"Now we are able to keep up a Bohemian school in the 8th ward." With these words the Bohemian school started, being supported by the Ladies' Educational Club Calliope.

Why are we able "now"? Have we not in Chicago 35,000 Bohemians, half of them liberal thinkers? Have not the Catholics fourteen schools, six Bohemian and eight English? Have not the Catholics two Bohemian and three English in the 8th ward? There are fewer Catholic Bohemians than liberal thinkers. Are the liberal thinkers worse than the Catholics?

There are in Chicago fifty-two liberal thinking societies with more than 6,000 members. This entire community has one English-Bohemian free liberal school supported by the Czecho-Slovak Pilzen Sokol. This school is frequented by seventy to ninety boys and girls, which makes one pupil to 2every seventy to eighty members of the societies. The 8th ward alone can be proud of eighteen societies, two national halls, but not a single school. Eighteen societies should certainly be able to support more than one school. Would they unite and work uniformly for the general progress. Would the purpose of the society Calliope be fulfilled, i. e., would all Bohemian liberal thinking societies be united for the purpose of maintaining and keeping up the Bohemian schools? It would be wholly possible to have one Bohemian school in every part of the city, no matter if it were an every day or a Sunday school. It would be necessary to make only a little sacrifice on the part of each society, and the future of the Bohemian population in Chicago would be protected.

Let us consider that we have here the Bohemian theater. How can we understand the theater if we don't know the Bohemian language? It is impossible to know the virtues of our theater if we have no school where we can learn the Bohemian language. How can we expect the boys and girls to frequent the Bohemian theater when we neglect to implant love for the mother language in the delicate hearts of our children?

The theater is a temple of knowledge, where each race learns to recognize itself. How can we learn about things that our race has accomplished without knowing the Bohemian language? Now that the public school vacations have begun, the society Calliope opened a school in the headquarters of the Bohemian-American Sokol. The school rooms at the headquarters of this organization would qualify better for any other purpose than for the school. It is too bad but it seems that the serious obligations of the enterprise are too great for such a new society, especially when we consider that it is one of the poorest societies, financially, in Chicago. This school, in spite of its handicaps, should be morally supported by parents who have high patriotic feelings. They should send their children to it. At present there are forty-one pupils of both sexes in active attendance.

Miss Klara Rottova accepted the duties of teaching, which she is performing with sacrifice and magnanimity, overcoming innumerable obstacles and fulfilling her obligations to the satisfaction of the school committee of the society and of the parents.

Now we are appealing to all patriotic clubs and societies to act jointly and to remove all obstacles in the great problem of maintaining the Bohemian schools, and the future of the Bohemian population in Chicago. In unity there is life, in division there is death.