the end of November In the town of Lucerne, in Novoprad province, north of Budapest, to which peasants went crowding from all parts of the province. A resolution was adopted adopt-ed unanimously, expressing joy at their liberation 0114 at their union vith the Czccho-SIovak state, and adding: "We bow low before the noble spirit of President Wilson and jvill call God's blessing upon him in our dally prayers. ' The greater part 01 tne people ot me upper Novoprad suffer terribly under the opprcssin of the proprietors of the great estates, and wo demand that our people be freed as soon as possible from that ! yoke and that the big estates be speedily broken up in a legal way." ! The meeting elected delegates to the : Slovak national council. A peasant ! speaker benn his speech by saying: "This is the day which the Lord hath I made." and all tho people responded : "We will rejoice and be glad in it." Then j the people shouted: "Glory to our noble 1 liberator, Wilson!" and with bared heads ! they sang the national song, 'Xej Slo-vac." Slo-vac." Similar happy meetings are helng held in many little towns and villages between be-tween Pressburg and Ungvar. One village vil-lage reports: "It was our prisoners returned from Russia who acknowledged to us the great j happenings in the world." 1 There has naturally been a certain ! amount of trouble and confusion. Mag-i Mag-i yars and Magyarized Slovak officials have I intrigued vigorously and scattered thou-I thou-I sands of Magyar troops who have com-I com-I mitted acts of violence. At Kperjes, under the shadow of the eastern Carpathians, a rival national council had formed by individuals who never fought for the Slovak cause, and it has proclaimed an independent Slovak republic, separate from Bohemia, on the ground that the Slovak language differs from tbe Czechs', very much as the Ukranian does from the Russian or broad Scotch from London Pnglish. But, as Professor Mayarsk is fond of saying, "You cannot found a state on dialect," and the movement had slight success. When the inhabitants of the. district very near Eperjes were called on to send representatives to this new council, they scornfully rejected the offer and stoutly declared for the Turin national council and for the Czecho-Slovak republic. In any case, the chief danger is now removed by a remarkable communication made on December 3, in the name of the entente, hy the French colonel at Budapest Buda-pest to Karolyl and to Hodza. tho Czechoslovak Czecho-slovak representative. This declaration empowers Czecho-Slovak troops, as allies, al-lies, to occupy the Slovak country in the name of the entente under the terms ot the armistice, and orders the immediate withdrawal of Magyar troops from tho country.