CHAPTER VIII.

“MY DEAR CHRISTIANS!”

For Vienna the last day of this year was a holiday unparalleled in the history of that gay and carefree city. By mobilizing all means of transportation, by borrowing locomotives from neighboring countries, and by interrupting all other traffic the authorities had succeeded on that day in sending out the last Jews, in thirty enormous trains. In the forenoon the directors and high officials of the great banks went away, at noon the Jewish journalists and their families. They had stayed to the last second, had composed and edited the evening papers, and had let the new masters take possession of the editorial rooms only after the damp sheets had begun to fly out from the whirling presses. Most of the Viennese journalists had found positions on papers in Germany proper, or on German papers in Czechoslovakia; many were emigrating to America; and a few had decided to turn to other professions.--However, the publisher of the great _Weltpresse_, together with a small staff of collaborators, was moving to London, where he intended to publish a German weekly, to be called _Im Exil_, which would concern itself primarily with Austria.

At one o’clock in the afternoon whistles proclaimed that the last trainload of Jews had left Vienna, and at six o’clock in the evening all the church bells rang to announce that there were no more Jews in all Austria.

Then Vienna began to celebrate its great festival of emancipation. Red and white striped flags fluttered over a hundred thousand roofs, all the shops were decorated with these colors, Japanese lanterns burned before every window. On this frosty starlit night a million people walked over the creaking snow to form processions. Men, women, and children carried lanterns, the various district parades were headed by bands, loud rejoicing filled the air, and again and again there resounded the cry: “Long Live Christian Vienna!”

All the parades met at the City Hall. Fairy-like in its splendor, Meister Schmidt’s beautiful Gothic building shone as one enormous flame, fed by millions of electric lamps. On a platform the peerless Viennese Philharmonic Orchestra,--purged of Jews, and therefore somewhat diminished in numbers,--played popular airs, while the Male Choir of Vienna sang its best songs. The People’s Hall, the large space before the City Hall, and the Ring from the Schottentor to the Bellaria formed a solid human wall. And at eight o’clock it was no longer a cry, but a howl that rose again and again from a million throats and shook the air.

At last the great moment came. On the balcony appeared Mayor Karl Maria Laberl with Chancellor Schwertfeger. With his powerful voice, audible even at the opposite end of the square, the Chancellor began to speak--briefly, coolly, but all the more effectively:

“Fellow-citizens, a gigantic task has been completed. Everyone who is not Austrian at heart has left the territory of our small but beautiful country. Now we are alone, a single family; henceforth we must depend on ourselves and our own peculiar qualities--with our own power will we now reorganize our clean house, will we brace up decaying walls and build up falling foundations. Citizens of Vienna and of our entire country! Today we are celebrating a holiday the like of which has never been seen before. Tomorrow marks the beginning of a new year, and of new life for all of us. Tomorrow we may still lean back and meditate. But then we must work as we never worked before. We must dedicate all our ability to our country--we must make the most of every hour. We must show all the world that Austria can live without the Jews. Nay, more--we must show that we will recover because we have removed the foreign element from our organism. In this solemn hour, fellow-citizens, you must promise me faithfully that we will no longer live only for today and its pleasures, but that we will work, work, and do nothing but work until the fruits of our labors have matured.”

“We promise!” roared the crowd; strangers shook each other’s hands, men and women wept and laughed in one another’s arms, someone sounded the new national hymn and was joined by the entire chorus. And then, spontaneously, there rose as from one throat the cheer: “Hail our Dr. Schwertfeger, the liberator of Austria!”

When the joyful shouting had subsided a little, Mayor Karl Maria Laberl finally had an opportunity to say something. He began his speech with the words:

“My dear Christians!...”

But the crowd did not hear much more, for the warm southwind that had been blowing through the previously ice-cold night was now followed by a shower. Screaming and shrieking, the mob dispersed, to hurry to the tramway lines through a sea of slush and melted snow.

PART TWO