Sternegg, for instance, deplored the fact that the empire should have recourse to the “Verkehrsprache” test for political purposes. On this ground Austrian official figures should be scrutinized with extreme caution. It has repeatedly been proven by private census-takers that the official census is unreliable, and that it grossly underestimates the numerical strength of the Bohemians. From an agricultural state, that it was until recently, Bohemia is rapidly changing into an industrial state. Two of the most valuable products, which make for the wealth of industrial countries, namely, coal and iron, the hills of Bohemia contain in abundance. Among her specialties, which have acquired world-wide renown, are decorated and engraved glassware, beer (Pilsener), high-class cotton textiles and linen goods, grass seeds, embroidery, hops, fezzes worn by the Mohammedan people of the Orient, toys, etc.
From times immemorial, Bohemia has been the battle-ground between the Slav and the Teuton. A glance at the map of Central Europe will tell the story. Most westerly of all the Slavic peoples, the Bohemians are surrounded on the north, west, and sonth by Germans. Only on the south and east frontiers are there strips of territory that connect them with kindred races. More than once the Germanic sea has threatened to engulf them in the
