And this experience was general throughout the duration of the congress.
Day by day sittings were held for the transaction of all kinds of
business and the discussion of the most varied subjects. It was
impressive to see people from half the countries of the world rise
from different corners of the hall and contribute their share to the
discussion in the most matter-of-fact way. Day by day the congressists
met in social functions, debates, lectures, and sectional groups
(chemical, medical, legal, etc.) for the regulation of matters touching
their special interests. Everything was done in Esperanto, and never
was there the slightest hitch or misunderstanding, or failure to give
adequate expression to opinions owing to defects of language. The
language difficulty was annihilated.

Perhaps one of the most striking demonstrations of this return to
pre-Babel conditions was the performance of a three-part comedy by a
Frenchman, a Russian, and a Spaniard. Such a thing would inevitably
have been grotesque in any national language; but here they met on
common neutral ground. No one's accent was "foreign," and none of the
spectators possessed that mother-tongue acquaintance with Esperanto that
would lead them to feel slight divergences shocking, or even noticeable
without extreme attention to the point. Other theatrical performances
were given at Geneva, as also at Boulogne, where a play of Molière
was performed in Esperanto by actors of eight nationalities with one
rehearsal, and with full success.

In the face of these facts it is idle to oppose a universal artificial
language on the score of impossibility or inadequacy. The theoretical
pronunciation difficulty completely crumbled away before the test of
practice.