on December 22, the booming of cannon told that the president's
train was drawing in at the station, the hundred thousand people who
had poured into the city of Prague were massed on every side to welcome
him and sang, as only the Slavs can sing, their national song.

Soon President Masaryk's train, with its engine elaborately decorated,
steamed in through the silent crowd. In complete silence, Masaryk,
gray-haired and distinguished appearing, left the train and entered the
station. There he saw groups of Czecho-Slovaks in French uniforms,
some wearing the war cross, and groups who had been fighting in the
Italian Alps. He saw also a group of university professors who had
come to honor him.

In the tense silence, one of the leaders of the new republic came
forward. He had for years conspired and worked with Masaryk for the
freedom of their country, and now he greeted him by throwing his arms
about him. After a further greeting from the government officials, and
from the nation's aged and honored poet, Masaryk gave a brief speech
telling of his hopes for the republic. He then passed out to the crowd
who hailed him in a tumult of joy. One who witnessed Masaryk's return
pictures the scenes on the way to the government buildings.

"There began a triumphal procession which took two hours to arrive at
the Parliament house. Every window, every balcony and every roof was
filled to overflowing, and every street lined on either side, twenty
deep. All this multitude, most of whom had been standing for hours,
had such joy written on their faces as has never before been seen and
cannot possibly be described. Elders were holding children on their
shoulders, all eyes were full of tears, all eyes smiling. The people
kissed the flags of the Allies as they would kiss their babies.

"Since the proclamation, all the young ladies of Prague have taken to
the fashion of peasant costumes, and several members of Parliament wore
the old national dress. Searchlights playing on the spires and
steeples of this most beautiful Slav city now again touch the great
castle, henceforth the seat of government, where hundreds of windows
are ablaze with lights, the first rejoicing it has known for three
hundred years."

For three hundred years the peasants of Bohemia together with Slovakia
which, with some smaller provinces, is now called Czecho-Slovakia, had
tried every means to free themselves from Austria. On the north and
west were