EASTERN NATIONALISM.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 617, 21 September 1909, Page 5

EASTERN NATIONALISM.

'. .GENEVA THE NEW MECCA. ' :<Bj .TclcEtapli.-l'rcM Assoclollrm.-Coprrlsht.) ' ■■ .■;:':.' London; September 19. ' The newspaper "Bande Mataram," which was.suppressed in Calcutta a short time ago, has reappeared in a new form at' Geneva (tho scene of tho recent gathering of Egyptian Nationalists).' ■ ; ~.:,'.,. Tho paper pays a tribute to Dhingra,' tho Indian, student who'was lately executed for ■the murder of Sir Curzon Wyliie' and Dr. Lalcaca, and bitterly denounces, tho'moderato members of the Indian National Congress. V.-.;■,.■ : 'A POLICE ERROR. '■• , I ' Calcutta, September 19. ', The police | at Calcutta now attribute. the recent damage to. a train, rear tho capital, by which the roof of a van was knocked off, not to a bomb, but to the fouling of-the, van by heavy ' maohinery at a crossing.' ■: . ' •.•- ; '.'•, [Geneva has witnessed the' birth of many great movements, and has harboured many great men;, but as the, Mecca of a striving Oriental nationalism the old 1 Swiss town enters a new sphere. In its time/Geneva has produced .or adopted' many learned men of the West, including Calvin, Beza, Cranmer, Lesagc, Snussure, de Luc, Lefort, Ncckar, and Jean Jacques Rousseau.- John Knox, tho Scottish reformer, was long a resident there. From its connection with Calvin' Geneva was termed the Rome of Calvinism. An insurrection in 1781 ultimately drove many Genevese to Ireland and England. Prom tho Goneva Convention sprang the Red Cross organisation. The Alabama arbitration commission met there. A few days ago the Egyptian Nationalists and their English- Labour sympathisers gathered there and invited Britain to quit Egypt; and now the Indian "Bande Mataram" ("Hail, Motherland") has been resuscitated on Genevese soil. In:the time of Caesar Geneva was already ono of the. chief towns of the Allobrogea. Apropos Calvinism, a recent announcement states:, "In Calvin's city, whore, the commemoration'of the 400 th anniversary of his birth was held, his followers are now, by the irony of hislory, in' a minority. Tho last official census of Geneva showed that the Catholics outnumbered the Cnlvinists by several thousands. The change is said to bo due to the oxtensive building operations during tho Inst twenty years. The Italians nro ;tho best joiners anil masons;'they have crime in thousands, and ihiiny of them havo become permanent resir dents."!'