New Constitution

In the final drafting stage last week was a new Czechoslovak Constitution which will shortly federalize the Republic, centring legislative power at Prague in a National Assembly and a Senate.

Bohemia, the Czech part of the Republic, will have 140 seats in the Assembly, Slovakia 50, Ruthenia ten. In the Senate the three States will have equal strength, eight seats each. A hyphen will probably be inserted into Czechoslovakia, making it "CzechoSlovakia" according to Prague dispatches, but the Ruthenians want the Republic's name changed to "The State of Czechs, Slovaks and Ruthenians." Other proposed names with important backing this week: "Western Slavia"; "Central Slavia"; "Slavia."

It was solely as "Professor Eduard Benes" that the surviving Founder of Czechoslovakia last week went with Mme Benes to the Prague airport. No Czechoslovak official higher than a passport inspector was present to say good-by as the ex-President and Mrs. Benes took off for England, whence in a few weeks he sails to become Professor Benes of the University of Chicago.

Cabled the Prague correspondent of the New York Times: "The Czechs are not sentimentalists. People of various classes questioned about his [Dr. Benes'] departure answered with apparent indifference. 'He was not successful in defending us against German aggression,' one man said. 'We must now follow the German line. The Germans hate him, so he must go.' "

Little Entente. One bulwark erected by Dr. Benes when he was "Europe's Smartest Little Statesman" had not collapsed last week, the Little Entente of Czechoslovakia, Rumania and Yugoslavia.

The British recently have sent confidential emissaries to King Carol and next month His Majesty will make a State visit to King George. Last week Rumania and Yugoslavia were exerting pressure on their neighbor Hungary to keep her from grabbing such a great slice of Slovakia & Ruthenia as would pinch off the whole eastern end of Czechoslovakia. This would give Hungary and Poland a common frontier, would mean that Rumania and Czechoslovakia would no longer be adjoining States.

To Galatz, Rumania, from Warsaw suddenly traveled Polish Foreign Minister Colonel Josef Beck seeking audience with King Carol to urge Hungary's claims. He was received coldly. Soon afterward His Majesty and Premier Patriarch Miron Cristea let the Rumanian censorship pass news that the Pole "achieved nothing that he had sought."

After Colonel Beck's return to Warsaw there were hints in the Polish press that King Carol had threatened to move troops in defense of Czechoslovakia in case Hungary should try to take what she wanted by force. King Carol with a characteristic flourish announced he had been "deeply touched" by a petition from 50,000 Rumanians of Ruthenian blood who begged His Majesty not to let Hungary have Ruthenia.

Indignation in Budapest was such that 100,000 Hungarians milled about in one demonstration shouting "Give us arms!" Regent Horthy made a military inspection tour of the Hungarian-Czechoslovak frontier. Adolf Hitler, who had been expected by Regent Horthy to support the full claims of Hungary, continued the policy launched fortnight ago of insisting on a settlement by direct negotiation between Prague and Budapest. Originally the Hungarians demanded 8,000 square miles and the Czechoslovaks offered zero square miles with a promise of autonomy for the Hungarian minority in Czechoslovakia.

By last week Hungary was demanding exactly 5,091.5 square miles and Czechoslovakia, whose first three offers had been rejected, made a fourth of exactly 2,818.5 square miles. In Hungarian Army circles there were rumors that Regent Horthy was "resolved to march" if, within 48 hours, Hungary had not been given all she asked, and Budapest heard that Poland would "march" if Hungary marched. On a smaller scale a new Central European war scare began to reproduce that before Munich. In Warsaw however the official Government spokesman branded "false" the rumors about a Polish "march," insisted that Poland desired peaceful solution of the Hungarian question, added he did not think Budapest had sent any ultimatum to Prague. The Hungarian Government finally announced this week that a fifth Czechoslovak offer "not acceptable in its present form" had been received, that "negotiation will be continued through regular diplomatic channels." There was still danger that Hungarian Army hotheads might get out of control, but none of the Great Powers appeared scared, not even the British, and it was announced that King Carol will make his State visit to King George on November 1.

Back to Business. Meanwhile freight service on the Elbe and Danube was resumed last week between Czechoslovakia and countries trading with her. The Syrovy Cabinet announced at Prague that on top of the Bank of England credit to Czechoslovakia of $50,000,000 which Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain opened on his return from Munich, London bankers are now speeding further large loans to the Republic. In spite of bitterness, the tough little State was righting itself.

Suicides among German refugees from Sudetenland and Austria increased in Prague meanwhile, and the German Social Democrat paper Prager Mittag said it was going out of business rather than begin "to damn what the Mittag formerly praised and praise what it formerly condemned. The world that the Prager Mittag loved and in which it breathed and labored exists no more."

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