English Translation

.y - 2 - After the appearance of the President, who was greeted by the public without application of the German greeting, only by raising from the squares, where he also thanked only with slight bendings, Minister Moravec gave a speech, which was pursued by the audience without particular inner sympathy and to close after the apse, rather than a "academic festive speech". An embarrassing situation arose from the fact that after the Minister's speech a part of the audience rose from the seats, as according to the program sequence the hymns were played while the larger part remained seated. This situation was evoked by the conduct of the conductor Prof. Jirát, who did not,/before, invite him to take up his place in the orchestra room during the re- de the minister, in order to use the hymns immediately after the end of the speech, but only appeared after Minister Moravec had left the speaker's desk in order for the embarrassing situation to remain idle on the podium for minutes. The opinion was expressed in various ways that Jirát could only have done so consciously in order to disturb the positive impression of the audience, which may be caused by the smooth running of the event. The anthems were heard standing all the way with raised right hand, where, however, many Czechs with their fingers squealed or with their hand almost clenched to their fists only slightly bent their arm. The pieces of Beethoven and Wagner brought by the orchestra to the lecture - played the "Eroica" and the preludes to "Tristan and Isolde" and to the "Meistersingeren" - lacked any momentum and any passion. According to several opinions, this performance did not represent a special performance, which is consistently attributed to the conductor. The festive performance of the "Freischütz" at the National Theatre in Prague took a dignified course, which still contributed significantly to the fact that most of the listeners appeared in evening dresses contrary to the other customs. The audience also offered the same picture as in the Smetana Hall; only the proportion of government troops and government police might have been even greater.