Part 11 (2/2)
Then came the crux. The Prince was terrified lest I should write to The Times and shatter his golden dreams of wealthy tourists. The whole Montenegrin Government trembled before the possibility of such a catastrophe. I promised cheerfully not to write to any paper at all. |Nor till now have I mentioned the affairs.
So the matter was settled, to the obvious relief of poor old Nikita, who was most grateful and seemed much surprised that I required no vengeance.
I started again, this time for Niks.h.i.+tch and the Durmitor, with the intention of going into Turkish territory if possible.
At Rijeka I was taken to the small-arms factory on the river, the primitive machinery being worked by water power. Here were men busy fitting new stocks to old rifles, Russian ones. I was told that one was being prepared for every man in Bosnia and the Herzegovina. When all were ready they would be smuggled in. I was taken aback at this, but found when playing the phonograph in the evening to a large party, that the notion of a not distant war with Austria accompanied by a great Balkan rising was generally accepted. Still more was I surprised to hear talk against the Prince. He and his sons were accused of taking all the best land and doing nothing with it. And the question of the tobacco regie raged. Podgoritza I found greatly changed. The outer world had rushed in on it. The tobacco factory dominated the town. ”G.o.d willing, we shall burn it down!” said the populace cheerfully. True, it employed many hands, but they complained the pay was low, though they admitted that the girls had never earned anything before. In truth, regular work was a new thing in Montenegro. The end of the days of indefinite coffee- and rakia-drinking and recounting of past battles was now approaching.
The middle ages were leaping at one bound into the twentieth century, and the Montenegrin was angry and puzzled.
The Italians had undertaken to construct a railway, quays, and harbour works, and offered fair wages for workmen. The Montenegrins demanded fantastic payment and imagined that by standing out they would get it. To their astonishment the Italians imported gangs of far better workmen and finished the work. Then the Montenegrins cursed the Italians and hated them bitterly. Even Montenegrin officers openly boasted that they did not know the price of the regie tobacco as they smoked only contraband, and feeling ran so high that the Italian Monopol buildings at Antivari were attacked and damaged.
At Podgoritza I met again the Albanian coachman Shan, who had served me very faithfully on my previous visits. He took me to the house of his family. A striking contrast to the Montenegrin houses, it was spick and span and even pretty, for the Albanian has artistic instincts, whereas the Montenegrin has none. Left to himself, his taste is deplorable.
Further signs of change in the land soon showed themselves. Rijeka had already grumbled. At Danilovgiati I was at once approached by a youth, who proudly showed me a Serbian paper containing his portrait and verses by himself. He was lately come from Belgrade, where he was a student, one of the many who have there been made tools of by unscrupulous political intriguers. He indignantly inveighed against the poverty of Montenegro and ascribed every evil to the Prince. I suggested that the Montenegrins themselves were among the laziest on G.o.d's earth, and could with energy do very much more with their land. But he blamed ”the Government” for everything. No learning, no progress, he declared, was possible. You could not even import the books you wanted. He hurled his accusations broadcast and then, for he took his literary qualifications very seriously, sat down and wrote a verse about me after considerable labour and much sprawling over the table.
Danilovgrad was the home of another reformer, Dr. Marusitch, a Montenegrin who had but recently returned from Manchuria after many years' service as a surgeon in the Russian Army. A wild, enthusiastic creature--good-natured, well-meaning and indiscreet. For Montenegro he was rich. He had just married an extremely beautiful young woman, and the hospitality of the two was unbounded. He at once asked me to stay six months as his guest and write, with his aid, the standard book on Montenegro. Like all who had lived in Russia, he was a hard drinker and tipped down alcohol in alarming quant.i.ties. He was a strange mixture of the old world and the new.
Took me to see the grave of Bajo Radovitch, who fell in 1876 after having cut off fifteen Turkish heads; admired the b.l.o.o.d.y feat, but blamed Germany for keeping up militarism. He had no opinion at all of the Montenegrin Government, and poured out a torrent of plans for its reform. He was all for peace, he said, and wanted to rearrange all the world--which badly needed it. I little thought what would be his fate when I wished him goodbye, and promised to look him up next year.
On the road to Niks.h.i.+tch we came up with the military wagons carrying weapons, mainly revolvers and sword bayonets up-country for distribution. Russia had sent a revolver for each man in the country, and great was the rejoicing. Russia, when she re-armed her forces, usually bestowed the old weapons lavishly on Montenegro.
Artillery was soon to follow.
We left the road and struck up-country towards Durmitor, along with a string of pack-horses laden with the Russian weapons which went with an armed escort. By the way we pa.s.sed two stones recording recent murders, showing that blood feuds were not yet extinct.
At Zhabljak, Durmitor, I spent two amusing days seeing the distribution of arms. Men flocked in from all parts, were delighted with their new toys, and Russia leapt up in every one's estimation.
No ammunition was served out for, as an officer remarked, ”It would all be wasted.” They conversed on blood and battle and clicked their new revolvers. ”How we should like to go over and try them on the Turks,” they said. ”But we dare not cross the border because of the Powers.”
Two chetas (battalions) were armed and had left when a bugle sounded of a sudden. ”That means third cheta a.s.semble!” shouted Krsto. All rushed out. Sure enough a telegram had arrived saying ”The Turks are over the border! Mobilize at once!”
Every one was delighted. The men hustled into their great-coats. The women stuffed bread and a bottle of rakia into their torbitzas. The officers saddled their own horses, and in a very short time the third cheta was drawn up in line on the hill-top by the church in marching order. The commandant made a speech. They were to behave as Montenegrin heroes. They were not to fire a shot till the word was given, and above all they were to do nothing that would ”look crooked in the eyes of Europe.” They were a wild lot, in every kind of ragged garment. Had had a few months' drill, so marched in step for the first twenty yards. Then they broke rank, howled a war cry and rushed over the hill like a pack of wolves on the trail, firing their rifles as they went. Their officer followed on horseback and as he topped the brow, turned in his saddle and emptied his revolver over our heads. We sat up all night, every one wild for war.
Bandages and carbolic arrived on a mule. There was in fact some fighting on the other side of the border between Albanians and Serbs near Bijelopolje. War, of course, did not ensue. But for some days the frontier was all lined with troops.
Meanwhile I wanted to go on to Plevlje in Turkish territory, and had to wait till the local governor thought safe to let me pa.s.s. While waiting I heard here, too, more rumours about the Prince. He was accused of having poisoned the Minister of Justice, who had died suddenly after dining with him. The dead man's family lived here.
They said an Austrian doctor had said it was not poison. But there was much talk about it, and folk seemed unconvinced. I never learnt the truth of it. The route at length being open, we crossed the swift Tara at the bottom of a deep gorge on a most primitive ferry of seven planks lashed together in a triangle, and the Turkish gendarmerie on the opposite bank furnished guide and horses. Krsto had to leave his revolver behind, and having never in his life been out without one, was as nervous as a cat and saw brigands in every bush. At which I laughed.
Plevlje then was a strange sight. On one side were modern up-to-date Austrian houses with a park, smart barracks and an inn. On the hills behind it in immense letters of white stone were the initials of Franz Josef. The opposite side of the town was occupied by the Turkish Army, wonderfully smart, as if in compet.i.tion with Austria, and a Crescent marked the hill on that side. Between the two lay the native town and bazar.
The local Turkish Governor was an Albanian, Suliman Pasha. He was delighted to have an English visitor, explained to me the difficulty of his position, with enemy lands, Austria, Montenegro and Serbia on three sides of the Sanjak, all intriguing to obtain it, and enemy soldiers quartered in the town. Austria he was confident was preparing to move shortly. He believed that even then they had more troops in the Sanjak than was allowed by treaty.
He pressed me to continue my journey to Mitrovitza and to Prizren, where the Russians were, he said, stirring up trouble. But the strict time limit of my holiday made this impossible. The result of the Murzsteg arrangement was, according to him, that Austria and Russia regarded the Peninsula as to be shortly theirs, and were working hard to extend their spheres of influence. Each, under the so-called reform schemes, had put their gendarmerie in the districts they could work from best. They had put England in an unimportant place. England ought to have insisted on being on the frontiers, then the importation of arms could have been prevented. As it was, Austria and Russia were both smuggling arms in by means of their gendarmerie. Russia wanted to provoke a rising of Christians in order to rush in ”to save the Christians.” Austria wanted to foment differences between Moslem and Catholic, and, being nearest to the spot, hoped Europe would again request her to ”restore order” as in Bosnia. ”Then she will be one day's march nearer Salonika,” said the Pasha. I believe his statements were correct.
I had an introduction to one of the leading Serbs of the town, Filip Gjurashkovitch. The Gjurashkovitch family had left Montenegro owing, as we have seen, to a fierce quarrel with the Petrovitches. Had fled, as usual, to Turkish territory and had, for years, held official positions, Filip had lived in Durazzo, and was strongly in favour of the establishment of an independent Albania, declaring that the trouble with the Albanians was due entirely to Turkish misrule. If given a chance of education they were among the most intelligent of the Peninsula. He emphasized this by pointing out that Suliman Pasha was an Albanian, and only a man of great skill could have kept the peace for twenty years between two rival garrisons both in the same town.
It was Whitsuntide, and several thousand pilgrims arrived at the Troitza Monastery, just outside the town, from Montenegro, Serbia, and even the Herzegovina, as well as from the surrounding villages.
Especially a number of schoolmasters a.s.sembled, all of whom ran propaganda schools in the district; I thus learnt much of what was going on. The schoolmasters were nearly all Montenegrins and regarded the Sanjak as ”their claim.” They were furious with Austria, because they had ordered a quant.i.ty of the usual propaganda prints, grotesque portraits of Stefan Dushan, Milosh Obilitch, the nine Yugovitches, etc., for their schools in order to preach Great Serbia. Had had them sent by Austrian post so that they might not fall into the hands of the Turks--and the Austrians had stopped them. There was no Russian Consul there to see to it. Nor could Russia be relied on entirely. Two Russian officials had been recently to Miloshevo Monastery, near Prijepolje, and had declared the language spoken there to be Bulgar. And it was the place where St. Sava was buried! They were furious. Russian monks were now firmly established at Detchani. That was all right. None of them wanted reforms introduced into the Turkish Empire, because then there would be no hope of tearing it to pieces. As in Macedonia I found the approved method was to start a ma.s.sacre and then cry to Europe for help. On all sides I heard again that the great Balkan rising had been stopped by the Russo-j.a.panese War. The Archimandrite of the Monastery was bitter about Russia. ”What does Russia want with Manchuria? She has gone to take distant land that is no affair of hers and has left her brethren in the Balkans unhelped. G.o.d's curse is upon her.” They were disgusted that Ferdinand of Bulgaria had been guest at the German wedding. He was an arch plotter, but a fool. ”He wants to be Tsar of a wide land. But he will not succeed.
He has weakened the Serb position by his propaganda, but he will never have Constantinople. Russia would trundle him out. She means to have Constantinople. No one else will.” King Petar was Serbia's only hope, but the propaganda against him was active. England's att.i.tude about the murder was incomprehensible to them. Had Alexander not been killed he would have allowed Austria to build and control a railway through Serbia. The Montenegrins jeered at Serbia, ”a country that has a new ministry every few months.” None of them seemed to think it counted. And none seemed to see the point of all working for a common cause. Whether they were pro- or anti-Petrovitch, they took it for granted Montenegro was to be the head of Great Serbia. For Austria they had nothing but contempt, and said pleasantly that all Austrian officers looked as if about to bear twins. You had only to run in a bayonet and the beer would run out.
They had, however, no right to talk of drink, for the pilgrimage was an orgy of rakia, beer and wine.
From Plevlje I rode to Prijepolje, the furthest military outpost of Austria. There were but one hundred Christian houses in it.
Nevertheless there was a schoolmaster industriously teaching ”Great Serbia” and ”patriotism.” The Turkish Government was powerless to prevent this revolutionary work, as any interference would have brought protests from the Powers about ”persecuting Christians.”
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