Welsh Journals

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•• A R1ANA" — pronounced as a Welshman would pronounce it-is a word that is destint;d to become known in every town throughout the world. It is the name of a public park in Geneva, and in this park will rise the new buildings of the Secretariat and of the Assembly Hall, buildings which will be the joint property of over fifty nations. And there, too, will be placed the International Library for whose. structure and upkeep Mr. John D. Rockefeller has made provision to the extent of £ 400,000. And how came the park by so euphonius a name? One Gustave Revilliod, a citizen of no mean city, tra- veller, writer, poet, made Geneva his debtor by a gift of a museum and of a fine open space which he desired should be called Ariana. Revilliod, who died in 1890, bequeathed to posterity not only the treasures which it had taken him a life- time to collect but also a letter. In this letter, to be read by those who came after him, he wrote "Ariana bears the name of her to whom it is dedi- cated, Ariane de la Rive, my dear mother, who died in 1876 at 85 years of age." Then, after a reference to the museum he goes on to say—"The present year is beautiful, rich in all its harvests, allowing the poor to live without privations. But the days are sad. The decadence of old institu- tions is leading us at a great pace towards ruin. He who writes hopes, without daring to believe it, that those who follow in the world will arrive at a better future, a future prosperous for them, for Geneva and for my well-beloved Switzerland. God grant that she may be happy and flourish." Little did the apprehensive Gustave Revilliod think that his prayer would be more than an- swered and in a way of which he did not dream. "Saffa" is not so attractive a word as "Ari- ana" it is just a manufactured article of initials like "Copec" was. But the thing it represents has been one of the greatest attractions ever ar- ranged in Switzerland. Every Swiss, man, woman and child, must have heard of Saffa. Thousands went by "excursion" from all parts of the country to see Saffa at Berne and no news- paper in the land could afford to neglect so com- pelling a national feature. Many people from other countries, including some from Wales, also looked in upon Saffa. It was an exhibition oh a nation-wide scale of the work done by the women of Switzerland-a revelation of what Swiss women can do and are doing for their country and generation. I have no doubt that if the "Women's Institutes"-a most vigorous social movement in our midst-were to decide upon a Welsh National Exhibition of women's work they might rival Saffa, WALES AND THE WORLD by Rev. Gwilym Davies, M.A. Under the sign of the League of Nations at Prague, in the second week of October, was held the first Congress of Popular Arts. Folk-lore has, at last, won international recognition folk-songs and folk-dances the fostering care of the Institute of Intellectual Co-operation. More than 200 re- ports were harvested by the officers of the Insti- tute for examination by the experts gathered from many countries-reports touching upon so extensive and so fascinating a field, as for exam- ple, "Architecture amongst the Maoris," "The popular art of building houses of wood in Slova- kia," "The furniture and the implements of Japanese peasantry," and "The painting of East- er eggs in Rumania." Some timid friends of the League of Nations have been a little doubtful of the usefulness and as little nervous of so intense- ly national and particularistic a project as that of the Congress of Popular Arts at Prague. They have no eyes to see that what matters a good deal in the quest for world co-operation in that the peoples get to understand one another's ways and to sing one another's songs. The Prague Con- gress, with its heart in the local and its emphasis on the homely things of life, has made a substan- tial contribution to the new technique of Peace. In the Carnegie Palace at the Hague, M. C. Ter Meulen, the librarian, zealously guards a pamphlet in Welsh, published long ago by Spur- rell of Carmarthen. It is a translation by Silfan Evans of an essay by Grotius. This Welsh pamphlet forms part of an imposing collection of translations which testify to the widespread influ- ence of him who is the pride of the Netherlands. I was thinking of this pamphlet the other day in connection with the centenary of Tolstoy, who has been annexed by the Soviet Government with, as governments say of treaties, reservations. It is reported that M. Lunacharsky-who at first sight might easily be mistaken for a particularly well- dressed member of the French Chamber of Dep- uties-in his office as head of the Soviet Educa- tion Department, has circularised the masters of the primary and secondary schools on how to ex- plain Tolstoy to their pupils. The teachers are to make clear that Tolstoy never understood the workers' movement and they must not spare themselves in condemnation of his doctrine of non-resistance as "reactionary and Utopian." That done, the Soviet Government has to its cred- it a most thoroughgoing scheme for a first-rate centenary. The Moscow Museum of Fine Arts, in its exhibition, can boast of 41 portraits, 33 statutes and busts, together with the copies of Tolstoy's work seized by the Tsarist police. Last- ly, there is a collection of 2,000 volumes in 37