3 1 8 D O C U M E N T 3 1 8 S E P T E M B E R 1 9 2 4
pace. The success of the entire project rests on the capabilities and perseverance of
our pioneers. Our workers had the courage to settle on new land, and they have en-
dured in the unfamiliar climate, in unhealthy regions until today. We must not let
these people down. We must support their courage and their working morale by
making it possible with sufficient funds to colonize and develop the land in the fu-
ture. The Keren Hayesod must see to it that flowering and healthy settlements are
established on the land purchased by the Keren
Kayemet[3]
[Jewish National Fund].
For the next few years a concentration of all forces is imperative so that, in con-
junction with the especially favorable political situation today for the construction
project, a sound foundation is laid, visible in a cohesive Jewish settlement area, ag-
riculture based on autonomous work, and strengthened elements of labor.
Only the right human material can surmount the obstacles. These people, how-
ever, must garner the necessary backing from the visible interest by Jews in the
Keren Hayesod.
I hope you will succeed in convincing wide circles among the Polish Jewry that
at the present moment all good wishes only make sense if they are translated into a
voluntary contribution for the construction.
With best wishes for your work, I am very sincerely yours.
318. From Hendrik A. Lorentz
Haarlem, 12 September 1924
Dear Colleague,
Now that the summer vacation is over, I must prepare for the meeting of the Sub-
committee on Analytical Bibliography that is supposed to take place next
month.[1]
Thus I must invite Prof.
Scheel[2]
to it and also send him the letters to the chairmen
of the Physical Society and to the Society for Practical
Physics.[3]
Regarding the
latter, they involve the minutes of the resolutions and desiderata which have already
been agreed upon, with a short cover letter. All of this is now already sitting, ready,
in Geneva, namely in the French and English languages; those are the two official
languages of the League of Nations. I am thus ready immediately with what I have
to send to the chairmen of the Société de Physique, the Physical Society, and the
Institute of Electrical Engineers (which the Science Abstracts depend on). But as
regards ¢the language² the two German societies, I am in doubt about the language.
Do you think that French or English would be permissible (and which of the two
would you then choose) or would that be deemed inappropriate? I am thinking of
the aforementioned sensitivities.