The Bells of St. Stephen's

The bells of St. Stephen's were pealing again, in homage to the holy season. From the soaring spire of Vienna's beautiful old cathedral they rang out the hopes and fears of hard-pressed little Austria--and they spoke, too, with a solemn undertone for all the Western world.

St. Stephen's has been a Western watchtower down the centuries. Eight hundred years ago it rose near the site of a Roman fort on the barbarian frontier. Three hundred years ago it looked out on the Turkish horde sweeping in from the East. During the siege of 1683, Vienna's resolute commander Count Ernst Riidiger Starhemberg climbed to the highest perch in the Gothic steeple, fired rockets of distress, at last spied the armies of Poland's Jan Sobieski and other allies marching to the city's relief. The Turks were beaten back, and the bells of St. Stephen's intoned free and joyous thanks.

From the Spire. Last week, as Viennese again mounted the 343 precarious steps to the observation platform just above the lookout of 1683, they still talked about "the Turks," but they meant the Russians. From St. Stephen's, on a clear day, Viennese could see the Red Hungarian border, 40 miles away. They knew it was strung with barbed wire, studded with police stations--as ominous as the camels and the silken tents of the 17h Century Turks.

In their own city, almost five years after World War II, the Viennese still chafed under Allied occupation. The British and Americans would have pulled out long ago, but the Russians would not agree to a peace settlement, save on Russian terms. The Viennese made sad jokes about their situation. Said one comic in a small theater off the Kaerntnerstrasse: "Those Turks, they weren't so bad. Then, we had allies to help us drive away the Turks. Now our Allies are here. Who's going to help us drive out the Allies?"

From the Yanks. So far, the Russians have made no major move to take Austria; they are biding their time. With U.S. aid, Vienna has achieved a fitful glow of prosperity, which includes even the traditional rich blobs of Schlagobers (whipped cream) floating on Vienna's coffee. But what delighted Viennese stomachs most during the holiday season were fat geese and pungent salamis imported from Austria's Eastern European neighbors. The Russians are hoping that, when the U.S. ECAid ends in 1952, need to trade with Communist Eastern Europe will pull Austria inexorably into the Red sphere.

For the 45,000 Red armymen in the Russian zone of occupation, the anti-Communist Viennese have only hatred and fear. For the 10,000 easygoing, sometimes ill-mannered American G.I.s, Viennese have a kind of cultural scorn--and a cultural weakness. Such Yank idioms as "50-50," "yam [i.e., jam] session" and "get a bissel [i.e., a little] in the mood" have crept into the Viennese vernacular. Fruit juices, powdered coffee and Coca-Cola from American PXs are standard in the Viennese way of life. Austrian counterparts of American bobby-soxers are singing such ditties as Kaugummi oder Ich muss den Johnny kiissen:

I must kiss Johnny because he is chewing gum.

Sometimes it tastes like lemon, sometimes like melon or hazelnut, and then like peppermint.

One sticks to this kind of kissing, and how!

From the Ruins. Viennese have stuck to their love of the city's glorious monuments, and they are slowly rebuilding them. Above all comes the restoration of their Alten Steffel, or Old Steve, whose marble floor many a citizen kissed during holiday services.

In 1945's fire, which the Nazis set before they moved out, the cathedral's heavy larch roof and its covering of multicolored tiles collapsed into the nave. Since then, Viennese have donated 15 million schillings (about $570,000) to restore the cathedral, but St. Stephen's still needs 250,000 tiles to complete its new roof; by last week the church had money enough for only 40,000. In a tiny hut in St. Stephen's Square, donors could buy one tile for five schillings (about 19-c- and Theodor Cardinal Innitzer pleaded with Viennese to help clothe their "oldest citizen."

The oldest citizen's future was undoubtedly precarious; but Vienna (and all the West) could take some cheer and comfort from the fact that the bells of St. Stephen's were still there to ring in the new year.

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