Page:The Bohemian Review, vol2, 1918.djvu/27

Rh deed in this matter of agricultural prosperity.

Other products of the farm show a much higher yield in Bohemia than in the rest of Austria. Bohemia raises 1,301,626 quintals of cabbage, 60,000 quintals of flax fiber, 208,577 quintals of peas, 32,475,385 quintals of potatoes, etc. Bohemian fruit has been famous all over Europe ever since the 18th century; it is exported in enormous quantities into Germany, and in the present war especially Bohemia has been virtually deprived of its entire fruit crop for the benefit of Germany. Both the soil and the climate of Bohemia are unusually favorable to the culture of fruit trees of all species grown in the temperate climes. In 1910 14,686,223 fruit trees gave a crop of 2,744,820 quintals of excellent fruit. As early as the 16th century a chronicler says: “In the Bohemian lands there is much fruit and fine wine and other products of the soil, so that the Bohemian lands are known as the granary of Germania.”

In cattle raising, as well as in field and fruit culture, the Bohemian lands take the first place among the provinces of Austria, although cattle raising is the principal industry of the Alpine (German) provinces. The last census gives the number of horses in Austria as 1,752,848; of that the Bohemian lands had 463,167 or just about their rightful proportion. In sheep raising the lands of the Bohemian crown fall slightly below the quota which they should have for their area. Of 3,684,879 sheep in Austria they had 823,478, falling short by about one hundred thousand of their percentage. But then most of the sheep are raised on the poor land of southern Austria; Bohemian soil is too valuable for this industry. There were in Austria in 1910 6,423,080 pigs, and of that number the Bohemian lands had 1,790,020, about two hundred thousand more than their proportion. Still better showing is made by Bohemia in that most important branch of agriculture, cattle raising. Whereas the total of cattle for all Austria was 9,160,009 head the Czech lands had 3,188,291 head of the finest breeds, almost a million over the number which they should have in proportion to their area. In Denmark, the model cattle-raising country, there are 46 head of cattle to a square kilometer; Austria without the Bohemian lands has 27, and the Bohemian lands have 41.7, a remarkably good showing, when it is remembered that Denmark raises little grain, while Bohemia is both a grain growing and cattle raising country.

Without the agricultural riches of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia the Austrian monarchy would cease to be a Great Power, and without the food raised in Bohemia and confiscated by Austrian authorities Germany would have been compelled by hunger long ago to capitulate.

During the modern period the development of literature in Bohemia got a start far ahead of the other arts. After Kollar’s “Slávy Dcera” (Slavia’s Daughter) in 1824 and Čelakovský’s “Ohlas Písní Ruských” (Echo of Russian Songs) in 1829 we get suddenly in 1836 the wonderful “Máj” of Mácha, by which the recently born Czech poetry came at a bound into contact with the most modern currents of the world poetry. As against that, the decorative arts and music had to wait a good many years longer. Bedřich Smetana, founder of modern Bohemian music, composed as early as 1847, upon the occasion of the marriage of his pupil, Countess Marie Thun, three “Wedding Pictures”, of which the last is identical with the opening part of the first scene of the “The Bartered Bride”; but the last-named work, one of the most distinctively national products of Bohemian art, took shape only in the years 1863-1866. And in like manner, the lifework of Mánes, the first fruits of which was the portrait of Rieger in 1849 and the delightful “Honeymoon in Haná”, was given forth in its full bloom only some years later. But fate was so far favorable to Bohemian art that it gave to all branches pioneers of genius who reached in their creations the very highest standards and brought the art of the Czech nation to a wonderfully elevated stage.

As Smetana reached by his study of the spirit of folk songs a type of Bohemian mu-