The essence of Austria is not the center but the periphery

Of course, it is the Slovenes, the Polish and Ruthenian Galicians, the caftan Jews from Boryslaw, the horse traders from Bacska, the Muslims from Sarajevo, the Maroni crickets from Mostar who sing our national anthem 'Gott Erhalte.' But the German students from Brunn and Eger, the dentists, pharmacists, hairdresser's assistants, art photographers from Linz, Graz, Knittelfeld, the goiters from the Alpine valleys, they all sing 'Die Wacht am Rhein.' Austria will perish for this loyalty to the Nibelung, gentlemen! The essence of Austria is not the center but the periphery. Austria is not to be found in the Alps, where you find chamois, edelweiss, and gentians, but hardly any trace of a double eagle.

J. Roth, The Emperor's Tomb (1938), loc. 168

They were refugees. We know them as "the peril from the East."

They were refugees. We know them as "the peril from the East." Fear of pogroms has welded them together like a landslip of unhappiness and grime that, slowly gathering volume, has come rolling across Germany from the East. A few clumps of them have come to rest for the time being in the East End of Berlin. A small minority of them are young and healthy, like Geza Furst, the born cabin boy. Mostly they are old and frail, if not broken.

J. Roth, 'Refugees from the East (1920)', tr. M. Hofmann, What I saw: reports from Berlin 1920-33 (2006), 37