Mucha designed this poster to promote a lottery for raising funds for Czech schools in southwestern Moravia.

Under Austria-Hungary's ruthless policy of Germanisation, the Czech language could only be taught in private schools run by local communities. These lottery tickets were sold for one crown and the profits went to support such private schools.

In the poster, Čechia, the symbolic mother of the Czech nation, sits on a dead tree, weeping helplessly. In the foreground, a little school girl with books and pencils stares accusingly at the viewers, demanding support from them for her education and for the ailing Čechia.