Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924074596853 CORNELL UNIVEfiSITV LI6RAR' 3 1924 074 596 853 In compliance witli current copyright law, Cornell University Library produced this replacement volume on paper that meets the ANSI Standard Z39.48-1984 to replace the irreparably deteriorated original. 1995 BY THE SAME AUTHOR: CANADA AS IT IS. WITH Al ILLUSTRATIONS. THIRD IMPRESSION. "We can almost see new cities rising up as we read 'Ccuiada As It Is." It is a word-picture gallery of prosperity, a panorama of the most astonishingly growing territory in the British Empire," — The Daily Mail, AMERICA AT WORK. WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS. FOURTEENTH IMPRESSION. " Brilliant. More than G. W. Steevens, or Mr, Kipling, or Mr. Archer, or Mr. Heckles Willson, Mr. Fiaser focuses in a single blazing light the ▼ision of the new America." — Daily Neivs. THE REAL SIBERIA : Together with an Account of a Dash through Manchuria. PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED FROM SPECIAL PHOTOGRAPHS. NINETEENTH IMPRESSION. "Mr. Fraser has lifted the veil which hid the real Siberia from our eyes." — Black and White. CASSELL & COMPANY, Limited, io«(fo«,- Paris, New York &■ Melboitrju. PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS BY JOHN FOSTER ERASER WITH MAP. COLOURED FRONTISPIECE AND FORTY FULL-PAGE PLATES FROM PHOTOGRAPHS CASSELL AND COMPANY, LIMITED LONDON, PARIS, NEW YORK AND MELBOURNE. MCMVl ALL RIGHTS RESERVED CONTENTS. CHAPTER L A KETTLE OF FISH. PAGE An Affray at Orovsji — Civil War between Rival Christian Churolies — Jealousies between tbe Powers^The Mace- donians a Mixture of Races — Bulgarian " Bands " and their Methods — Greek " Bands " — Conversion and Re- conversion — European Officers and the Gendarmerie — A Big Massacre Wanted — Servian " Bands " in Macedonia — Turk and Greek — The Remedy 1 CHAPTER U. BELGRADE. A Russian Town made Clean — MiUtary Officers — The Mark of a Crime — Rival Dynasties, Obrenovitch and Karageorgo- vitch^King Milan — King Alexander and Queen Draga^-^ Austria's Hand in the Plot — Breaking into the Palace — The Search for the King and Queen — A Woman's Shriek — Murder of the Queen's Brothers, of Ministers and Officials — Where the King and Queen were Buried — Indignation of the Powers — The Servian People not Responsible for the Crime^Plot and Counterplot — The Serbs a Nation of Peasants — The National Garb Dying Out 18 CHAPTER in. A SITTING OF THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT. A Mean House of Parliament — A Debate — Short-hved Govern- ments — DeaUng with Irregular Elections — Democratic Appearance of the Members — A Congeries of Chques — The Pay of Members and Ministers — The Leader of the Opposition — The Minister of Justice — An Interview with the Prime Minister 37 vi CONTENTS. CHAPTER IV. A MONASTIC EETEEAT. rtGE The Most Famous Monastery in Servia — The Archimandrite — A GUmpse of the First King of Servia — The Vicissitudes of a Silver Coffin — Saeredness of the King's Remains — A Devout Brigand — Dinner in the Monastery — The Church —Feast of St. Mary 47 CHAPTER V. THE PEASANT NATION. The Serb a Hater of Town Life — A State without Towns — The Servian Pig — Why British Trade is Dwindhng — Peasant Proprietorship — A Country Ruled by Local Government — Taxation — MiUtary Service — A Simple, Genuine Folk . 59 CHAPTER VL SOFIA. A Miniature Brussels — A City in the Making — The Public Build- ings — The Church of St. Sofia — The Bulgar's Quahties — A Kaleidoscopic History — Prince Ferdinand — His Unpopu- larity — Bulgarian Ambitions — The Prince a Factor for Peace — The Most Efficient Army in Europe — A Nation that Beheves in Education ...... 66 CHAPTER VLL A BIT OF OLD BULGARIA. Out of the World — Timova in the Sunrise — A Primitive Tnn — The Tariff — " Ver' Good Enghsh " — A Litigious Community — The Churches — Monastery of the Transfigxuration . . 77 CHAPTER VHL OVER THE SHIPKA PASS. Memorials of the Great Fight^Traces of Turkish Days — The Joy of Early Morning — Shipka Village — How the Russians Behaved after their Victory — Glimpse of the Plain of Thrace ......... 87 CHAPTER IX. THE ROSE GARDEN OF EUROPE. Where the Best Attar of Roses Comes from — Kasanhk — A Rose Garden Eighty Miles Long— The Plantations— The Process of Distilling— Adulteration— Prices— Potency of Attar of Roses .......... 93 100 CONTENTS. CHAPTER X. THE CITY OF THE PLAIN. A Sunday Evening at PhilippopoUs — Individuality of the CSty — A Passion for Education — Bulgarians not Speculative — Agriculture — Industry of the Peasants — Return of the Turks — Bulgar Characteristics — Fleeiag from the Heat — Monas- tery of St. Petka — A Night in the Open .... CHAPTER XI. IN THE LAND OF THE TUEK. Adrianople — ^Mistaken for a Person of Distinction — The Real East — A Mixed Population — The Mosques — A Great Fire — A City of Terror — An Armenian's Adventure — Celebrating the Sultan's Accession— A Turkish Exhibition — Turkish Time— A Visit to the Vah 110 CHAPTER Xn. WHEEE THE " BEST BOEDEAUX " COMES FEOM. Turkish Roads — A Halt — Kirk Kilise — Shipping Wine to Bor- deaux — Visiting the Governor — Etiquette — The Return Visit — Elaborate Make-believe — A Representative of Great Britain . . . . . . . . . 123 CHAPTER XEX IN THE BOEDEELAND. Insurrection and Reprisal — Taken for a British Secret Service Official— The Village of Dolan— The Headman— Sileohlu— Bulgarians and Turks Living Together Amicably — Incessant Coffee-drinking 132 ' CHAPTER XIV. HIS majesty's ebpeesentativk. A British Consulate Described — Comfort the Triimiph of English Civilisation — Home Thoughts — England Honoured in the Balkans 143 CHAPTER XV. THE TUEK as EULEE. Virtues of the Turk— The Sultan's Point of View— The Two Turkeys — The Reform Party — Universality of Corruption — Abuses of Taxation — The Peasant — The Turk Incompetent to Rule 151 viii CONTENTS. CHAPTER XVL TJNDER THE EYE OF BRITAIN. ^^^^ Drama, the Centre of the British Sphere of Influence — British OiEoers Wearing the Fez — An Expedition into the Hills- Spies — Enmity between Greeks and Bulgars — Philippi — Memories of Greeks and Romans — St. Paul's Visit — Kavala — Skittish Turkish Ladies — Where the Tobacco for Egyptian Cigarettes is Grown — A Moslem Monastery — Birthplace of Mahomet Ah 160 CHAPTER XVII. THE CONDITION OF MACEDONIA. The Different Parties — Decrease of the Moslem Population — Nationahty not a Matter of Race — A Hotbed of Intrigue — The Macedonian Committees — Austria and Russia as Watch- dogs — Greece the Tool of the Sultan — Where the Future of the Balkaiis is Likely to be Decided . . . . .174 CHAPTER XVnL SALONICA. Mount Olympus at Sunrise — Ancient and Modem Greeks — Albanians — Women of Different Races and their Dress — The " Converts " — Enghsh Manners and Others — The Turks of Salonika — The Art of Driving Bargains . . . 183 CHAPTER XIX HILMI PASHA, " BONHAM'S BABIES," AND SOME STORIES. The Viceroy of Macedonia — Major Boaham and the Gendarmerie School — " Bonham's Babies " — The Salonika Explosions — ^Tales of Greek and Bulgarian " Bands " . . . 197 CHAPTER XX. MONASTIR. The Cut-throat Part of Europe — Murder a Commonplace Massacres by the Turks— Bursts of Ferocity and Bursts of Philanthropy— Outrages by Greek and Bulgarian " Bands " —The Risings of 1903— Audacity of the A'omi«a7t.s— Rela- tions between the Bulgarian and Turkish Governments . 205 CONTENTS. IX- CHAPTER XXI. THE QUAINT CITT OF OCHEIDA. paqi Among Brigands— Attacked by Goat-dogs— The Dogs Dismayed — A Gratefvd Albanian — Resna — Melons, Melons all the Way— Hard Life of the Albanian Peasants— A Thirsty Ride — Water at Last — A Young Tm-kish Soldier and his Devotions — Ochrida — The C!hief of PoUce and his Horse — A Hotbed of Intrigue — Healing Water .... 218 CHAPTER XXn. THE MOUNTAINS OF ALBANIA. Lake Ochridei — Struga — A Nation of Dandies— Why the Turks Provided an Escort — Confidence of Albanians in the English — A False Alarm — Kjuks — A Beautifvd Prospect — A Start at Daybreak — A Perilous Descent — Roman Bridges — Rudimentary Roads ....... 233 CHAPTER XXIIL ELBASAN. The Central Town of Albania — Albania like Scotland and the Highlands in the Sixteenth Centmry — Chronic GueriBa Warfare — Elbasan — Twenty or Thirty Murders a Week — • Ducks as Scavengers — Albanian Silk — The Best Hotel in Elbasan^A Single-minded Landlord — Mr. Carnegie's Fame 245 CHAPTER XXIV. THE ALBANIANS. Albanian Ferocity and Chivalry — A High Sense of Honour — Language — Rehgiou — Customs — Lack of Unity — Outrages 256 CHAPTER XXV. BEEAT. A Dismal Journey — Berat at Sunset — A Fever-breeding Town — Koritza — A Specimen of the Eastern Christian — Goodbye to Berat 261 CHAPTER XXVI. EOUGH EXPESIENCES IN THE MOUNTAINS. A Refuse-heap of Nature — Benighted — A Dangerous Path — A Cheerless Night — Cigarettes for Breakfast — On the Moim- tain Top — The Down Grade — Permet — A Short Cut over CONTENTS. PAGE the Mountains to Liaskovik — Turkish Courtesy — Albanian Wedding Festivities — A Turkish Bride — A Sixteen Hours' Ride — Koritza Again — An Antiquity ! — Back at Monastir . 269 CHAPTER XXVII. A NIGHT ALARM. USKUP. THE FINISH. Difficulties in Hiring — A Disturbed Region — Taking Refuge in a Harem — A Midnight Visit from a " Band " — At Uskup — War the only Solution of the Macedonian Problem — A Gloomy Forecast — Germany's Designs . . . .281 LIST OF PLATES. To Face Page Tlie Author in Maradouia .... FrontUpiece An Insurgent Band of Bulgarians 5 Slaughter of a Family through Religious Animosity ; Fate of Christians Suspected by a Revolutionary " Band " , .12 Servian Village Scene 39 The Servian Parliament House ; In the Market at Belgrade . 42 Studenitza Monastery; Some of the Monts .... 55 The Church at Studenitza 58 Servian Women ; On a Country Eoad in Servia ... 60 A Bit of Old Sofia; A Bit of New Sofia .... 71 A Gipsy Encampment in Bulgaria 74 The Quaint City of Tirnovo 80 MouEistery of the Transfiguration 84 At the Foot of the Shipka Pass; the Shipka Pass ... 90 Rose Pickers near Kasanlik ....... 94 Early Morning Market in a Eoumelian Town ... 98 PhiKppopoHs 101 A Bulgarian Dance; A Corner of Old Bulgaria . . . 102 Primitive Method of "Wheat Threshing in Bulgaria . . 108 Adrianople en Fete ; Coffee Drinking . . . . .117 Scene at Adrianople ; In a Mixed Village : Turks and Bulgarians .......... 124 Turkish Hospitality to the Author 140 xii LIST OF PLATES. To Face Page Drama 165 Euins at Philippi 167 A Comer of Drama; Nearing a Disturbed Village . .170 Kavala ; Outside the Walls of Kavala 172 Major Bonham; Some of " Bonham's Babies" . . .199 Macedonian Peasants 202 Turkish Soldiers in Monastir ; A Good Trade in Daggers . 209 Bulgarians Slain by Greeks ; How the Turks Punish a Village . 211 Ochrida 222 A Rough Road 224 On Lake Ochrida ; Method of Irrigation near Struga . . 231 The Author's Route through Albania 234 Relic of the Roman Occupation 242 A Group of Albanians 245 The Inn and Innkeeper at Elbasan 252 Bazaar Scene; Castle of an Albanian Bey .... 254 A Village in the Highlands of Albania 263 Albanian Gentlemen; An Albanian Fanner .... 266 In Wildest Albania 270 An Albanian Peasant ; Priest and Bulgarian Insurgent . . 280 Map of the Balkans, showing the Author's Route ... 1 19 long East 20 of Greenwich PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. CHAPTER I. A KETTLE OF PISH. An Affray at Orovsji — CSvil War between Rival Christian Churches — Jealousies between the Powers — The Macedonians a Mixture of Races — Bulgarian " Bands " and their Methods — Greek " Bands " — Conversion and Reconversion — ^European Officers and the Gendarmerie — ^A Big Massacre Wanted — Servian " Bands " in Macedonia — ^Turk and Greek — The Remedy. EiDiNG in Macedonia I passed the village of Orovsji. The inhabitants had just buried seven Bulgarians and four Turkish soldiers who had killed each other the previous day. Othervfise all was quiet. Indeed, the Balkan peninsula was never so quiet. There were no wholesale massacres of peaceful Christians by ferocious Moslems, no fire and sword campaign by the troops of the Sultan, no batches of outrages on peasant women by devils wearing the fez. There were few incidents which newspaper correspondents at Constantinople heard of and tele- graphed to London. And yet, if totals count, there were more murders in Macedonia in 1905 than during any of the years which have thrilled Christian Europe and caused worthy folk to exclaim, " Some- thing must be done ! " The reason Macedonian methods have attracted 2 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. scant attention is because the barbarities have been scattered. A village of a dozen houses is burnt down — a common occurrence, not worthy the atten- tion of Constantinople ! A family is murdered — hus- band, wife, children, aged folk — shot, maybe, more likely with brains battered out, possibly with throats cut — an everyday affair ! The good Christian at home, when told, shud- ders, and being pious, offers a little prayer that the day may soon come when the accursed Turk will be swept out of Europe, and the sorely tried but patient Christian people of the Balkan peninsula be free to live peaceably and worship as the heart and con- science dictate. Very likely he sends a contribution to a Balkan committee to assist in the noble and patriotic work of feeding the destitute and driving the murderous Turks out of Europe. What the worthy English Christian does not always realise, and what it is not the business of the propagandists to inform him, is that most of the murdering now going on in the Bal- kans is by Christians of Christians. The fact is the whole of the Balkans is infested with rival Christian "bands," which terrorise villages and convert them from the Greek Church to the Bul- garian Church, or from the Bulgarian Church to the Greek Church, at the dagger's point. The Turkish soldiers occasionally hunt these " bands," and when they catch one there is some quick killing. The situation in the Balkans has gradually en- tered a new phase. The Christians hate the Turk ; but they hate each other more. " What are you? " A KETTLE OF FISH- 3 I asked an innkeeper in a village near Koritza, on the borderland of Macedonia and Albania. ' ' Well , sir," he replied, "I find it best to be a Greek." There was a Greek "band" in the neighbouring hills. The genuine problem before those who seek the welfare of the Balkan people is not so much to remedy the incompetence of the Turk as to find a means of checking the civil war which is beginning to rage between rival Christian Churches. The ad- herents of these Churches perpetrate atrocities on each other as vile and inhuman as the Turk ever per- petrated on either. The Turk meanwhile quietly chuckles. Why should he slay the Christians when they are so busily engaged in slaying one another? The Balkans is a confused kettle of fish. The ordinary man knows there is a tangle of interests too complicated for him to understand. He does not try. In a rough way, however, he wonders why the Great Powers do not immediately come to some agreement to remove the Turk, as a ruler, out of Europe. That is what the Powers cannot do. Who shall have the Balkans when the Turk goes? The Eussian has an eye on Constantinople. The Aus- trian has both eyes on Salonika. Russia freed Bul- garia from the Turk, meaning to use Bulgaria as a stepping-stone to the Bosphorus. Austria used Servia as a pawn to prepare the route to an Aus- trian port on the .lEgean Sea. Both Russia and Austria were surprised and hurt that Bulgaria and Servia, instead of being grateful and subservient, began to preen themselves and dream dreams of a 4 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Great Bulgaria, and an extension of Servia, with no interference from northern neighbours. About the same time the Greeks began to remember that Greece once extended far into the Balkan region. Then Eoumania, on the other side of the Danube, startled everybody by the brilliant audacity of the claim that the Balkans was really Eouman terri- tory. See the welter 1 The Great Powers cannot agree to clear out the Sultan. They know Eussia and Austria want to annex the dispossessed region. Germany stands in the background; she will have no part in bullying and badgering the Sultan to re- form the Macedonian administration. The thank- ful Sultan accordingly gives Germans the most valu- able concessions in the Turkish Empire. Germans grow more than ordinarily fat and wealthy. Also they can afford to smile. They know that though Austria and Eussia may join France and Britain and Italy in demanding reform, reform is just the thing neither Eussia nor Austria wants. It is the disturbed condition of the peninsula which gives the two countries hope that their services maybe required to come in with armies to secure peace — and stay ! Germany thinks that over the little kingdom of Servia and the principality of Bulgaria Austria will reach Salonika and Eussia Constantinople. Ger- many sees far. She hopes Austria will get to Salonika. Also she reckons that the Austrian Em- pire is doomed, that the German Empire must ex- pand. She thinks she sees the not-distant day when Salonika will be a German port. D CO A KETTLE OF FISH. 5 But Britain? The Christian populations in the Balkans appreciate that England has no territorial aspirations. They believe that were any of the nations to attempt annexation they would have to face British cannon. They know that Britain squeezes Turkey, sometimes very uncomfortably, to put its Macedonian house in order. They rely on Britain — if Turkey does not govern the country well, as she never will — first to secure European control of Macedonia, and ultimately to give the Macedonians independence. So the name of England is honoured. England is the one European Power which, un- selfishly, and from purely humanitarian motives, will see justice is done the Macedonians. But who are the Macedonians? You will find Bulgarians and Turks who call themselves Macedon- ians, you find'Greek Macedonians, there are Servian Macedonians, and it is possible to find Eoumanian Macedonians. You will not, however, find a single Christian Macedonian who is not a Servian, a Bul- garian, a Greek, or a Eoumanian. They all curse the Turk, and they love Mace- donia. But it is Greek Macedonia, or Bulgarian Macedonia, and their eyes flame with passion, whilst their fingers seek the triggers of their guns, at the suggestion that any of the other races are Mace- donian, or, indeed, anything but interlopers. In point of fact, Macedonia is little more than a name given to a tract of Turkish territory where, besides the Turks, live congeries of races, chiefly Bulgarian and Greek. Converse with a Roumanian consul, say at 6 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Monastir. "True, these people talk Bulgarian or Greek," he says; " but they are really Eoumanian, though they don't know it. Therefore, when Mace- donia is freed from the Turk, its natural and proper ruler is Eoumania." Interview a Servian. " Before the coming of the Turks," says he, "the Servian Empire stretched south to the sea." Seek the views of a Bulgarian. " It is obvious," he tells you, " that practically all Macedonia is filled with Bulgarians. They speak Bulgarian, and are adherents of the Bul- garian Church. Many people who speak Greek and are Orthodox have been coerced ; but they are Bul- garian. Macedonia is the rightful heritage of Bul- garia." " Nothing of the kind," retorts the Greek ; "the Bulgarians are schismatics, and are not even entitled to the name of Christian. They compel villages by threats to renounce the Orthodox Church, and then they are reckoned Bulgarian. Bah on the butchers ! ' ' It is this race animosity, nurtured by politicians and egged on by the priests in the name of Christian- ity, which is putting an obstacle in the way of the Powers doing much to remedy the condition of the country, and would do so even were they united and possessed of the best intentions in the world. The misrule of the Turk is bad enough. But to hand over Macedonia to the Christians of Macedonia to work out their own salvation would be to plunge the country into direst bloodshed. The rivals are afflicted with land hunger. That we can appreciate, especially as the claimants bring for- ward plausible reasons. The regrettable thing is A KETTLE OF FISH. 7 that the war of extermination waged by Christians upon Christians is unconsciously fostered by well- meaning but ignorant Christians in other parts of the world. Among the Balkan races the Bulgarians are un- doubtedly the sturdiest, most industrious, best fitted for self-government. What they have done with Bulgaria, since the Turks were driven out of then- land, is deserving of respect and admiration. When the Bulgarian frontier was fixed it should have been drawn much further to the south and west than it is, and have included districts, undoubtedly Bulgarian, which were unfortunately left in the Turkish Em- pire. Bulgaria, especially since it realised its poten- tialities as a nation, has smarted under the limita- tion. A considerable section of the Bulgarians is working for a " Greater Bulgaria." But this laud- able ambition has run wild, and is the cause of much of the existing unhappy strife. Understanding that when Concerted Europe should be sick of endeavouring to badger or kick the Turk into improving his methods of government, autonomy would probably be given to Macedonia, the Bulgarians began to arrange so that, at the proper moment, Macedonia should fall like a ripe plum into the mouth of Bulgaria. The Bulgarian Committees, safely ensconced in Sofia, organised the notorious " bands," not only to retaliate upon the Turk and guard Bulgar- ian villages from Turkish depredations, but also to further the Bulgarian propaganda in those parts of Macedonia which were not quite sure. Be 8 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. it remembered that when Bulgaria broke away from the Greek Orthodox Church, numerous villages in Macedonia did likewise, and appropriated to them- selves the Greek churches. But there were and are many villages of Bulgarian-speaking peasants who did not secede from the Greek Church, but who — after the manner of the Balkans — are called Greeks, though they do not know a word of Greek. Further, there are Greek-speaking peasants who call them- selves Bulgarians because — living probably in dis- tricts where the real Bulgarians predominate — they have succumbed to local religious influences. The men composing the Bulgarian " bands " are courageous fellows. They undergo many hardships in the mountains. They risk their lives in the Bul- garian cause. But they are playing at revolution, and when they lose a point in the game and are caught by the Turks and slain, and their heads thrown into saddle-bags, so that Turkish soldiers may give proof they have earned reward for killing brigands, it is for their friends to regret their loss, but not to rail at the barbarity of the Turk. Here were the methods invented and pursued by the Bulgarian " bands." They visited the Bulgarian villages, levied contributions, and stored arms, so that on an appointed day there might be a rising against the Turk, and Bulgarian Macedonians be liberated from their oppressors for ever. Naturally they were greeted as heroes ; food was willingly found for them. Most of the industrious peasants living under the eye of the Turk knew where the rifles were stored, and were sworn to join the re- A KETTLE OF EISH. 9 volution when the signal was given. But there were Bulgarian villages which — maybe not knowing better — were content with their lot, lived in amity with their Turkish neighbours, had no national aspira- tions, and, what is more important, dreaded any traf&cking with the " bands," which would lead to terrible reprisals by the Turks. And the Turk is a bungler in administering pun- ishment. His spies inform him when a village is the headquarters of a " band." He sets out to cap- ture the revolutionists. He rarely does so, however, for the " bandsmen " also have their spies, are warned of the coming of the troops, and are off to the fastnesses of the hills before the Turks appear. The soldiers do not follow. They proceed, on the usual Asiatic lines, to punish the village. They shoot, they burn houses, they commit rapine. So the innocent and the least guilty suffer while the revolutionists escape. If the " punishment " is severe, Constantinople in time hears of it, very likely in a grossly exaggerated form, and we read over ■ our breakfast of a wanton and unprovoked attack by Turkish soldiers on a peaceful Bulgarian village, guilty of no other crime than that of being Christian ! Now it is occasionally forgotten that half the population of Macedonia is Moslem and Turk. The Turkish peasant is just as good and industrious a fellow as the Christian. He has to give the " blood- tax " in serving as a soldier, which the Christian has not, and the bloodsuckers of Turkish officials oppress him quite as much as they oppress the Christian. He has no foreign consul willing to 10 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. listen to his tale of woe, and no Orthodox or Ex- archist bishop to carry a complaint to higher officials. On the whole he accepts his fate resign- edly, taking it as part of the order of things that he should be ill-treated, just as his neighbour the Christian, after four centuries of Turkish authority, is sometimes disposed to take the exactions of the tax-gatherer as part of the scheme of life. And because it is characteristic of human nature for us to open our ears to tales of tragedy, and be heed- less of quiet contentment, we are occasionally dis- posed to ignore the hundreds of Moslem and Chris- tian villages in Macedonia, all subject to Turkish misrule, which, as between themselves, have no ani- mosity whatever. Indeed, I have been in many a Macedonian village where Turk and Christian trade and deal and live side by side in perfect accord. Take the case of a Bulgarian village which has no desire to be mixed up with the " patriotic " movement. Those who resist are generally one or two men of character. If they do not yield to the demands of the " band," and all the rest of the male inhabitants swear to join the revolution, it is not un- likely that some morning a couple of resisters, or maybe three, will be found dead. After that the village is submissive. But the methods of the Bulgarian " bands " went further. They terrorised Bulgarian villages belonging to the Orthodox Church, and therefore deemed Greek, into renouncing the Greek Church and becoming Exarchist and Bulgarian. Eor in the Balkans race and speech count for nothing in A KETTLE OF FISH. 11 nationality. Nationality is decided by the Church to which you belong. It is much as though a London-born Roman Catholic were called and counted an Irishman, or a Presbyterian in New York, though his ancestors came from Germany, were called and counted a Scotsman. The plan of campaign on the part of the " bands " was to make Macedonia Bulgarian. In furtherance of this they took to " converting " villages that were not only Greek in religion but Greek in speech and race. The Greek nation, with memory of Hellenic influence stretching far into the Balkans — with hundreds of Greek villages penetrating half through Macedonia, till they mingle with Bulgarian vil- lages and then disappear — resented the methods of the Bulgarian "bands." If there was to be any division of Macedonia, Greece was entitled to the larger share. Accordingly, Greek "bands" ap- peared to check the propaganda of the Bulgarian " bands." What amounted to civil war began. Greek " bands " adopted the methods of the Bul- garian "bands." Greek-speaking villages which had adopted the Bulgarian Church were obliged to renounce their religion, and become Greeks proper, or have their houses burnt, or worse. The villagers, who would like to be left in peace, yielded, and instead of Bulgarians became Greeks. When the Greek " band " withdrew, down came the Bulgarian ' ' band " to " re-convert ' ' the village and make the inhabitant Bulgarians again. There- upon the Greek " band " cut a few throats and 12 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. fired a few houses just to remind the peasants they must be Greeks or be killed. The Greeks invaded Bulgarian villages — Bulgarian in race, speech, and rehgion — and, with murder, compelled a conversion to the Orthodox Greek Church. The bishops and priests of the Greek Church not only countenanced but urged crime as a means of compelling Bul- garian Macedonians to proclaim themselves Greeks. What think you of a letter written by a Greek bishop advising a ' ' band ' ' to warn a village that if it is not converted all the Bulgarian houses will be burnt ; and on the top of the notepaper the emblem of the Christian faith ! The Bulgarian ' ' bands ' ' are excused on the ground that they are necessary to protect Bul- garian villages from indignities at the hands of the Greeks, and the Greeks say that their " bands " are only to frighten off the Bulgarians from molest- ing Greek villages. Both races believe they are engaged in a high patriotic mission. They will not listen to reason. They regard the others as vermin deserving only extermination. So the burn- ing of houses, the murder of partisans, is proceed- ing apace in a more flagrant manner than during the times of Turkish atrocities. What impressed me two or three times a day as I wandered through that wild and bloodstained land was that the bitterness against the Turk was, even among the Bulgarians, not so ardent as it was two or three years ago. The explanation is that the Turks, except when " punishing " a village for harbouring "brigands," have been comparatively SLAUGHTER OF A FAMILY THROUGH RELIGIOUS ANIMOSITY. FATE OF CHRISTIANS SUSPECTED BY A REX'OLU- TIONARY " BAND." A KETTLE OF FISH. 13 guiltless of violence. This is not because the leopard has changed his spots. It is because the Turk knows he is being watched by the European officers who have been introduced to assist in the reform of the Gendarmerie : the British at Drama, the French at Seres, the Russians at Salonika, the Italians at Monastir, the Austrians at Uskup. In- dividual officers are stationed in particular districts, and few are beyond three days' horse-journey from any point of outrage, where they can make persona! inquiry. Therefore the Turk is behaving himself, and the country is comparatively quiet. Yet the murders and the burnings as between Christians continue. They are not made much of to the outer world by the rivals, because they dread the alienation of Western European sym- pathy, and do not want to be interfered with in their reprisals. It is only in quiet conversation you get the brutal truth. This was said to me by one of the Bulgarian leaders in Sofia : ' ' We intend to make every village in Macedonia a centre of revolution. If there are any, Greeks or Bulgarians, who check us, they must be removed in the interests of Macedonian in- dependence. The time for argument is gone. We shall run no risk from traitors. At the proper time the country vdll rise en masse against the Turk." "But what chance," I asked, " will your peasants have against trained Turkish soldiers? You know what the Turkish soldier is when let loose. The country will welter in massacre." 14 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. " We know it, we know it ! " was the quick ex- clamation in reply. "We want a big massacre! It is the price we shall have to pay. We shall provoke the Turk into such a massacre that Europe will — must — ^intervene. I do not expect anything from your Reform movements, or Boards of Finan- cial Control. The Turk plays vdth you and defeats you every time. I know Europe is getting sick of the Macedonian muddle. But Europe has got to be stirred. The only thing to stir it to interfere and take Macedonia from Turkey will be a great massacre of Christians. That is the way by which Macedonia will get its liberation." Horrible words ! Spoken by a revolutionary leader, a man whose name is well known in Eng- land and America to the more prominent sym- pathisers vsdth the Macedonian movement. Another phase of the situation. Servian " bands," and, I believe, even Eoumanian " bands," have appeared in Macedonia, ostensibly to save Serb and Eoumanian villages from " con- version " to Bulgar or Hellenic nationality. And while the Bulgarian ' ' bands ' ' are the more nume- rous — figures are difficult to obtain, but I think about 7,000 "bandsmen" were in the hills last summer — they have not been so active with their propaganda as the Greeks. They received orders from Sofia to "go gently !" If Western Europe and America knew how Christians were waging war on Christians the clock of Macedonian freedom would be put far back. Accordingly the Bulgarians have not been so energetic as the Greeks. A KETTLE OF FISH. 15 If one must balance criminality, the weight of horrors now rests with the Greeks. And I am within the mark in saying that the Turkish au- thorities wink at the doings of the Greek ' ' bands. ' ' The Turk abets the weaker party and helps Greek propaganda, not because he loves the Greeks, but because he wants — and this is the blunt truth — to let the rival parties get more equal in numbers, to provoke reprisals, and let the mutual murdering by the Infidels proceed. I saw constant evidence of this. Whilst the Bulgarian "bands" are hunted by the Turkish soldiers, the Greek "bands" are now left alone. Purther, in all mixed Christian villages where there is strife, whether the Church is Greek Ortho- dox or Bulgarian Exarchist, the Turk aids the Greek. In many a village where the Church was originally Orthodox, but became Exarchist when the Bulgarians renounced the authority of the Greek Church, the Turk by his authority has handed church, schools, and revenues to the Greek minority. The consequence is that to-day you can hardly meet a Greek who will not tell you the Turk is doing the right thing by seeing that Christian property is restored to the legitimate owners. The Greek fails to perceive that the whole proceeding is part of a scheme to keep the Christians at enmity. As things are, the misrule of the Tiu-k is pre- ferable to the condition of affairs that would be in- evitable if the races in Macedonia were given their freedom. That the Turk is impossible as a ruler is a truism. That all the tinkering at reform wUl end in 16 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. nothing is recognised by everybody who has any direct acquaintance with the Balkans. The Turk, fine fellow as he is personally, cannot, in governing, conceive the right way to do a thing, and even when it is pointed out to him, he is content to do it in the wrong way. But there can be no genuine and lasting ame- lioration in the Balkans till the Bevolutionary Com- mittees in Sofia and Athens understand that the desire of the outer world is not to aid Bulgarian or Greek aspirations, but to save Christians, of whatever Church, from injustice. If there is to be outrage in the Balkans, let it not be between the Christians themselves. Many students of the Balkan problem are plunged in pessimism as to any solution being possible. I am not without hope, though I am quite certain that pricking the Sultan will not lead to anything beneficial. The idea that Macedonia may become peaceful under the Turk may be put on one side. The Macedonians themselves, being quite unfitted for self-government, must consent — and they will consent if Great Britain, whose impartiality is re- cognised by all the Balkan States, gives the lead — to efficient European control by the representa- tives of all the Powers. Bulgaria, Greece, Servia, and Eoumania ought to be given to understand that they need expect no territorial acquisitions, that Macedonia is a state unto itself. "Bands" and propagandists, whoever they are, must be repressed in the sternest manner. Then Macedonia will have an opportunity to A KETTLE OF FISH. 17 develop ; and in that development and consequent prosperity I have some hope that in years to come the inhabitants will think less of their Turkish, Bulgarian, or Greek origin and a great deal more of the fact that they are all Macedonians. And then only can self-government be conceded to Mace- donia. Behind that, however, I have hopes there may be a Confederation of the Balkan States, with the remainder of European Turkey as part of the Confederation. So long as there are half a dozen little nations open to attack by powerful neighbours, the Balkans will continue to be a region of unrest. A Confederation of the States for de- fensive purposes would, however, not only count for mutual prosperity, but would remove the cause of the bad dreams from which European statesmen often suffer. CHAPTEE II. BELGBADE. A Russian Town made Clean — Military Officers — The Mark of a Crime — Rival Dynasties, ObrenoTitch and Kaxageorgovitch — King Milan — King Alexander and Queen Draga — Austria's Hand in the Plot — Breaking into the Palace — The Search for the King and Queen — A Woman's Shriek — Murder of the Queen's Brothers, of Ministers and Officials — Where the King and Queen were Buried — Indignation of the Powers — The Servian People not Responsible for the Crime — Plot and Counterplot — ^The Serbs a Nation of Peasants — The National Garb Dying Out. When you have got south of the Danube, crossed the sprawling Save, left Hungary and its swarthy Magyars behind, you feel, despite the testimony of your map, that you have stepped out of Europe into Asia. Yet Belgrade, high-perched, and turning the eye of its citadel toward the twin and quarrelsome em- pire of Austria-Hungary — the wolf which constantly frightens little Servia that it is going to be gobbled up, only the other wolf, Eussia, also hungry, is showing its teeth — is not at all Asiatic in appear- ance. It is bright and white, broad-streeted, and clean, wide-spreading. The people are Slav, fair, bony, not well-set ; but occasionally you note a tinge in the skin, a cast of the eye, a thinness of the nos- trils which tell of splashes of Tartar, Magyar, even Turkish blood. Belgrade, however, is European — outwardly. It looks like a Eussian town made clean. Had I been 18 BELGRADE. 19 borne from Paris to Belgrade by the agency of the magic carpet instead of by the service of the Orient Express, I should have concluded I wa.e in a Russian city where the scavengers had been busy, and the citizens had profited by lectures on sanita- tion and the advantages of whitewash. Not that Belgrade is devoid of odour. In the lower town it breathes upon you — the soft, rather quaint smell which greets you in the East, maybe antiseptic, possibly decayed Turk, and certainly flavoured with defective drainage. Within easy memory Belgrade was a Turkish town. Slobberly Turkish soldiers and wheezy Tiurkish guns looked over the citadel and ramparts. But the Turk has gone, save a few decrepit old men who sit in the cellars of the lower town, puff their narghilis, slither to the little mosque, as shaky as themselves, kneel on the ragged carpets and worship Allah, sHther back again to their narghilis, and philosophically resign themselves to kismet. The Servians have rebuilt their capital. Evi- dence of the Turkish occupation is removed. Elec- tric tramcars whiz along the streets ; the electric light blinks at you as, in the dusk of a sultry day, you sit beneath the limes and sip Turkish coffee — the one legacy of tlie Turkish occupation the Servians accept. The smart German waiter at your hotel has learnt English at your favourite restaurant in London, and the price charged for a second-rate bed- room is the same as that at Eitz's or the Savoy. Belgrade is doing its best to acquire European habits. There is never a moment in the streets when the 20 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. eye can escape a military officer. The officers are as handsome, as well-set, and carry themselves with as jaunty a bearing as any in Europe. They are neat and well groomed; their garb — peaked caps, close-fitting and spotless white tunics, and crimson trousers — is distinctive. I did hear Servians com- plain that their officers are fonder of the card table and the cafe than of military study. When I saw the officers of a cavalry regiment give a display before King Peter I was surprised such fine fellows on such excellent horses should ride so badly. It is permitted to young officers all the world over to have a little swagger of demeanour. In Bel- grade you notice that the extra swagger is v?ith those who wear on the breast an enamelled Maltese cross with golden rays between. That is the first signal you get — notwithstanding the up-to-dateness of Bel- grade in aspect and attire — that you are among a people who do things the rest of Europe could not do. The medal is the acknowledgment by King Peter to those soldiers who took part in the bloody assassination of King Alexander and his consort Draga on that dread night in June, 1903. The officers are proud of the barbarous deed. They have a lighter, brisker step than those who have no such medal. You are startled at the number of officers who wear it. Yet I never saw it worn anywhere outside Belgrade. The explanation is that King Peter keeps near him the regiments which betrayed Alexander and placed Peter on the throne of Servia — a very unstable throne. Other regiments, not implicated in the conspiracy, possibly resenting the BELGRADE. 21 disgrace brought upon their country, have been care- fully distributed throughout Servia. The danger of concerted retaliation is small. That tragedy was one of the blood marks in a long, wretched royal vendetta, the end of which is not yet. The story of it all is like an historical novel, with more than the usual amount of plotting, counter-plotting, daring deeds, dark crimes, and the love of women. Servia has had much buffeting. At the time England was settling down under the Nor- man Conquest, the Serbs, tribes which in unknown times had wandered to the Balkan Peninsula from the Ural Mountains, coalesced, and the Servian empire arose. Afterwards came the Turk. The re- sistance was valiant, but the Serbs were crushed. The Ottoman pressed on, crossed the Danube, and advanced toward Vienna itself. Later came the push- ing back of the Turk. He was forced below the Danube, and Servia was the buffer which bore many blows whilst the Moslem, fighting hard, backed Asia- wards. In time, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the Serbsthemselves rose against theirTurk- ish masters. The great leader was Karageorge (Black George), a swineherd say some, a brigand say others, a brave man certainly. One of his aids, another brave man, was Obren. Karageorge, after long struggle against the Turks, lost heart and retired to Hungary. Obren continued the resistance and broke the power of Turkey. He became king. He was the founder of the Obrenovitch dynasty, of which the murdered Alexander was a son. Karageorge de- sired the crown. Obren refused. Then the vendetta 22 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. began. The Obrenovitch dynasty was overthrown. The Karageorgovitch dj'nasty began. And for a century Servia has been a hotbed of conspiracy between the rival houses. Murder has provided the step to the throne. Though Milan Obrenovitch, father of Alexander, was the darling of the soldiery, because he cut the last thread which bound Servia in vassalage to Turkey, and made Servia an independent kingdom, he only reached the throne by murder. He was a dominating personal- ity, but he had the morals of a Tartar chief, and his treatment of his beautiful Queen Natalie — now living quietly in the Biviera mourning her murdered son — made him the disgrace of Europe. He lost favour with the Servian people. Probably fearing the assassin's bullet, he abdicated in favour of his son Alexander, a mere boy, and retired to his amours in Vienna and Paris. Alexander had much of his father in him. That he was boorish and unintelligent is untrue. But when he reached the full power of kingship he showed a stubbornness that was the despair of those about him. He was quick in understanding, had almost genius for reaching the root of a matter. But advice and argument were things he never heeded. He displayed what was almost a madman's eccen- tricity in his thorough enjoyment of upsetting Government plans. He would acquiesce in a Minis- terial proposal, and then begin plotting to upset it. He regarded the discomfiture of his Ministers with unfeigned delight. There were two Houses of Par- liament — the Senate, and the House of Eepresenta- BELGRADE. 23 tives. When he found the Senate opposed to his will, he rose one morning, abolished it, reverted to a Constitution of ten years before, and appointed another and obedient Senate — all in about half an hour. That sort of conduct he considered clever. But it aroused bad thoughts in the country. Then came Draga. She was the widow of a Bel- grade official — a beautiful woman, vsdth soft and cap- tivating eyes, an excellent conversationalist; she had all the personal qualities which fascinate men. When she was thirty-two and Alexander was eigh- teen she became his mistress. The relationship was quite open. That Alexander had the deepest and most sincere affection for Draga is undoubted. Her influence over bim was tremendous. She was the only person in the world who exercised power over the King's actions. And though, according to the moral standpoint, the relationship was bad, Draga' s influence was good. Alexander was too headstrong to care whether he was personally popular. Draga did her best to restrain the King's immoderate conduct. Her power in the Court was great, though probably not so great as generally thought. Endeavours were made to estrange the King from Draga. Even the Oriental method of bringing young and sprightly actresses before him was adopted. It was no good. Alexander would look at no other woman than Draga. His friends in the European courts thought the liaison would stop on the King's marriage to a princess — a necessary proceeding, for Alexan- der was the last of the Obrenovitch line. It was possible to find him a bride among the German 24 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. princesses. Would he agree ? Yes ; and he left the details to be arranged by his father, the exiled Milan, and the Emperor Prancis Joseph of Austria. A suitable German princess was found, all the purely personal arrangements were made, the time arrived for the announcement to be made to the world. Then, as usual, Alexander fooled everybody. He married Draga. The Serbs, who did not concern themselves much so long as the woman was only the "King's mistress, felt they had been slapped in the face. There were the customary stories, that Queen Draga was little other than a strumpet, that she had been the mis- tress of other men before she met King Alexander : stories most likely untrue, but not unnatural among a people who smarted under insult. She was hated. Nothing the King did unwisely but Queen Draga was always seen behind the action. Draga was a woman as well as a queen. She had old scores to pay off in regard to other women who held their skirts on one side in former days. There was the snubbing of women against whom there was no scandal. Draga's two brothers were given high places in the army, and they, presuming too much on their relationship with the Queen, were unpopular with their brother officers. Draga was an ambitious woman. She desired that one of her own blood should ultimately succeed Alexander as king. The news spread that Draga was about to present Alexander with an heir. A great Paris specialist was brought to Belgrade and said it was so. Then rumour got to work. It reached the Austrian Court. BELGRADE. 25 The Emperor Francis Joseph wanted definite in- formation. Two great Viennese specialists were sent to Belgrade. They reported that not only was it not so, but it was a physical impossibility. The mystery has never been cleared up, but the belief in Belgrade is that Queen Draga was in collusion with her married sister, and hoped to introduce to the Serbs a baby nephew as the son of King Alexan- der. No wonder, with this story-book proceeding taking place in their midst, the people of Servia were beginning to seethe with indignation against Alexan- der and Draga. Servia had had enough of them. They must be got rid of. But the Serb people con- templated nothing more drastic than exile. Meanwhile there was living on the banks of Liake Geneva, very modestly. Prince Peter Karageorgo- vitch, the claimant of the Servian throne for the rival dynasty. He was a widower with two sons and a daughter. His wife had been a daughter of Prince Nicholas of Montenegro. When she died Prince Nicholas stopped the payment of the income from her dowry. So Prince Peter Karageorgovitch lived quietly. There was an anti-Obrenovitch party in Servia, working secretly for the overthrow of the ruling dynasty and the re-establishment of the Karageorgo- vitches. When you talk to men in Belgrade you hear that Austria found much of the money for sub- terranean propaganda, and then you are told in a whisper — for once you get below the surface in Bel- grade you breathe conspiracy — that Austria's motive was not simply to provide Servia with a more 26 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. promising sovereign, but really to cause disruption in the state, bring about civil war, give Austria an excuse in the sacred name of peace to intervene, to pour her troops into Servia — and to keep them there. Then came the deed of June 10th, 1903. There had been a family supper party at the Palace. Midnight had gone, and the King and Queen had retired to bed. All vras still. Then uproar. A couple of regiments hurried through the streets of Belgrade. Heavy guns rattled, and soldiers were supplied with ammunition. " The King is in danger," the soldiers were told — which indeed he was, though the troops did not know what part they were to play. The Palace, all in darkness, was surrounded. A signal was given. The traitor within the walls should have unbolted the doors. No response. It was given again. No response. Curses, but no time to be lost. Conspirator officers crashed the door. The traitor who was to have given entrance was in the lethargy of intoxication. His brains were blown out. To the room of Alexander and Draga ! All was turmoil. An aide-de-camp of the King appeared affrightedly. To the royal apartment ! He refused. He was shot dead. The bedroom was reached; the lock was broken. The bed had been occupied, but the King and Queen were gone. They must be found. Minutes were valuable. The town would soon be roused ; the police would be sum- moned ; regiments a mile outside Belgrade would arrive. Then the conspirators would be shot down like dogs. They searched eagerly, ravenous for BELGRADE. 27 blood ; but in vain. They found another aide-de- camp. He knew nothing of the flight of the King and Queen. Eevolver at his head, he was directed to lead the search. He led to a little room where was the electric light installation. With his foot he smashed the connection. There was black gloom. Matches were struck, and death was the payment for that kick. Stricken with dismay at the miscarriage of then- plans, the conspirators groped their way to the servants' quarters. They got candles. Hirrry ! or their lives would be forfeit for the wild endeavour of the night. The Palace was searched. Gone ! Frenzy strack the conspirators. They fired then- revolvers into every cranny. And the town was aroused. The police dashed up. Eifle shots and ranged cannon drove them back. News of the revolution reached the troops beyond the town. Officers spurred up, were met and were killed. The troops before the Palace began to murmur, to waver. Let the other troops come up and there would be war in the streets. ' ' In the name of Christ, hurry!" was the blasphemous cry of the conspirators outside. Enraged, mad- dened, distraught with terror at the miscarriage of their designs, the conspirators inside the Palace pursued their search. They fired at random, and into walls. A bullet pierced a thin lath partition. There was the shriek of a woman. "By God, we've found them!" It was a cupboard where Draga's gowns were kept. The door was broken open. There, in the flicker of candle light, stood the 28 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. King and Queen, pale to ashen hue. But one moment they looked on their hunters. Alexander stepped in front of Draga to protect her. It was only for an instant. They sank beneath the bullets. The animals, not content with the death of their quarry, slashed the dead with their sabres — hor- rible, awful mutilations. " Hurry up, for Christ's sake, hurry up ! " was the cry. The troops beyond the gates were on the point of revolt. The window was raised. "It is all over," wias the reply. " Prove it ; let us see ! " Then, in the dark of the night, with no light but the uncertain flicker of the candles, two figures, ghastly and blood-smeared, were flung from the first storey window into the grounds below. The revolution was accomplished. In an ugly, half- naked heap lay the last of the House of Obrenovitch. But the gory work of the night was not yet ended. The house where Draga 's two brothers lived was surrounded. When told of their fate, all they asked was a dgarette and a glass of water. They drank the water, and whilst smoking their cigarettes they were shot. Other detachments visited the houses of the Prime Minister, the Minis- ter for War, and officials who might exercise authority against the revolutionaries. They were murdered, some before their wives and little children. Between thirty and forty lives were claimed in those awful two hours. The work, however, was done. The Eevolution was complete. There was now time for the officers BELGRADE. 29 to drink wine and display their bloodstained swords to the women in houses of Hi-fame. The conspirators promenade the streets of Bel- grade to-day with wives and sisters on their arms; they make lowly obeisance before the altars of the Servian Church ; they are merry and happy beneath the trees, where they sip their coffee and listen to the lustful music of the Tzigane bands. And they are proud of the white enamelled cross, with the golden rays, that they wear above their hearts. I visited the place where the dead King Alex- ander, aged twenty-six, and the dead Queen Draga, aged forty, were unceremoniously tossed to burial with none so merciful to say a prayer for the peace of their souls. In the dawn, and conveyed in a common cart, they were buried behind the door of the Uttle church of St. Mark in the old ceme- tery. A couple of rough wooden crosses lean against the wall. On one is painted "Alexander Obrenovitch ," and on the other is " Draga Obreno- vitch." That is all. Some day, maybe, they will be buried with the circumstance befitting their rank, and vsdth charity towards the frailties of their humanity. Europe was rightly indignant with Servia for this the latest crime to blacken its annals. All the foreign Ministers were withdrawn as a mark of disapproval. But when Prince Peter hastened to Belgrade to secure the kingship, and be crowned with an iron crown made from part of the first cannon his ancestor Karageorge directed against the Turks, the Russian and Austrian and the other 30 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. European Ministers came trooping back to bow the knee to King Peter. Only Great Britain held aloof. The Ministers told the Court they would not attend a New Year celebration if the conspira- tors were allowed to be present. The Court salaamed and were very sorry, but the officers who took part in the Revolution could not be excluded. So the Ministers left again. In a week or two the Eussian Minister was back. Austria, fearing its rival might secure the diplomatic upper hand, sent her Minister also, post haste. Then came the German Minister and the rest. Still the British Government held aloof. The Serbs laughed. "You," they said to the Ministers, "come here to squeeze advantages from Servia. Only Britain has acted consistently." In their hearts the Serbs admire England for refusing to recognise King Peter. But they regret it, and nobody feels more hurt than King Peter himself. He is a kindly man, but he feels an outcast among kings. Neither he nor the Crown Prince has caught the favour of the populace. The King lacks tact, and sometimes fails to do the things which touch the popular fancy. When he drives through the city, officials turn into shops or down by-streets rather than salute him. As for the crowd, there is no cheering, and seldom the raising of hats. Do the Servian people approve of the drastic means by which Alexander and Draga were re- moved? I am positive they do not. It is true they wanted to get rid of Alexander and Draga, BELGRADE. 31 but their thoughts did not travel beyond exile. It was the Army, and only a section of the Army, which conspired to free Servia by miu'der. Then why did not the Serbs rise, repudiate the conspira- tors and the new king? Because the Serbs, whilst having a warm love for their land, have a touch of the Asiatic, shrug-shoulder acceptance of facts. Alexander and Draga were dead. Another revolt would not bring them again to life. Besides, they were, not deserving of tears. A Mng was wanted. Why not Peter Karageorgovitch, who was a Serb, and the descendant of their national hero? And what would civil war mean? Much bloodshed un- doubtedly. Worse, for already Austrian troops were massing north of the Danube ready to invade Servia to restore order. The Austrians would come to stay, and the days of Servia as a nation would be gone. That was the real factor which guided the Serbs in their acquiescence in the new order of things. They felt and feel that their country stands disgraced in the eyes of the world. But that is not so bad as becoming an Austrian province. Get below the surface of things in Belgrade and you hit conspiracy at every point. You hear of a movement to place the conspirators, the King included, on their trial, and let the lot be shot. You hear of a movement to bring an illegitimate son of King MUan to the throne. There are rais- ings of the eyebrows ; that would be restoring the Obrenovitches, and the last was supposed to die with Alexander. You hear of the country repu- diating all Obrenovitches and all Karageorgovitchea 32 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. because they have made Servia a land of vendetta. You hear of a movement to offer the throne to a Montenegrin prince who would come with clean record and yet be of Serb blood. Sometimes en- vious eyes are cast across the frontier where Bul- garia has made such strides under a foreign prince. But the Serbs are a proud people ; they would chafe under the idea of a foreigner being their king. So that possibility is only mentioned to be dismissed. The Serbs are democratic. They have no nobility. Of rich men, such as we of the West understand by the expression, they have none. Country estates do not exist. I doubt if in aU Servia, with its three millions of population ^ there are half a dozen private houses in which a dinner party could be given to twenty people. One of the characteristics of Belgrade is the smallness of the residences. They are neat, clean, have gardens, and teU the story of general, frugal comfort. The servant ques- tion has extended to Servia. A Serb, man or woman, thinks it degrading to be in service to someone else. So in the hotels servants usually are German, whilst in the private houses the womenfolk attend to the needs of their families. The consequence is that the Serb, though good- natured, is little given to entertaining. Occasion- ally a big supper is provided at the Palace, and everybody who is anybody — eight hundred out of a population of about seventy thousand — ^is in- vited. So unused is the Serb to this kind of enter- tainment that he scrambles for the cigarettes. BELGRADE. 33 pockets dainties for friends at home, and has been known to leave with a bottle of wine under each oxter. Usually he dines with his friends at the cafe, spends a merry, laughing hour, and goes to bed early. I have walked along the main street of Belgrade at ten o'clock at night and not en- countered a soul. The nature of a race is not altered with a change of clothes. And although Belgrade looks European, the Serb is still the peasant of a hundred years ago, with peasant tastes, peasant virtues ; he is simple-mannered, kind, sentimental, and -yet vsdth a smouldering fire in his heart, the result of cen- turies of oppression and struggle and fight — a fire which, when it bursts into flame, shows that the Serb has much of the blind fury of the savage. There is a little picture gallery in Belgrade, where are a few good pictures and many indifEerent. But there are some on view which, from their subject, would be excluded from any Western gal- lery. They are very " bluggy " pictures. The place of honour is given to a big canvas represent- ing a grey ledge of rock in the Albanian mountains where an Albanian has been decapitated, his head placed between his legs, whilst his wife and child stare distractedly at the gazeless eyes. There is a plenitude of "purple patch" in the picture. Another scene is that of a woman just ending the operation of cutting a man's throat. The eyes of the dead man are repulsive, the skin has the sallowness of death, the throat — well, the custo- dian put his finger on it and told me it was very 34 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. fine. The attractiveness of these pictures — if at- tractiveness is the proper word — is in the gore. The old Serb garb is disappearing amongst those above the peasant class, save some middle-aged ladies who still retain the costume of their mothers — full but plain skirt, a zouave jacket fringed with gold or silver lace, a low-crowned, red Turkish fez, rather on the back of the head, while the hair plaited in one long coil is twisted round the fez, so that it cannot be seen from the front, and only the red disc of the top is seen from behind. Men and women usually dress in the European style. At the fall of the sun all Belgrade comes out to promenade the streets, the ladies dressed as prettily and much in the same way as the ladies at an English watering place. The shops devoted to the sale of picture postcards are as many as in any French, German, or English town. There are plenty of picture postcards of King Peter, plenty of portraits of King Peter in the hotels. But no- where in any part of Servia did I see a picture of Alexander. Even the coins bearing his effigy have been withdrawn from circulation. The authorities would wipe his memory from the public niind. Here and there is a touch of Servian colour. In the market-place are gathered the peasants with their wares for sale — big flat cheeses of sheeps' milk, piles of grapes and peaches, mammoth melons, masses of brilliant tomatoes. The men, lithe and lank, sunbaked of cheek, wear skin caps, an upper garment of white — half -shirt, half-smock — trousers white and like a pair of shrunken pyjamas. Their BELGRADE. 35 legs are swathed in rough home-spun stockings, generally with a red band ; on their feet are crude sandals thonged across the instep and round the ankle. The peasant women are plain of feature and inclined to podginess ; they wear short petticoats and have gaudy handkerchiefs tied over their heads. The Belgrade housewife does her own marketing, and there is much haggling. A man wanders through the crowd singing he has sweet drink to sell. Priests of the Servian Church, men with long black hair, black whiskers, and in long black gowns, receive salaams. A policeman, looking like a soldier, and with a horse pistol in his belt, marches along carry- ing a document. He is followed by an official who beats tap-tap-tap on a kettledrum. There is a halt, and the drum rolls. Everybody makes a rush and gathers round the policeman, who in a mumbling voice, not to be heard half a dozen paces away, reads a proclamation. Tap-tap-tap, and a move is mad© elsewhere. Out on the dusty country road I heard the shrill call of the bugle. A detachment of young soldiers came swinging by, with a long stride and dip of the body, like Highlanders on the march. There was no smartness. Their dark blue forage caps and dark blue breeches were grimy with dust, their cotton smocks would have been benefited by a wash, their boots were down at heel. Stuck in most of their caps was a bunch of clover, or a couple of ears of wheat. The officer, on a capital horse, was neatness itself. From a turn of the road came a clanging sound. 36 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Here were forty prisoners, gruesome fellows, all chained, clanging their way, talking loud and laugh- ing. An escort, with swords drawn, walked along- side. Further on, the highway was being repaired by convict labour. As the men, tawny sans-cnlottes , heaved the pick, they had the tune of their chains for music. At intervals soldiers rested on their rifles, ready to curb their charges should any be seized with a desire for quick exercise. CHAPTER III. A SITTING OF THE SERVIAN PAELIAMEKT. A Mean House of Parliament — A Debate — Short-lived Governments — Dealing with Irregular Elections — Democratic Appearance of the Slembers — A Congeries of Cliques — The Pay of Members and Ministers— The Leader of the Opposition — ^The Minister of Justice — An Interview with the Prime Minister. One of these days the Servians will build for them- selves a Parliament House in Belgrade that will be worthy of their nation. Till that time they are con- tent to hold the Skoupshtina in a place which looks like a French country inn from the outside, and much like a barn inside. The Servian, while conducting you to the Skoup- shtina, bemoans that his Parliament meets in so wretched a style, asks fifty times during your visit if you are disappointed, and, as you are leaving, promises that the next time you honour the Sendan nation with a visit there will assuredly be a new Parliament House. Certainly the Skoupshtina is undistinguished. It is lath and plaster and whitewash. In front and at the side are lime trees, and beneath these the Servians sit in their varied garbs — the town men in clothes imitating those of Western Europe, but those from the provinces in brown homespun zouave jackets, beflowered shirts, tight-fitting brown home- spun trousers, and rough rural-made sandals. Or they are in loose white garments, white trousei-s which look as though they have shrunk in the wash, 37 38 PICTURES PROM THE BALKANS. and white shirts falling to their knees, at first sug- gesting that their owners have forgotten to tuck them in their proper place. And everybody smokes cigar- ettes. Near the doorway lounge one or two police- men in blue uniforms, peaked cap, top boots, and with bulging revolver cases on the waist belt — amiable men, despite their warlike appearance. I conversed through an open window with a dark , Muscovite-like gentleman, with cropped head and a black beard spreading like a fan from the chin . He had hay fever, for our talk, frigid at first, but speedily cordial, was interspersed with considerable sneezing. I had a message from a dignitary that I be ad- mitted to hear the debate. Could that honour be mine ? The honour was all on the other side ! I bowed and received a card. A tinkle of a bell, and I had two attendants : a tawny, wiry little man who pirouetted about me like a dancing-master, opened doors, salaamed, backed into the wall, salaamed again, and made me feel pasha-likeand uncomfortable with his excess of politeness ; and a big policeman , who evidently was not quite satisfied of the wisdom of admitting a foreigner — possibly an abhorred Aus- trian, if not that incarnation of wickedness a Bul- garian — to the deliberations of Servia's Parliament. Phew ! was my gasp at the top of a dingy and creaking flight of stairs. The air was thick, oily, and sickeningly sultry. I was in a crush of Servians who were straining their necks and their ears. An excitable gentleman down below was getting thin of voice whilst first addressing two upraised fingers < THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT. 39 on his left hand, and then two upraised fingers on the right hand, repeatedly turning his head whUet swiftly he brought each pair within three inches of his nose and spoke to them for their virtue's sake. Phew again ! I was pressed through a steaming mob and reached the Diplomatists' Gallery — which I took as a compliment — crowded with round and weighty and panting individuals. Were these am- bassadors? Oh, no ! ambassadors never came ! Well, yes, perhaps, some of them, at the opening of Par- liament. Accordingly when Servian gentlemen were fat and hot, and their legs were inclined to weary, it was usual to allow them to fill the Diplomatists* Gallery. They did fill it, in swelling measure. I got standing room in the only interstice. The House was crowded with Servian representa- tives. It was a great debate : the fate of the Govern- ment rested upon it. The balance of parties was such that the Prime Minister had a majority of one — not large, but 'twould serve. Let the Govern- ment be defeated, and alas ! they would be in a minority of five — a hopeless minority. But only perhaps for a week or so, when the new Government would be defeated and a fresh party would come into power. For the Servian Parliament is the creature of the public will, and as it is the Servian political temperament always to be disgusted with things that are, to be confident a change would be an advantage, and to be furious — when the change has taken place — at finding things very much the same, there is a kaleidoscope of crises. The Servian Parliament is elected for four years ; 40 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. ifc usually lasts about two years, and if in that time there have not been half a dozen or eight changes of Ministry, politics have been dull. There had been a general election of 160 members a week or two before my visit. Parliament, however, had sat for a week. The first problem was to deal with elections in which there had been irregularities. The first concerned a batch of six seats — one Government and five Opposition. The Government were magnanimous. Irregularities might occur in the best-conducted of elections. Why, of course ! Let them be overlooked, and all six seats be allowed. As it was five to one, the Opposition regarded the result as quite sensible, because it limited the Government majority to one, instead of to five. Now came up a second batch of irregular elec- tions — six of them, and all Government seats. Of course, said the Government, these seats will be allowed the same as the last seats were. The Op- position never heard of such a proposition ! Things were quite different ! It was all very well for Minis- ters to desire that the breaking of the law in regard to the election of members should be overlooked, but the Opposition were the champions of honour, of justice, of recognising the law. Why should they acquiesce in electoral law-breaking so that this Ministry be kept in power? Honest elections were more important than any Ministry. That was the pedestal of Parliamentary virtue on which they were standing when I visited the Skoupshtina. The Chamber was plain to cheapness. It was a large square room, with colour-washed walls. On a THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT. 41 raised dais covered with matting was a crimsou canopy, and beneath was a huge red velvet and gold arm-chair — the throne. In front, before a long deal table covered with green baize, sat the President, on an ordinary seaside-lodging-house sort of cane- bottomed chair. He was an alert little man, with scant hair brushed back from the temples, and an enlarged imperial on his chin. Before him was a gong-bell, and when he desired order so that an orator might be heard, or when, in his discretion, the orator attempted to widen the range of discussion, he whacked the bell with vigour. On the right was another green baize table where sat the Ministers, and on the left, a third green table where sat the Departmental Secretaries. In front, in a pew, sat the Eeporter — an official whose duty it is to explain what has been done in committee, to defend warmly what has been done, and to shrug his shoulders and make gestures of contemptuous resignation that any Serb cannot understand that what the Ministry proposes is entirely for the best. Then, in a tiered semicircle, with three gangways, sat the members. What struck me first was the democratic ap- pearance of the House. There was no man with countenance that might be described as aristo- cratic. It looked more like a gathering of labour leaders, farm labourers, a tiny sprinkling of shop- keepers, and one or two long-haired, long-gowned priests. The majority were in peasant garb, and looked for all the world like men taking it easy in their shirt-sleeves. Not inaptly this has been called the Peasants' Parliament. 42 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. The composition is of cliques rather than parties. As far as policy goes they are rather six of one and half a dozen of the other: keep down taxes, and hate the Austrians and Bulgarians. Personality is the real power. Rivals win followers, and the rival leaders support and overthrow each other as per- sonal advantage and sentiment — for the Servian is nothing if not sentimental — dictate. When I was there the Young Radicals were the cocks of the walk — ardent reformers who had got ahead of the Old Radicals because of their glowing enthusiasm. There were fifteen Nationalists, who used to call themselves Liberals, but changed their name simply because Nationalist had a finer sound. There were small cliques calling themselves Patriots, Conserva- tives, Progressives — who, by curious paradox, are the very people who do not want progress — one re- presentative of the Peasant party, the Joseph Arch of Servia — a party which once promised to achieve much in the rural districts, but didn't^and two Socialists, who only differ from other members in that they always put on their hats when the Presi- dent reads the King's Speech at the opening of Par- liament. The Skoupshtina is a conglomerate of men get- ting in each other's way. Servia will not make much political advance until it has shaken itself down into two parties with distinct policies, and the change of Ministry be less often than three or four times a year. These peasant members receive fif- teen francs a day whilst attending to their Parlia- mentary duties, and also free railway travelling. THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT HOUSE. IN THE MARKET AT BELGRADE THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT. 43 Ministers receive remuneration at the rate of 12,000 francs a year, whilst the Prime Minister gets an extra 6,000 francs. Seven hundred and fifty pounds a year is not excessive pay for a Prime Minister. The Skoupshtina always meets at nine in the morn- ing, sits on tUl about one, divides into committees for the afternoon, and sits again for an hour or two in the evening when necessary. As the subject, when I was there, was whether the Government of a week should remain in office, speeches were lively. But gesture seemed almost as important as speech. There was one peasant mem- ber who knew the wily ways of the Government ; he closed every other sentence by placing his forefinger tight against the side of his nose and then slowly winking over it, as much as to observe: " See, I know the game." Another behaved as though his hands offended him and he were endeavouring to shake them off, throw them away ; he became de- cidedly annoyed because they would stick to his arms. Interruptions occurred. They were tame in the way of interruptions compared with the wild hulla- baloo to which the British House of Commons oc- casionally yields itself. On the first "No, no!" the President gave a bang at his bell. When there were cries of " No, no ! " from half a dozen quarters he stood up and aimed steady blows at the bell. When the shouts approached clamorous protest he seemed intent on breaking that bell. He appealed for fair hearing, got into personal altercation with a member, and won easilv, because whenever the man 44 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. who had challenged him attempted to reply he drowned his utterance with the clang-clang, clang- clang of the Presidential bell. There were two undemonstrative speeches, one by M. Nicholas Pashitch, the Leader of the Opposi- tion, an elderly, long-bearded man, incisive, yet calm, and the Archpriest Gjuritch — a benevolent old man, with flowing white hair and a crimson girdle round his black frock — a man much honoured, because for years he languished in prison and in chains. He was supposed to be mixed up in some revolution during King Milan's lifetime. A Servian patriot who has been in prison — and there are many of them — ^is regarded much in the same light as an Irish patriot who has been flung into prison by an alien British Government. There were great demands by the Opposition that the Minister of Justice, M. Petchitch, should defend the justice of allowing illegally-elected members to sit. M. Petchitch was a youngish man inclined to fulness of cheek, but sallow, and his hair was dusted with grey. He spoke slowly, with long pauses, working his hands all the while as though weaving an exquisite pattern, and he always clinched an argument by making a little pat at the first button of his waistcoat, pulling it off in imagination, and then giving a little toss of it towards his critics. The heat of the Chamber was stifling. I ex- pected to see the whole Assembly dribble away. My collar melted. Members walked to the table and drank inordinate quantities of water. One or two fell asleep, and some whiled away the time THE SERVIAN PARLIAMENT. 45 by reading the local newspapers. I was about to retreat when a message arrived from the Prime Minister, M. Stoyanovitch. Would I honour him with a visit? I went to his room just behind the Chamber. He was a charming man, about middle age, dark, quietly dressed, but alert in manner. We exchanged compliments. What a miserable Skoupshtina for a gentleman from England to visit ! I assured him I was captivated vsdth the debate, and that I admired his amiability in being the head of a Government with a majority of only one. I was quite certain that if the Prime Minister of England could only visit Belgrade he would have such an infusion of courage that he would never bother his head if the majorities of his own Government sank to a couple of dozen. M. Stoyanovitch clasped his hands ; a majority of twenty-four or thirty a small majority ! He threw his eyes to the roof ! What victory would strew his path for years if he had such a majority ! Enter the Minister of the Interior, M. Paviche- vitch, a cheery, twinkle-eyed man with an excellent taste in cigarettes. There was general conversation. Servia was a little country with a big heart ! It had a mighty past ; surely it had a magnificent future. It teemed with prosperity. It had its internal troubles — assassination of Kings and Prime Ministers and such-like — ^but these were not mentioned. It hoped soon to have a big army, for Austria, a few miles away, was hungry for terri- tory, and the Bulgarian neighbour? — a raise of the eyebrows, a shrug of the shoulders, and a meaning 46 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. smile ! England had no territorial aspirations in the Balkans ; England had ever proved the friend of small countries, and if Servia with the all- povFcrful aid of mighty England — and so on. I went back to the Diplomats' Gallery. The atmosphere was that of a Eussian bath. The rival cliques were shouting at one another ; the Reporter was forcJbFy orating and nobody listening. The President was more determined than ever to smash that bell. The rivals exhausted their mutual re- crimination — ' ' You were not legally elected ! ' ' met with "Who are you to talk? most illegally elected! " — ^the Reporter sank back breathless, the President's hand got sore banging the bell, and he wrapped his handkerchief round his fist. In a pause he pantingly exclaimed : ' ' The House is adjourned for ten minutes." Blessed relief ! Members tumbled out and made for the adjoining cafe, where native wine and beer and coffee were to be had. Afterwards I heard that the Government maintained its triumphant majority of one. The Prime Minister was safe in his office for a week. I hope for at least a fortnight, for M. Stoyanovitch did me several courtesies. CHAPTEE IV. A MONASTIC EETREAT. The Most Famous Monastery in Servia — The Archimandrite — A Ghmpse o£ the First King of Servia — The Vicissitudes of a Silver Cofiin— Sacredness of the King's Remains — ^A Devout Brigand — Dinner in the Monastery — The Church — Feast of St. Maiy. Dawn crept over the back of the Servian hills, throwing the palest of green lights into a velvety sky. There glistened a myriad stars which seemed to have come nearer to earth than they do in other lands. It was four o'clock in the morning, and the monastery bell was clang-clang-clanging, send- ing forth its summons to prayer. I rose from the simple bed the monks had given me, left my cell, and went on to the broad arched balcony. The air was crisp and stinging with life. From the gloom came the blusterous roar of the river hastening from the Turkish hills to the mighty Danube. The monastery cockerel raised his shrill voice heralding the morning. An unmonastic cockerel gave him challenge from a dis- tance. Across the grass, silent, like shadows, stole the black-cloaked monks. Taper lights, fitful and vagrant, appeared through the deep-recessed and dusky windows of the church. The clang of the bell ceased. Then sonorous but mufSed came the intonation of the monks as, in the old Slavonic tongue of their fathers, they began the day with obeisance to God. 47 48 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Somehow, as I stood there in the chill of the morning, bathing my sbul in peace, I felt I had slipped back through centuries. The clamour of great cities, the screech of trains, the conflicts of commerce, the maddening, deadening scramble for wealth — all such things were but a blurred dream from which I had just awakened. I knew it was not many days since I whizzed through the stifling London streets on the top of a motor omnibus. But it was gracious, while watching the heavens blush with the new day, and listening to the prayers of the monks for us all, to let fancy rove wayward and picture that the simple life in a monastery — far from the track of rushing civilisation, not easy to reach, visited maybe by a single foreigner a year, where indeed the world stands still, the same to-day as four centuries ago — is really the life beautiful. Without any priggish pretension to devoutness, the ordinary man, who kicks about the world, is worldly, and knows what modern life means, can go to Studenitza Monastery and feel a little cleaner of heart for his few days' retreat from the outer world. This monastery is the most famous in Servia. It is intimately associated with the history of the Serbs as a people. It is a shrine. The first crowned King of Servia sleeps here ; the latest crowned King, Peter, came here and kissed on the brow his predecessor of nigh six centuries ago. From eight in the morning till hot afternoon I had ridden in a crawling, often halting, local train. A winding branch line pushed towards the hills. At A MONASTIC RETREAT. 49 a little town there was coffee to be sipped with officials, and haggling with a horse owner for a carriage and horses. There followed an evening drive of forty miles towards the wilderness, the moon our only lantern. At midnight we rattled over the cobbles of the town of Krahevo, slept well at the inn, rose at five, were off at six, followed the swirling waters of the Ibar through the mountains, admired a big, square, ruined castle perched on the rock — which did brave service against the Turks in the centuries that are nothing but rankling memories — fed beneath the trees and slept beneath the trees, struck away up a ravine — surely 'the haunt of brigands, though so peaceful in the glow of fading afternoon — and, just as the Archimandrite had backed from the church door, bowed his head and made the sign of the cross, disturbed him by our arrival. We smiled and he bowed. We bowed. Then through my interpreter I said nice things and presented my note of introduction from the Prime Minister of Servia. .' The Archimandrite was a tall, spare old man, with long but thin grey hair and grey beard ; a stern old man, with a visage like that of John Knox, but an old man who had lived amid the sanctity of these hills for forty-six years, away from the world, knowing little of the world, having never been out of Servia. He had a beautiful smile. " I said to myself nearly fifty years ago when I came here that I must never regret. And I have never regretted. I am content. It is very quiet here — a very difficult place for a stranger from England 50 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. to reach. I am honoured. Let me see to your room." What a restful room it was ! Absolutely severe. But there was refreshment in the thick walls, in the shadows, in the look through the narrow win- dows to the hills beyond. A peasant, in the white and cleanly garb of his race, was in attendance. There was welcome : first a little glass of whisky made by the monks from plums, then several spoon- fuls of preserved cherries, a long drink of icy water, and a tiny cup of Turkish coffee — and all the time the peasant stood like a waxwork holding the little tray before him. So began my rest at Studenitza Monastery. High walls clasp the sanctuary. In the middle of the sloping sward stands the church, built of white marble from adjoining quarries. That was in the twelfth century, when the Serbs, who had wandered from beyond the Volga, made a nation of themselves with a bigger land than they own to-day. Here Stephen, the first crowned King of Servia, was made ruler, and here rest his bones. The double coffin was opened for me to see the form of the sainted king — shrouded, and on his breast a golden cross, containing in its centre a morsel of wood which tradition says, and the faithful believe, is part of the true Cross. When the Archimandrite and I entered the church we were followed by several countrymen who had travelled two days over the hills to attend a festival on the morrow. They stood back humbly, for the shrouded King Stephen is not for peasants' eyes. But when X had cast a A MONASTIC RETREAT. 51 curious gaze, the chief of the monastery invited the peasants to come forward. They bent their heads ; they crossed themselves; they kissed the edge of the outer coffin ; they kissed the cross ; they kissed the covered forehead of the King ; they crossed themselves again. Their rugged, sunbaked coun- tenances were illumined with light, for a precious opportunity had been theirs. I have mentioned two coffins. The first is of black wood, inlaid with exquisite gold and silver design ; the outer is a massive silver casque, mag- nificently embossed, supported by silver angels, with a mighty silver cross resting on the crimson velvet lid ; the interior is of blue satin, with three plaques in the lid representing incidents in the life of Stephen. But Stephen has not rested quietly. The vendetta between Servia's later rulers has been the cause of impious hustling — though surely he is a sufficiently far-off king for the rival Karageorgo- vitches and Obrenovitches to seek honour to them- selves in honouring him. When the last Karageorgovitch was on the throne, it was the mother of the present King Peter who hired the finest silversmiths of Vienna to make this gorgeous coffin. With reverence King Stephen was placed in it. But when murder brought the Obrenovitches to power, it would never do to have the most honoured of all Serb kings sleeping in a coffin presented by their enemies. So Stephen was removed, and lay, uncomplaining, in the old coffin which had served him for several hundreds of years. The silver coffin was hidden in a cellar. When 52 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Alexander and Draga visited Studenitza they saw nothing of the silver coffin. They presented the monastery with amazing golden robes and a golden communion cup. But when Alexander and Draga went their hurried way, and King Peter stepped to the throne, the silver coffin was brought out, pol- ished up, and Stephen once more laid in it — to the appreciation of King Peter when he visited the monastery, though he saw nothing of the woven golden robes nor of the golden communion cup, which were safely out of sight in the cellar. The sacredness of Stephen's bones is part of the faith of the Servian Greek Church. No people have so sure a faith as the peasants of the mountain slopes. The poor, the ignorant, and the humble have an exquisite advantage : they have no religious doubts. It is left for those who are more civilised, who have garnered culture, who have trifled with higher criticism and dabbled in the depths of com- parative theology, to smile at the reverence born of superstition. They can be condescending to those who have not yet learnt that it is all a mistake — though a beautiful mistake. But for such as these the simple faith of the peasants has its lessons. And the hallowed church — surely where for five hun- dred years men and women have poured forth their souls, have felt the anguish and found the hope, is hallowed — brings peace to the worldly man. The belief of others gives him a peep of something he lacks the quality to understand. Now the faith in the sacredness of the King's bones is shared by the devout and by others. No- A MONASTIC RETREAT. 53 thing is more firmly fixed in the peasant mind than that the possession of a piece of bone from King Stephen's skeleton is an absolute safeguard from death by bullet. And here I have a story to tell. For who is in more need of protection from bullets than the brigand, who must shift his abode often and show alacrity in keeping beyond the range of the rifles of the pursuing soldiery? The Archi- mandrite was one day honoured with a visit from the most notorious brigand in Servia. The priest's heart was glad ; the robber had turned from his wickedness ; he had repented. But he hadn't ! That was very far from the mind of the brigand. His visit had a more practical purpose. He con- fessed that in following his avocation he was occa- sionally worried at vs'hat might be the consequence if a stray bullet came his way. Indeed, he had become nervous about bullets. He did not at all fancy death by a bullet. So he sought the kind assistance of the Archimandrite. Let him have a small portion of the saintly King's skeleton, no matter how tiny, and not only would he be in- finitely obliged, but he would be able to follow his business without hesitation, and without fear of a leaden check. The reply he received was disap- pointing. The Archimandrite would not despoil the saintly king of a finger nail, even to oblige the most distinguished of brigands. A few days later the Archimandrite was thrown into a fluster. Though the monastery gates are locked nightly, somebody had surmounted the wall, smashed the church vdndow, gained entrance, and 54 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. wrenched open the coffin wherein lay the remains of King Stephen. The big toe had disappeared. It was well known who was the robber. Wonder pre- vailed whether carrying the saint's big toe as a charm was really efficacious in turning aside bullets. More than a year later the brigand was captured — alive. Knowing that his fate was sealed, he con- fessed. It was quite true he had rifled the coffin of the King's big toe. He carried it about with him, in a little bag strung round his neck. But after a time doubt troubled him. What if, after all, the big toe was no safeguard from a bullet? He decided to make an experiment. He fastened the charm to a lamb. Then he fired his gun. Just as he had dreaded ! The lamb fell dead. So he did not think much of kings' big toes as charms. How- ever — as he was about to be led out to be shot, sans toe — he returned the relic to the Archimandrite. The Archimandrite was joyed. He returned the big toe to be companion to the four little toes. And once more the skeleton of King Stephen is complete. It is pleasant to idle the days in this monastic retreat, to lounge within the shadows of the trees, to gossip with black -haired, black-whiskered, black- gowned monks : genially happy, and with no greater ambition than to take their last sleep close to the walls of the old church, where moss-fiaked slabs mark the stone cots in which monks of ages past have their eternal slumber. There is a little inn beyond the monastery gates. Vine leaves straggle over crooked boughs, and in the warm breath of the lazy afternoon it is well STUDENITZA MONASTERY. SOME OF THE MONKS. A MONASTIC RETREAT. 55 to sit within their fretted shade and drink the native wine, tart, strong, cool, enough for six of us, several glasses each, at a price of tenpence. The bell sounds vespers, and the monks go ofE to pray for us all. Night comes tardily, and the lights flicker eerily. In the long, dim hall is set a simple dinner. The Archimandrite mutters a blessing. I sit on his right with my interpreter facing me, and in the gloom stand the peasant servants, in clean linen garb, with crude shoes removed. It is a time of fasting, and the patriarch eats humbly of porridge and small cucumbers, vinegar-soaked. For his guest is a better meal , but all the dishes are vinegar- soaked, a simple monkish device to check the warm- ing of the blood. But there comes the wine. And what monastery is not proud of its wine? A great flagon of it, cool and delicious, is brought from the cellar : the real juice of the grape, grown and nur- tured by the monks, gathered by monks, pressed by monks, and drunk to bring sunshine into the heart. The old Archimandrite is proud of the wine of his monastery ; he stands, a tall, dignified figure, smiling as he fills my glass once, twice, thrice, many times. He watches with curious eyes my first taste, the parley with the wine upon the tongue, the appreciative smack of the lips. Later he drinks my health, standing, his spare, black figure bending over the table, his black eyes gleam- ing under his black, funnel-like hat, his grey hair tumbling about his shoulders. " My heart is very glad," says he. " It is a bright day, for the son of 56 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. the most enlightened of nations has travelled all this way to honour our humble monastery. I raise my glass to the distinguished gosipodin. I wish him a pleasant journey and a quick return to Servia." I have not the knack of pretty cross-table speeches. " Say thanks," I mutter to my inter- preter. Says the interpreter in free and elongated translation : ' ' The heart of the gospodin is so touched with your kindness that his tongue cannot express all he feels." The church, a medley of marble and whitewash, of precious relics and gewgaw decorations, has a chastened distinction. In its six hundred years it has had batterings. Time has done something In disfigurement, but the Turk has done more. The grey marble pavement is cracked and uneven. Marble pillars which graced the inner sanctuary have been wrenched away. A group of Apostles present only battered and unrecognisable features. The walls bear frescoes of saints painted in garish Byzantine style. But years have softened the colouring. In places the frescoes have gone, and cheap plaster fills the cracks. Turkish spears have smashed the painted faces of the saints, and a blodge of plaster has done the mending. There are pic- tures of sainted kings — famous in Servian history, but of whom the foreigner never heard, though he listens with the ears of a child to the story of their heroic deeds. The altar-screen is ornate with Scrip- tural scenes in the " Pilgrim's Progress " vein. About are heavy gold and silver ornaments. I see the robes worn on high festivals. A key opens a A MONASTIC RETREAT. 57 Clipboard full of sacred books in old Slavonic — all Eussian gifts from the time of Peter the Great. The Turks burned the old Servian manuscript volumes. There was celebrated the feast of Saint Mary. Peasants had come two, even three, days' journey. They were clean, stalwart. God-fearing people, picturesque in Balkan garb. Some came by horse ; most had walked. The women with their gay ker- chief head-coverings sat in huddled groups. The men, in groups also, sauntered the monastery grounds. A few stayed at the adjoining inn ; a few slept on the balcony of the cells ; most slept be- neath the trees. Quite a hundred arrived the after- noon before the festival. At sun-dip they munched their black bread. With the coming of night they wrapped their cloaks about them and slept beneath the stars, the burnished silver moon their lantern. At four in the morning, when the bell clanged, they crowded the church. I attended one of the services. The church reeked with incense. The voices of the monks, chanting in old Slavonic, were sonorous, musical, impressive. Only the voice of the Archimandrite had thinned with forty and more years of praying. The peasants stood with bowed heads and clasped hands. Their womenfolk stood modestly aside and in corners. The gilt doors of the Holy of Holies opened, and a monk, pale, with long raven hair, and wearing a robe of silver adornment, came swinging the censer. All the peasants knelt, and the intoning was loud and ardent. I daresay there 58 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. was much that was bizarre in the scene. I have thought so since. But just then I had eyes and ears only for the picture of reverent, humble folk, in an unknown corner of the world, giving heart-thanks to the Giver of the good they knew. THE CHURCH AT STl'DENITZA. CHAPTEK V. THE PEASANT NATION. The Serb a Hater of Town Life— A State without Towns — The Servian Pig — Why British Trade is DwindUng — Peasant Proprietorship — A Country Ruled by Local Government — Taxation — Military Service — A Simple, Genuine Folk. Servia is the real peasant state of the Balkans. The first proof is that the Serb, contrary to the tendency in other European countries, hates town life. The shop windows, the electric lights, the clatter of cabs have no attraction for him. When he comes into a town it is to sell or to buy some- thing, and then get to his homestead as quickly as possible. The life of the hills, its wildness, even its eeriness, has laid hold of him. He is emotional. So he loves well and hates well. He will do anything for you if he loves you ; if he hates you he will kill you, and mutilate your body afterwards. His tastes are simple. Civilisation, with its cheap excursion trains and music halls, has not reached him. His main amusement is to attend a Church festival, where not only is he conscious of doing good to his soul, but he is able to meet his friends, eat, drink, and be merry. On the eve of the Sabbath he puts on his best clothes, and the women put on their gaudiest of frocks. They meet on the sweep of green before the church. The local gypsies — tall, swarthy, handsome, most of them — provide shrill music, while the Serbs, 59 60 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. clasping each other by the hand, sing mournfully and gyrate sedately. It is a melancholy dance. But they are sure they are having a capital time. Except Belgrade, there are no towns worth the name. The " towns " are really big villages, with very wide streets and single-storey ed, unpicturesque houses. Everybody " makes promenade " in the evening. In the dusk the few paraffin lamps in drunken lamp-posts make the local inn — ^rather meagre in the daylight — quaintly bright. There are dozens of tables and hundreds of chairs. Every- body gathers, whole families, the merriest throng in the world. There are no rich people ; but wine is cheap, the coffee is good, the food is plain and inexpensive. From the ordinary point of view — that of the man who hves in Liondon, for instance — they are people to be commiserated. But not a bit of it. They are light-hearted and contented. And, after all, light-heartedness and contentment are worth much. Of course, Servia is an agricultural country. Its soil is good, and the yield is abundant. Some Serbs look to manufactures increasing the material wealth. But that is the road to losing money and securing heartache. The Serb is not deft in manu- facture ; factory life would be intolerable, because it would mean employer and employed, and the Serb has a quixotic repugnance to being anybody's servant. If he is wise he will keep to his hus- bandry and pig'-rearing. He is a good farmer when his holding is small — as it generally is. I travelled long miles in the interior, and noticed how every SERVIAN WOMEN. ON A COUNTRY ROAD IN SERVIA. THE PEASANT NATION. 61 available yard was under close cultivation. No country has so frugal and industrious a peasantry — not even France. The Servian pig is " the gentleman who pays the rent." The growing of pigs and exporting them to Austria is the staple industry. Indeed, pig-breeding may be called the one trade of Servia. When a Serb is well-to-do, the money has come from pigs. There is, however, a speck on the prosperity. Austria is not only the big customer, but it is the big neighbour. Sometimes Austria is inclined to play the bully and make Servia do things that little Servia does not want to do. " Very well," says Austria, " you have swine fever in such a village ; swine fever is a terrible thing ; we could not think of subjecting Austrian swine to the possibility of contagion from infected svsdne ; therefore we prohibit any Servian pigs entering this country." Euin stares Servia in the face! It is no use protesting that the swine fever is so in- finitesimal that it does not matter. Austria is adamant. Servia yields. It does what Austria wants it to do — ogives Austrian wares a preference over those of Germany and France. And just at the time Servia gives in , Austria kindly decides that the svrine fever in Servia is not very bad after all, and the prohibition is removed. Servia cannot do anything commercially without the sanction of Austria. Austria has about half the imports into Servia, and takes practically all the exports. British trade is dwindling : firstly, be- cause Continental competitors have the advantage 62 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. in transport; secondly, because British merchants will not give the long credit, Austrians and Ger- mans will ; thirdly, because the Briton insists on issuing his catalogues in English, and writing his business letters in English, which the Serb does not understand. The fact tliat Servia has practically no poor is due to the industry of the people, and the system of peasant proprietorship. Every little homestead is a family commune, whilst in some of the mountain districts is the Z a drug a, or communal village. The village is really one big family ; everything is held in common. The oldest man is the guide, ruler, and despot. He decides whether a man and a woman shall marry or not. And here one drops across a difference between Serbs and more enlightened com- munities. To get daughters married is the desire of most parents in Western Europe ; to delay their marriage is the endeavour of Serb fathers and mothers. The Serb woman is a first-rate worker in the fields. So whilst there is no objection to a son marrying, because he remains in the family and brings in a woman worker, the departure of a daughter means the loss of a worker. Every grown man can claim five acres of land from the Govern- ment. That usually goes into the family plot of laud. Other land may be bought, and, possibly, may be lost to the moneylender. But those five acres are sacred. They cannot, nor can their yield, be claimed for debt. So, be a man ever so poor, he has still his five acres. Now although Servia has a Parliament elected THE PEASANT NATION. 63 by manhood suffrage — every man who pays about twelve shillings a year in indirect taxes having a vote — the main governing authority is local. The District Council, elected every year by the peasants, manages the local finance ; it is also a combined County Court and Petty Sessions. The Government only concerns itself with large matters. Murderers are usually shot on the spot where they committed their crime. The Serb is democratic. Nobody, except the King, has a title. Property is equally divided be- tween the sons. Education is free, from the ele- mentary school up to the University. Corporal punishment is prohibited. Practically everybody belongs to the Servian National Church ; but though the priests are personally popular, the Serbs are not church-goers except at festival times. Then the pic-nic is as much an attraction as the opportunity to worship. The Serbs are a moral people. Also, as is natural in a mountain people, they are super- stitious. They hang out a bunch of garlic to keep away the devil, and if a widow desires to get mar- ried again she hangs a doll in the cottage window to give male passers-by due notice of the fact. The taxes of Servia are light ; but light as they are, reduction is the popular cry of the politicians. Eather than pay rates the peasants of a district give two or three days' labour in the year for road-mend- ing. The consequence is that the roads are uncer- tain. A Servian road is much like the young lady in the poem who wore a curl in the middle of her fQrehea,d, and who, " when she was good, was very. 64 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. very good, and when she was bad she was horrid." I have seen stretches of road in Servia as good as any to be found in an English home county. Also I have seen others. Servia has conscription. Every man, from his twenty-first to his forty-fifth year, is liable for mili- tary service. Pay — as is all official pay in Servia — is very low. When I looked at the smart young lieu- tenants, I wondered how they could be so gorgeous on £72 a year. The peace strength of Servia is just over 20,000 men. In time of war well over 300,000 men could take the field. Each young fellow serves two years ; afterwards he is in the reserve, liable to thirty days' service per annum till he is thirty years of age, eight days' service till he is forty, and afterwards only liable in emergency. The Serb bears what is often called ' ' the burden of conscription ' ' willingly, and as a matter of course. It is the natural thing ; it exists in the surrounding countries. The Serb knows that any day he may be called upon to fight for his existence as a nation. All told, the Servian population is not yet three millions. Personally I keep a warm corner in my heart for the Serbs. It was De la Jonquiere who called them " a brave, poetic, careless, frivolous race." Frivol- ity is hardly a description to apply to the people as a whole, though it does apply to a few in the capital who ape the ways of Vienna on a miniature scale. Merry, heedless of mechanical progress — or he would find other means of threshing corn than letting horses run through it on a patch of beaten ground, or letting oxen trail a board in which flints are inseti THE PEASANT NATION. 65 as a means of pressing the wheat from the ear — in- dependent, not mindful much of education, knowing his people have a noble though tragic history, but making no attempt to assimilate the old culture, jealous of Bulgaria, afraid of Austria, the Serb is really a relic of the mediaeval age. I have sat beneath the trees chatting with these simple, genuine folk. They loved to hear of London, of New York, of Paris, but with no envy: rather with the interest of a child in a fairy story. They wanted little or nothing from the outer world. Their coarse linen shirts, rough brown homespun jackets, and trousers, their crude shoes, their bead- studded belts, their sheepskin caps, had all been made on their own peasant plots. The women, when tending the cattle or going to market, always had a hunk of flax or tousle of wool which they spun between their fingers as they walked. In Ueu of the evening newspaper, a blind old man told a story of how the Serbs fell at Kossovo beneath the onslaught of the Turks. When the moon rose, big and bril- liant, there was the inn to go to, with wine at two- pence a flask. Travelling is not expensive. About a sovereign a day is charged for a phaeton and pair. At the neat town of Kralievo I had supper, coffee, cognac, and mineral water, a decent bedroom, and breakfast, at a total charge of three dinars, about half a crown. CHAPTEE VI. SOFIA. A Miniature Brussels — A City in the Making— The Public Buildings — The Church of St. Sofia — The Bulgar's Qualities — A Kaleidoscopic History — Prince Ferdinand — His Unpopularity — Bulgarian Ambitions — The Prince a Factor for Petice^ The Most Efficient Army in Euroi)e — A Nation that Believes in Education. Thebb is something of the western American city about Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. A quarter of a century ago it was a squalid Turkish town. The squalor has been swept away. The ramshackle, wheezy houses, bulging over narrow and ill-smelling passages, have disappeared as though swept by a fire. There are now big and broad thoroughfares, fine squares, impressive public buildings. The boule- vards are shaded with trees, the caf^s sprawl their little round tables and vpire chairs into the roadway. Sofia is a miniature Brussels. One of these days it may rival Buda-Pest, or rather Pest, the most modern, spick-and-span town in Europe. Twenty- five years ago there were eleven thousand people in Sofia. Now there are over seventy thousand. But Sofia is still in an unfinished state. The old town, as the Turks left it, has nigh gone. But the new town has not come in its completeness. There is not a single paved street ; the roads are bumpy, vile with dust in summer, and villainous with filth in winter. The houses are built with poor bricks, but stuccoed and plastered and bevelled and colour- washed into representation of stone blocks. There 66 SOFIA. 67 is the flimsiness of stage mansions about the resi- dences. That, however, does not prevent them look- ing neat and clean and, vpith the acacia trees which grow rapidly to give a tone of softness, quite com- fortable. Unbuilt Sofia is pegged out after the American style. Imposing, walled residences stand up soli- tary. Before you get to them there is a patch of waste land, with rank vegetation growing among old pots and pans which have been pitched there ; then you get to a house in the course of construction, the material littering three parts across the road; then a completed and pretty house ; then more waste. Sofia, in a businesslike way, is setting about to make a fine city of itself. It is well situated on a patch of plain, with picturesque mountain ranges as a background. No time has been lost in providing magnificent public buildings. The Eoyal Palace, where Prince Ferdinand occasionally stays, is fine. The National Assembly is a serviceable pile, and the interior is ornate. The technical schools are well equipped and up to date. The barracks are equal to any in England. The Military Club would hold its own with a Pall Mall establishment. The hotels are clean, comfortable, and cheap. There is a good theatre. Also there are gardens where, in the cool of the summer evening, the band plays, and folk sit round and sip beverages. The Bulgarians intend to have a capital worthy of their energetic little nation. Eemember, it is only since 1878, when the Turks, having smeared the country with their sloth for centuries, were driven south by Bussian guns, 68 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. and Bulgaria got its liberty, that the Bulgarians have had an opportunity to show the stuff of which they are made. They have acquitted themselves well. The first thing they did was to wipe out the evidences of Turkish occupation. When the Turk- ish rulers had gone, the Turkish populace also began to disappear. The mosques were unfrequented; they were converted into prisons, markets, and even baths. Only one mosque is in use to-day. There is the Church of the Seven Saints, originally Greek Christian, changed to a mosque by the Turks, de- serted when the Turks went, and now changed to a Christian Bulgarian Church. It has been re- stored, and looks like a new building. There are the remains of St. Sofia, the mother-church of the city, built in the twelfth century. It is a mighty, but cracked and tumbling mass of Byzantine architec- ture. The walls are eight feet thick ; where decrepi- tude has caused them to gape, secret chambers filled with skeletons have been found. The plaster of four hundred years is falling as though intent on revealing the frescoes of Christian saints beneath. There stUl stands the Christian altar facing Jeru- salem. The pulpit from which the Moslem priests proclaimed Allah is askew, so that it may face Mecca. Eemnants of Christian and Moslem worship com- mingle in ruin. No formal service has been held for many years. The interior has the damp smell of a dungeon. But fervent Christians come and burn candles before the cheap oleographs of Christian saints which are pasted on the walls. An old man, grey-locked and cadaverous, knelt on the slimy floor SOFIA. 69 and prayed. He gashed his arm with a knife, and, using his fore-finger as brush, made, in blood, the I sign of the Cross on the Mahommedan pulpit. You must look beneath the surface for the quali- ; ties of the Bulgar. He is dour, even sullen. There I is little refinement about him. He carries himself I slovenly. He has brusqueness of manner, and the polite " thank you " rarely enters his speech. He hates the idea of subservience ; to avoid any sem- blance of that his behaviour savours of rudeness. i He is stolid and unimaginative. In commerce he I is slow. But he is a good worker, zealous, plodding, I and is one of the best agriculturists in the world. : You cannot stir the Bulgar with sentimental ora- tions. Yet the Bulgar is fond of his country in a cold, determined way. He does not move quickly, I but he is always moving. That is why Bulgaria, I since the Liberation, has made steady and definite I progress. I The history of the country is a kaleidoscope. The Romans made a province of it. The Goths and the Huns overran it. Tribes invaded it and but- chered one another. The dominant tribe was that of the Bulgari : Finns with an Asiatic strain, and from the Volga regions. They got mixed up with the Slavs — indeed, the Bulgar is more Slav than Bul- garian, though he does not know it. The Bulgarian language was pure Slavonic. Modern Bulgarian is Slavonic, but murdered by alien peoples. No doubt Vlach and Eussian influence has been the cause. In writing, Bulgarian assimilates to Eussian. Still, the Bulgarian language is no more of a hotch-potch than 70 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. is English. In the twelfth century the Bulgarian tribes consolidated and flung off the Byzantine rule. Then they fell under Servia. Next, both Bulgaria and Servia came under the Turks, and for nigh five hundred years remained stagnant. Russia, with an eye on the Bosphorus, came as the Liberator, and after the siege of Plevna and the defence of the Shipka Pass, forced Turkey to free Bulgaria. Then by the Treaty of Berlin, 1878, Bulgaria was con- stituted an " autonomous and tributary Princi- pality " under the suzerainty of the Sultan. Seven years later northern European Turkey, called Eoumelia, but mainly inhabited by Bul- garians, united itself to its brother and became South Bulgaria. This growth of Bulgaria did not please Eussia. It was all right lopping off a piece of Turkey and erecting the little Bulgarian nation, Russia's child, to be claimed as her own whenever it suited the Muscovite intention. But an enlarged Bulgaria, with possible ideas of standing alone, brought scowls to the brow of Czar Alexander III. All Russian officers, who had so kindly assisted the Bulgarian army, were withdrawn. It was imagined Bulgaria lacked the brains to defend itseff. The Servians, egged on by Austria, made war on their neighbours. The Bul- gars, under their foreign Prince Alexander, smashed the Serbs, and would have annexed Servia had not Austria, under threats, cried halt, and even made the Bulgarians yield territory. So the two countries have no love for each other. It rankles in the mind of Servia that it was defeated ; it galls Bulgaria that A BIT OF OLD SOFIA. A BIT OF NEW SOFIA. SOFIA. 71 it lost territory. Russia was wroth with Bulgaria strutting as a nation instead of being dependent on Russia, which had done so much for it. Russia kid- napped Prince Alexander, held him prisoner, let him go when Europe cried " Shame ! " but succeeded by intrigue in making Alexander's life miserable, broke his heart, and caused him to abdicate. The country was in turmoil. Then Prince Ferdinand of Saxe- Ck)burg was chosen by the Sohranje, or ParUament, and under his rule Bulgaria has gone ahead. Ferdinand is astute. Yet his cleverness is not of the kind to be appreciated by Bulgarians. Dur- ing the last twenty years he has had an excellent opportunity to get a grip of the hearts of the people. He has done nothing of the kind. Rightly or wrongly, they are convinced that he neither likes them nor their country. If they are vrrong, he ministers to the mistake by preferring to live in other countries than in that of his adoption. His ofi&cial allowance is about a million and a quarter of francs, money drawn from peasants. They think it ought to be spent in Bulgaria, and not in Vieima or Paris. He is not popular. Th© Bulgars are a democratic people, with exag- gerated notions of independence. The endeavour on the part of the Prince to create an aristocracy goes against the grain. He has round him a band of Ministers — a few above reproach, most under a strong suspicion — who utilise the national finances for their individual benefit. Political corruption is, in its way, as marked as in the United States. The party in power, the Prince's party, who are little 72 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. but tools in his hand, come to office again and again, because they have the means of bribing the con- stituencies. Educated Bulgarians are sick of the whole business, but any endeavour toward purity is swamped beneath the flood of corruption. The Con- stitution is nominally democratic, but really auto- cratic. The Prince has greater powers than those possessed by any constitutional monarch. He can and does actively interfere in politics. The Ministry has greater latitude than any other European Minis- try. Prince and Ministry working together — and the Prince has only pliable Ministers — the Sobranje, with less than the powers of any other constitutional Legislature, does not really represent the people. The Government has machinery, not always credit- able, which regulates the results of the polls. The Bulgarians are ambitious. They are rightly proud of the way in which their country has gone ahead since the Turkish shackles were cast off. Possibly they exaggerate their powers ; but that is natural. There is a feeling that Bulgaria should win back by the sword what Austria forced it to cede to Servia. There is a much stronger feeling for a Big Bulgaria, and eyes are cast toward Macedonia, where it is alleged most of the Christians are of the Bulgar race. There are also Macedonian Bulgarians in the Principality — for since the Liberation Bulgars in Macedonia have emigrated to the land where they could have more freedom : men of sprightlier intelli- gence than the pure Bulgarian — and these, not anxious to have Macedonia fall under the rule of Bulgaria, are working for an independent Mace- SOFIA. 73 donia, with, of course, the Macedonian Bulgarians as " top dog " over the Turks, Serbs, Eoumanians, and Greeks. So in regard to Macedonia there are in Bulgaria itself two parties — the Big Bulgaria party, and the Autonomous Macedonia party. There is bitter feeling between them. The cynic smiles. The Balkan problem is wheels within wheels. All the Christians hate the Turk. The rival Christians, Bulgar, Serb, Greek, hate each other. Then rival factions of Bulgars are at daggers drawn — and sometimes the dagger is used. The Sultan plays off one Christian nation against another. Prince Ferdinand plays off one Bulgarian party against the other. Despite his shortcomings, Prince Ferdinand is a factor for peace — a greater factor than the rest of Europe gives him credit for. Were his influence removed there is little doubt Bulgaria would pick a quarrel with Turkey, and plunge the Balkans into war. The war spirit is dominant, though there is little of the splash and splutter which would be shown by a more volatile people. It is a spirit which has its roots in the belief that the Bulgars are at last coming into their heritage, and have a large place to fill on the scroll of destiny. They have watched the Far East. " If," was often said to me, " a little country like Japan can overthrow so great a Power as Bussia, why should not Bulgaria overthrow Turkey? We are the Japanese of the Near East." The nation expects and wants to fight Turkey. The Turks know it. Later in my wanderings I had talks with Turkish officials. They admitted that 74 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Turkey did not want to fight, but not because Tur- key was afraid of defeat. Here was their logic : ' ' We fought the Greeks and defeated them ; then we lost Crete. We shall defeat the Bulgarians, but we shall lose Macedonia. Kismet ! " Then a shrug of the shoulders. Now Prince Ferdinand does not want war. He is a little afraid of a rival Bulgarian nation in Mace- donia. He is more afraid of an endeavour toward a Big Bulgaria, for he is not as confident as are his people that the Turks -wUl be defeated, and he knows that under a Turkish victory the Bulgarians, in their wrath, would make him their first victim. There is, however, something fine and noble in the way the little Bulgarian nation is equipping itself to meet a great Power, be it Eussia or Turkey. Now and then I heard a groan at the burden of the army, which consumes a third of the national revenue. It is borne, because there is no Bulgarian who does not realise that his country any day may be called upon to fight for its independence — for the suzerainty of Turkey is but a name. I visited, and was shown over, the great barracks beyond Sofia. I went out to the plains and saw the men at drill. For its size the Bulgarian army is the best equipped and most efficient in Europe. It means business. Every detail is attended to, every probability of war- fare provided for. The officers are not so smart as those of Servia, but they are more practical. What worries the War Minister is that the officers run so much to fat. They are a most podgy lot of officers. If someone will devise means whereby the Bulgarian SOFIA. 75 officers need not wear such large waistcoats he will receive the profuse thanks of the army. Conscription prevails. It embraces everybody. Even those who, for special reasons, escape full con- scriptive service must do duty in the Keserve for three months in each of two years, and then must pass into the active Army Reserve for nine years. In peace time a recruit enters the Army when he is twenty years of age ; in war time he starts his fighting at eighteen. Not till he is forty-five years of age does a Bulgarian escape from liability to serve. Even foreigners, after three years' residence, must serve, unless they have a special certificate of exemp- tion. If Moslems pay £20 they can claim exemp- tion ; but as the Moslems remaining in Bulgaria are poor, very few escape. Bulgars afflicted with in- firmities which prevent them entering the service must pay a special tax. The Army lays its grip on Bulgaria. The peace strength is some 3,000 officers and 50,000 men, 6,000 horses and oxen, and 250 guns horsed out of 500. The war strength is about 6,000 officers, 300,000 men, 45,000 horses, and 2,500 oxen. The Army stands for Bulgarian independence. The young Bulgarian straightens himself, drops his slouch, and walks with a proud glint in his eye when his country calls upon him. Military service is popular. Now the Bulgarians, though unemotional and somewhat brusque, have other qualities besides in- dustry and devotion to their country. They are a moral and a truthful people. Further, though so young a nation, they realise, better than any other race 76 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. in the Balkans, the advantages of education. I was somewhat astonished at the number of men I met who spoke English but who had never seen England. The fact is that a considerable number of the public men were educated at Kobert College, near Con- stantinople. English is the language of instruction. That College has had a marvellous effect on the Christians, not only of the Balkans, but of Asia Minor. Both Bulgaria and Armenia owe much to Eobert College. In the uttermost corners of Tur- key I have met men who spoke English. " Where did you learn it? " "At Eobert College," was the invariable answer. In Bulgaria itself there are at Samakov two American missionary schools, where the pupils are Bulgarians, and all learn English. A good word for Samakov. The directors realise the danger of over-education. Only harm will come to Bulgaria if ill-prepared minds are stuffed with what are called " enlightened views." So earnest and particular attention is directed to technical instruc- tion, which is the thing the Bulgarians, as an agri- cultural people, specially need. All the State schools are free. Excellent colleges are at Sofia and Philip- popolis. Parents submit themselves to hardship so that their children may go to college. In the smaller towns travelling State-paid lecturers instruct the people in scientific husbandry. These lectures are always well attended. " What a wild, barbarous land Bulgaria is ! " is the popular but ignorant belief in Britain. It is just as safe as England. The Bulgarian likes to think be is imitating England. CHAPTEE VII. A BIT OF OLD BULGAEIA. Out of the World — Timova in the Sunrise — A Primitive Inn — The Tariff — " Ver' Good English " — A litigious Community — The Churches — MonMtery of the Transfiguration. TmNOVA is the ancient capital of Bulgaria. Liter- ally, Tirnova means " the thorn," and this quaintly perched city, to the north of the first Balkan range, is not only shaped like a thorn but has truly been a thorn in the side of Europe. It is away from the tourist track. It has not been touched by the stucco civilisation which marks Sofia. It is old Bulgaria, picturesque, romantic, sleepy. The plain of Plevna is to the north. The land becomes restless and knuckled before the Balkans push their black shoulders skywards. There is a gnarled rock-heave with the purling river Yantra making a pear-shaped sweep at its base. On the rock Tirnova rises. If the rock on which Edinburgh Castle is built were ten times the size, and it were nigh circled by a river, and on the rock were built a ramshackle town, and hanging over the side of the rock were bits of the town that could not gain full foothold, it would give a fair idea of Tirnova. I saw it first in a mixture of mist and gorgeous sunrise. It was as fantastic as a much-daubed stage-setting of a mediaeval town. I was down in 77 78 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. the chasm, and wraiths of vapour trailed along the river banks. There was cold shadow, and tall pines showing how straight they could stand on precipitous ledges. Above, like a picture through the clouds, was the town, bulging over the rocks, propped-up, wheezy: a hotch-potch of white build- ings with garish yellow shuttering and balconies, festooned with the dead green of the vine, and, above the ragged house-line, a sky that was blue — pure blue, with no qualification, no accentuation, just blue. When I climbed into the town I felt as though I had trespassed upon a stage during a perform- ance, when the scene is filled with swarthy peasants in kaleidoscopic raiment. My grey lounge suit was out of harmony with the splashes of rain- bow hue among the traffickers in the market. I had a cheery dumpling of a driver, who made himself all the more of a dumpling by entwining his waist with enough red baize to cover a stand for a royal procession. I was in a crooked, ricketty carriage, which banged and jolted over the cob- bles, and seemed to be playing quite a clever game of cup-and-ball with me. I never fell out once, but I got more shaking in a two-mile drive than most folk get in a railway accident. When my friend had deposited me in front of a gaunt and dark- bowelled inn he told me his fare was Is. 3d. When I gave him Is. 8d. he bowed to the ground. A great and rich foreigner was visiting Tirnova ! I found a seat on a shaky chair — everything in Tirnova is uneven : to keep everything else in A BIT OF OLD BULGARIA. 79 countenance, no doubt — and had half a pint of good wine for 3d. ; a small glass of native brandy for my friend cost Id. The landlord, a morose individual, led the way to a room, up stairs that were drunken, and through a door that absolutely refused to close. There was a bed which had four legs, but never stood on more than three at a time, and when I was in it was in a constant wobble, try- ing to show its cleverness in standing on only two but never succeeding. Water to wash — for I was grimy with an all-night journey. Certainly ! A pint was brought. Not enough. In time I showed I was a mad Briton by having four pails of water brought in. That was all right ; but two of the pails leaked, and the water escaped into a sort of restaurant be- low. The main ornament of my room was behind the bed — a sort of hearthrug in violent colours, de- picting an Arab sheikh escaping with a plum-eyed damsel — who was sitting on the neck of the horse, whilst her arms were around the neck of her cap- tor — and leaving far behind an Eastern town which apparently consisted of nothing but mosques. There was as much art in the mat as in the sam- plers our industrious grandmothers worked when they were young women. But there was more colour. There was a French door to the room — • of course, it jammed — leading on to a balcony which was so flimsy that it ought to have tumbled down the rocks into the river. But it did not. That caused me much wonder. Yes, I had got into an unfrequented part of the world. I had six eggs and plenty of fresh 80 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. butter ; a plate of beans and another plate of sliced tomatoes ; then half a litre of wine and a cup of Turkish coffee; and this — including a meal for my driver, two glasses of brandy for him, and feed for three horses — cost Is. 7Jd. My conversation with the landlord, whose countenance suggested sour wine, was fragmentary and unsatisfactory. Delight, therefore, was con- sequent on the bouncing appearance of a fair and florid little man, who excitedly exclaimed, "Me speak English." "Capital," said I, "and where did you learn it? " " Me speak ! " " Yes, I know, but where did you learn? In London?" "No — small boy — ver' small boy — two year — Australia ; me Englishman ; me speak eight languages. Me speak English good, eh?" "Then will you kindly tell the landlord that I should like my room swept." " Swep'? iMe no 'stand swep' — me speak English, ver' good English, eh? " He beamed and glowed and puffed and basked within the admiring gaze of the restaurant loun- gers as the one man in all Tirnova who could speak English. Later, through my interpreter, I brought him to positive tears by regretting that his know- ledge of English was so limited. "What say? Me small boy — two year — Australia — me Englishman." Later he came to my room. He knew I was a great and powerful man ! He also was an English- man. He wanted to leave Bulgaria and go to Lon- don ! But he had no money. Would I tell the British Government to send him £250? I mourned the callous-heartedness of the British Government, A BIT OF OLD BULGARIA. 81 and, whilst promising to do my best, should befit- ting opportunity occur, I besought him not to base too much expectation on the fatherly sentiment of the British Government towards a German born in Australia, who was removed when only two years old. I left him in renewed tears. The streets of Tirnova are narrow, excruciat- ingly cobbled, foetid, but kept in a state of rank coolness by all the waste water being thrown into the way. The carts, hauled by slow and cum- brous black buffaloes, screech. Ponies, packed with wood, jostle along under whacking and much swear- ing. The vendors of melons — the cheap vegetable on sale in the gutters — wail and blaspheme when a cart-wheel crushes and squelches melon ; a bony donkey, piled high with cocks and hens tied to- gether with twine — rather uncomfortable for the poultry, one would think — is driven by a big, broad, brawny, red-petticoated woman, whose stick is plied on the nose of every buffalo or pony which does not swerve out of the way. Half the male popu- lation, even in mid-morning, are idling before the cafes, sipping gritty concoctions, puffing innumer- able cigarettes, and playing dominoes. Tirnova is litigious. Perhaps it is an inherit- ance; maybe it is something in the air. But in all Bulgaria there is not another town where the people are always having the law on one another. The courts are busy. I do not believe it is because the Tirnovians are either rapacious or dishonest. They are famous for their lawsuits, famous for their street of lawyers , and they take a sort of civic pride 82 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. in upholding the notoriety of their town. The lawyers have shops just like chandlers and dealers in cigarettes. In the window is a stack of musty and dusty volumes, but a good space is left so that the lawyer may be seen at his desk with important papers before him, a cigarette between his lips, and a cup of coffee at his elbow. If he have a client in hand a good view is provided for the passers- by of the pair in confab. If not, he is usually to be seen wheeled round, sitting close to the window, gazing abstractedly at the wall across the way, but certainly in evidence, and on the spot if any Tir- novian merchant wishes to maintain his reputation by an action in the courts. In the eyes of Tii'nova a man who does not go constantly to law has some- thing wrong in his composition. Further, the people are very proud of their de- crepit city. For two hundred years, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, it was the capital of Bul- garia. Here lived the kings, and I barked my shins clambering the crumbled walls they built to resist the invaders. Here were plotted the revolutions which drove south the Byzantine power. Kings died of their wounds beyond the gates. In the dim year of 1257, when kings and kings' offspring were slain, there gathered here the first National As- sembly, and Constantine Ticho was chosen king. Ever since then, though the fortunes of Bulgaria were broken, though the hill lands between Bul- garia and Servia were often stained with blood, though Tirnova in its corner seemed out of the way and Sofia waxed large, the fortress town never forgot A BIT OF OLD BULGARIA. 83 and never failed to insist that it is the lord of Bul- garian towns and deserving reverence. When the unhappy Prince Alexander, not many years ago, was forced to abdication by Eussia, the three men who composed the Regency came from Tirnova. When Ferdinand was elected Prince he was not really in the saddle till he had come to Tirnova and been proclaimed. The Tirnova man likes to tell the stranger how for centuries his ancestors fought the Turks. As he sits before his cafe trifling with the dominoes he may look a lethargic gentleman ; but when the talk touches something affecting Tir- nova there is a quick spark in the eye which tells much. Here, as elsewhere, the quiet relics of a noble past are the churches. Wandering down the ragged hillside I came to the Church of the Forty Martyrs, low-roofed, dim, vault-like, but sturdy. John Osen, the king, built it in 1330. The Turks made it into a mosque in 1389. Christian worship did not take place in it again until 1877. Only a bit of the old edifice remains. The granite pillars are of various periods. One came from a Roman temple ; another is undoubtedly Greek. The Christians had helped themselves to the ruins left by former worshippers. I turned the pages of books of prayer in the tongue of ancient Slav : wafer-like, brown, crumbling in the hand. I went down grooved stone steps to the Metro- politan Church, its glory faded, and with only one service a year now. The old dame, the custodian, had lost the key ; she had no hesitation in sug- 84 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. gesting that the lock should be broken. But, at the end of three-quarters of an hour, during which time I sat and smoked in the shade, the key was found. A dark interior, with indifferent frescoes of outrageous-visaged saints. The pillars were black marble — loot, no doubt, from a Grecian tem- ple. In a cell, accidentally discovered by a crack in the wall, were found wonderful old manuscripts — a rich delving ground for the antiquary, I ween. The stalls for the monks, shades of memory, were cobwebbed. In the gloom could be discerned in- numerable ikons; from a beam hung massive can- delabra. There was something eerie about this silent, gloomy, old place, with its pavements grooved by the feet of men and women long gone and long forgotten — forsaken now, save for its once-a-year ceremonial. But I wondered, as I prayed in that sanctuary of the dead, if there ever came the spirits of the little children given the kiss of greeting into the Holy Church, of tired old men who had hobbled there and given their thanks to God. For an hour I had the church to myself. I sat in the stall of a monk. From a slat, high in the roof, gushed a broad stream of sunshine and illumined the face of the Virgin. It was an hour of peace and thought. The sun was high, the road was dusty, and the horses raced. I was off to visit the Monasteiy of the Transfiguration. The way twined and rose, and twined again. We left the road and struck along in the cool of z o 3 o X A BIT OF OLD BULGARIA. 85 high trees. The drowse was broken by the drip of water. A curve, and there was the Monastery. There were no old and hoary walls, no odour of sanctified centuries. It was bright and variegated. The sward was richest green, the sky was deepest blue. The walls were white, but blazoned with pictures in brilliant pigment. The tiles were warm to ruddiness, and vines traded everywhere. For an instant I forgot this was a Monastery. If damsels with short skirts and long hair had ap- peared, swinging garlands and singing and rhythmically kicking their heels, I should have accepted it all. But there was no peach-cheeked maiden. There was a kindly monk in long cas- sock who came forward and gave me a handshake. " Come and rest," said he. We went into a balconied alcove, high perched, shadowed, but over- looking heavily wooded hills, whilst away on one side stretched a vast bleached plain. It was cool ; there was a breeze ; eagles glided slowly on the wind. And then a saunter. The monks were proud of the vines which drooped by the casements of their dormitories ; they were prouder of the wine they made. The church was small and white. There were frescoes of saints — of estimable morals, no doubt, but certainly of quaint anatomy. There was the refectory, a long, low-roofed room, where the monks ate their vegetables on marble-topped tables, all keeping sUence save the appointed brother who read a pious discourse. My host, a kindly monk, had as decorations in his room photographs 86 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. of dead friends — the photographs taken after the friends were dead, laid out on a table before the house, and relatives standing round looking their best — rather after the " wedding group " style with us. Cheerful pictures ! CHAPTEE VIII. OVER THE SHIPKA PASS. Memorials of the Great Fight — Traces of Turkish Days — The Joy of Early Morning — Shipka ViBage — How the Russians behaved after their Victory — Glimpse of the Plain of Thrace. It was in the Pass of Shipka, on the first Balkan range, that the most savage fighting took place between the Turks and the Russians in 1877. The Pass is a narrow gully of a road over black rocks. The country is wild and woody. Here and there, though you must look for them, are weedy trenches from which the rivals poured fire into one another. On slopes are patches bumped with hillocks, as though giant moles had been at work — the graves of the soldiers. There is one cemetery ; but the wall has been broken and never mended, the crosses are aslant or fallen, the graves are all covered with rank grass, not a flower is anywhere. Plentiful tears were shed when the officers were laid to rest ; now they are forgotten. Obelisks, stunted and white, points for the eye in the mountains, tell in Russian of the valour of the Russian troops, and commemorate the heroic stand of famous regiments. There are many of these monuments proclaiming the bravery of the Russian soldiery. But not one did I see to the memory of the brave Turks. None can say which are the Turkish burial places. Not the whiz of a bullet, but the call of a bird, 87 88 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. is the sound you hear as you slip from the saddle after long hours of hard riding in blazing sunshine, and seek the shelter of a clump of trees. For the better part of a day I rode through Bulgarian villages. The houses were low, and had roofs three sizes too big for them — they stretched far over, and provided rich shade. Festoons of vines put their arms across the little streets. I had only to rise in my stin-ups to help myself, on the invitation of the peasantry, to bunches of grapes. Along the crooked paths were hundreds, thousands, of trees bearing their burden of plums — tart and cool, and cleaning to a dust-smeared mouth. Eemnants of Turkish days were there. The costume of the peasants was more Turkish than European. Tinted turbans were worn. The people, though Bulgars by race, were often Mahommedan in religion, a relic of long-ago compulsion. The Turks compelled the conquered people in these parts to embrace Moslemism. Succeeding generations be- came Moslem as a matter of course. Now the Turk has gone and the Bulgar is free ; but hereabouts he clings to the Mahommedan faith, and hates his brother Bulgar who is a Christian. So I got to Gabrova, a Turkish-like town, with more mosques than churches. It is an energetic place, doing much trade in leather and woollen manufactures. The inn where I stayed was dirty, and the charge of three francs for the bedroom was probably excessive. There was difficulty about food, for a Church fast-day was on. However, I got a kindly OVER THE SHIPKA PASS. 89 old Turk, who cared naught for Christian observ- ances, to get me some fish — four wretched sprats ; but these, with a chunk of bread and a pint of wine, served as supper for myself and attendant. Five o'clock in the morning, and a hammering at my door. In ten minutes I was down in the inn yard, where were the four horses I had hired over- night. The best, a ramping stallion, I selected for myself, gave my attendant the next best, and left the guide to decide which of the other two he would ride, and which should be the pack-horse. No breakfast but a tiny cup of coffee which would fill about a couple of thimbles. Then into the saddle and off at daybreak. My saddle was Turkish. During that day I appreciated there must be some- thing different about a Turk's anatomy from that of a Briton. The high pommel, the brass-plate orna- mentation, the shovel-like stirrups are pictm-esque in a painting; but for use they are not to be commended. Plain pigskin is the best. But the joy of early morning, even in a Turkish saddle and with no breakfast, brings song to the lips. We sang as we cantered. We tossed greetings to the peasants in the fields. We encountered bunches of them coming in to market — the men driving the goats, the married women wasting no time, but weaving wool 'twixt finger and thumb as they tramped along, the young women with red flowers in their hair as an advertisement that they were will- ing to be wooed and won. We rode hard, for I wanted to get the worst of the climb over before the heavy heat. Four hours' 90 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. going and we were at the foot of the Pass. A way- side inn provided a mush of eggs and black bread for breakfast. So off again. At first the way was broad and easy. Then it narrowed, became rugged, and the horses were in lather. At places we dismounted and walked. There were rude paths through the woods, made in times of battle so that the troops might be moved be- yond sight of the Turks on the heights. I rode over a knoll where were the Russian headquarters. I climbed a precipice where, with mighty labour, cannon had been perched to sweep the Pass. All silent now in the drowse of glowing forenoon. The eye wandered beyond the dark, cypress-cloaked ravines. The world was an impressive panorama of tumbled hills. Distance was lost in the haze of heat. Twenty-eight years ago the echoes were roused with thunderous cannonade. Eussians to the north, Turks to the south, met on this mountain road. Terrible struggles took place in the hollows of the hills. Positions were lost and won and then lost again The Eussians, fearless of death, pushed their advantage ; and the Turks, heedless of life, held their ground. One battle lasted for seven days. Then a fortnight of breathing time. On came the Turks again; they captured Mount Nicholas, the com- manding position in the Pass. But they were mastered by the Eussians, and with terrific slaughter fled to the southern ravines. There they waited till winter. The last great fight was in mist and blind- ing snowstorm. The Turks were outnumbered. ^.■■•-m--.-^-: ■ ■. „ ■ s SSi^H^^^^M^^^^^S^^^ ^CT ^^ •■ t-^-Jl— «l Ec^ i 1 &.:^:«ii^?^^>^...^ , y AT THE FOOT OF THE SHIPKA PASS. THE SHIPKA PASS. OVER THE SHIPKA PASS. 91 They struggled in desperation. It was useless. All that were left of them, 32,000 men, unconditionally surrendered. The Eussians poured down the southern slopes to Shipka village. There stands a bedizened, gorgeous, Eussian- Greek church to commemorate the victory. The massive cupola, surmounted by a cross, is of bur- nished gold. You can see the sun glitter on it from twenty miles away. But there is no record of the pillaging, the rapine and drunken orgies of the Eussian troops when they laid hold of Shipka village. An old man told me sad stories. "Ah!" said he, " the Turks did wrong things, but never any- thing so bad as the Eussians." " But you are glad," said I, " that the Turk has been driven away, and that Bulgaria is now free? " " Not so very glad," he replied ; ' ' when the Turks were here taxes were light, and now they are heavy. Then we had a wider market for our goods ; we had all Turkey. Now we are a separate country they try to keep out our goods. Bulgaria is a little country, and other countries tax our things. Perhaps it was best in the old days." My guide was garrulous, and had tales to tell of the old days. It was common for Turkish brigands to despoil Christians of their trousers, and then, to save themselves from qualms of conscience, at the pistol mouth compel the breekless ones to declare " Allah giveth." Standing on the summit of the range, with wooded lands behind me and bare ochreish sweeps 92 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. before, down even to Shipka village, I got my first glimpse of the Plain of Thrace — unrolled in verdant sweep till busked in a far-off glimmer of mist. It was high noontide. But the heat was tempered by a gentle breeze. I rested my lathered horse and looked over the silent, shimmering, basking land. Pity 'twas it had ever been desecrated by the horrors of bloody war. Down the broken path we went, which crunched and burnt like hot cinders. The baked rocks threw out heat that struck the cheek like an oven blast. I was smothered in dust, and my mouth was like an old glue pot. On the level ; a dig with the heel into the ribs of my horse, and in a couple of minutes we were in the village slaking our thirst with bunches of grapes. CHAPTEE IX. THE ROSE GARDEN OF EUEOPE. Wliere the Best Attar of Rosea Comes from — Kasanlik — A Rose Garden Eighty Miles Long — The Plantations — The Process of Distilling — Adulteration — Prices — Potency of Attar of Roses. L.4DIES who are fond of the most precious of per- fumes, attar of roses, will find, if they have the best attar, the name Kasanlik on the label. But where be Kasanlik, whether in Germany or France or Italy, is a matter which not one lady out of a thousand bothers her fair head about. Kasan- lik, however, is a little town on the Plain of Thrace, almost within shadow of the Balkans. The Plain of Thrace is like hundreds of others I saw in south- eastern Europe — absolutely flat, and the mountains surrounding rising almost precipitously. There is no undulation. All the valleys suggest the bottom of dried lakes cupped by hills. The remarkable thing is that this is the uniform topographical fea- ture over a stretch of hundreds of miles. Now a great slice of the Thracian plain is de- voted to roses. In the district of which Kasanlik is the centre there are one hundred and seventy- three villages devoted to rose culture. Roses, roses all the way, is the feature of the landscape. Where in other lands the peasants grow wheat and lye and feed cattle, here for long miles all the fields are rose gardens. It is the biggest rose garden in the world — eighty miles long. The world seems dotted with roses ; the air is 93 94 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. heavy with their perfume. It is not the richness of the soil that produces the abundance. The soil is rather indifferent, but there is a peculiar quality about it — like the soil of Champagne for grapes — which produces the rose most capable of yielding an exquisite essence. The rearing of roses is a legacy from the Turks. They grew the roses, distilled the attar, supplied the harems of the pashas at Constantinople with the scent. The dilettante Ottoman has gone, and now there are big firms which speculate in roses as Americans speculate in wheat, and out-bid one another in purchasing the products of whole vil- lages before the bushes have even put forth a bud — • firms which are in keen commercial rivalry, and have their representatives in Paris, London, and New York. The distilling of roses began in Persia : the word " atar " (fragrance) is Persian. Until three hundred years ago only rose-water was obtained. It was about the beginning of the seventeenth cen- tury that the method of securing the real essence was discovered. Prom Persia the art spread to Arabia, from Arabia to the Barbary States, and from the Barbary States a wandering Turk brought a rose tree to Ivasanlik. The Rosa damascena, grown in such quantities, is the same as the Rosa damascena grown in Tunis, though now in decreas- ing quantities. The Rosa alba, also grown, can be traced, in a sort of backward route, right through the Turkish Empire to Persia, where it is abundant. Fifty years ago something between four and five THE ROSE GARDEN OF EUROPE. 95 hundred pounds' weight of attar was produced at KasanUk. In 1904 the exact amount was 8,147 pounds. It is by an accident that rose culture on so gigantic a scale has grown up in this out-of-the- way part of Eoumelia. But everything is favourable. The mean temperature is that of France ; the soil is sandy and porous, and the innumerable rivulets from the mountains provide constant irrigation. There are plenty of other regions favourable to rose-growing. No region, however, is quite so suitable for roses needed for attar. The attar rose is sensitive to climatic conditions. Exactly identi- cal methods with those followed in Bulgaria have been adopted at Brussa, in Asia Minor, but not with success. The rose plantations of the Kasanlik region are not arranged in isolated plots or in narrow little hedgerows, as in the rose district of Grasse, in France, but in high parallel hedges, about a hun- dred yards long, taller than a man, and with a space of about six feet between them. The setting of a plantation is peculiar to the locality. Entire branches, leaves and all, from an old rose tree, are laid horizontally in ditches fourteen inches wide and the same depth. These boughs, each about a yard long, are placed side by side, four or five abreast, and form a long continuous line in the ditch. Part of the earth taken from the ditch is piled lightly on the branches, and above the furrow is placed a slight layer of stable manure. The rose harvest begins with the flowering time, about the middle of May, and ends about the 96 PICTURES TROM THE BALKANS. middle of June. Conditions most favourable to the grower are for the temperature to be moderate and the rain frequent, so that the harvest is prolonged for a full month. Great inconvenience is caused if the harvest is quickly over. Gathering takes place every day during the blossoming period. Every flower that has begun to blow, and every half- opened bud, is plucked. A hectare (21 acres) pro- duces generally about 6,600 lbs. of roses, that is almost three million roses. These three million yield at most 2^- lbs. of attar. With regard to dis- tilleries the question of water takes the lead, for unless water is at hand distillation is impossible. The distilling apparatus is simple. Its essen- tial part is a large copper alembic, about 4 feet 10 inches high, resting on a brick furnace. The alembic consists of a cistern with a peculiar mush- room-shaped head, and a cooling tube. The cost of the alembic is reckoned according to its weight ; thus one weighing about 163 lbs. costs about d£4 6s. The cost of the vat into which the cooling tube en- ters is from 2s. 6d. to 10s. The cooling tube enters at the top on one side, and passes out into a flask at the lower part of the other side. The operation of distilling rose-water lasts about one to one and a half hours, and is repeated again and again until all the petals picked that day have been used, because petals distilled after twenty-four hours' delay have lost so much of their scent that they only afford an unfavourable yield. To extract the attar from the rose-water a second distillation is necessary. From 40 litres o O < Z O z THE ROSE GARDEN OF EUROPE. 97 of rose-water a flask containing 6 litres is distilled. Upon this the attar collects in the form of a yellow , oily layer about 2 to 4 millimetres thick. It is skimmed off by means of a httle bowl in the shape of an inverted cone, with a small hole in the bottom to let the water, which is heavier than the attar, pass through. The current form of adulteration is to mix attar of rose with attar of geranium, produced from the Indian geranium, or Palma rosa. Adulteration is not confined to Constantinople, whence, it may be said, not a single gramme of pure attar is exported. It is done in Bulgaria, sometimes by the grower himself. Since 1888 an attempt has been made to remedy this, and the importation of attar of geranium has been forbidden by the Govern- ment, so that it can only be obtained secretly. Much more often the attar is sent on to Constantinople, where it is adulterated in perfect freedom. Another, and the simplest method of adulteration, is to add some white roses to the red ones to be distilled, the product of the white being less fragrant but much richer in stearoptene. The attar of geranium is, in its turn, often adulterated with oil of turpentine. So it is within possibility that the little flask of attar of rose you purchase in a fashionable shop may have very little of the genuine perfume in it. Simple and kindly-mannered are the peasants engaged in rose culture. But the life is not so idyllic as might be thought. There are no big rose farms. Indeed, the merchants find it more to their advantage to buy from the peasants who, on their 98 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. little patches, have grown roses, and by the most primitive means obtained the attar. This provides the merchant with secm-ity from loss. If a par- ticular crop is damaged the peasant bears the loss. Besides, the two or three Kasanlik merchants have the monopoly in their hands ; they have their own peasant customers, and have the power of fixing the price of the attar. The humble rose-grower can take it or leave it, but, if he keeps his attar, where else is he to find a market? Some fortunes have been made out of attar of rose ; but no peasants have grown rich. I had the pleasure of seeing over one or two of the Kasanlik stores. The merchants are amiable. But each took me aside and whispered in my ear : " Of course, we are quite friendly with our com- petitors, only I would like you to remember one thing : ours is the only genuine attar. All the other is adulterated. Of course, our rivals deny it, but we know." That little speech was made in each place. I would like to believe that all the attar sent from Kasanlik is pure. But when, searching for truth, I made independent inquiries, I was sor- rowfully reduced to the conviction that none of it is absolutely piu-e. No perfume is quite so strong as that of attar. Remember the yield is less than one twenty-fifth of one per cent. (0.04) of the roses used. For 1 lb. of attar more than 4,000 lbs. of roses are needed. The peasant gets about 18s. an ounce. For the same thing, as sold in Paris or London, the price is £8 an ounce. THE ROSE GARDEN OF EUROPE. 99 So strong is the odour that nothing short of a hermetically sealed jar will restrain it. A glass stopper, however tight, will not keep it back. In- deed, so strong is genuine attar of rose that it is nauseating. To remedy this and make it genial to the nostrils may be put forward as a kindly explana- tion why it is so often adulterated and weakened. To be in a Easanlik store was to be in a thick and sickening atmosphere. I put my nose over a copper jar in which was £8,000 worth of attar, and the smell was so powerful as to be disgusting and pro- ductive of headache. The time to visit Kasanlik is about the birth of June. Then you can get astride your horse and ride for two days, forty miles a day, feast your eyes on a land of damask blooms, and breathe the scent of millions of roses. When the wind is gentle the roses of Kasanlik have their perfume carried fifty miles. Anyway, Bulgarians fifty miles off have assured me that the breeze from the Kasanlik region has been laden with the breath of a rose garden. The village girls are out early, piling their aprons with roses and filling the slow and creaking oxen carts. No Battle of Flowers at Nice ever had such a mass of roses as deck the rude carts of Kasanlik in June. And the brown-cheeked, black-eyed peasant maidens always deck their hair with the most gor- geous of the blooms. CHAPTEE X. THE CITY OF THE PLAIN. A Sunday Evening at Philippopolis — Individuality of the City — ^A Passion for Education — Bulgarians not Speculative — Agriculture — Industry of the Peasants— Return of the Turks — Bulgar Characteristics — Fleeing from the Heat — Monastery of St. Petka— A Night in the Open. The Plain of Thrace is flat — curiously flat — and encompassed by high, black and jagged mountains. All over are dotted what look like exaggerated mole- hills — ^tumuli. The plain reeks vapourish in the summer, and throughi the quivering haze rises a giant molehill, not looking large in the far distance, but on nearer view showing several hills, almost like a crouching animal. It is a great knuckle of uneven granite rising out of the plain. On it Philip of Macedon reared a city. That is the Philippopolis of to-day. It was on Sunday night that I arrived after six- teen hours of hard travel over dusty roads. The horses put down their heads and raced madly along the tortuous, cobbled streets. The driver halloed, swung his whip and cracked it ; for however drowsy the pace may be away from a town, the Bulgarian driver always finishes his journey in a welter, imagin- ing, innocent man, that people will think that is the way he has been travelling all day. Which nobody does even for a moment think. I was weary and aching with long travelling, and had an irritable premonition of the kind of sleepincr 100 ^ o a, O 0. X a. THE CITY OF THE PLAIN. 101 accommodation that would be waiting me. Then a lighted street, a garish caf^, the ecstatic thrill of gipsy music ! Hotel porters tumbled into view. There was salaaming. The proprietor appeared. Ah, yes, the telegram had arrived ! Eooms were ready. This way! Capital rooms, clean, neat, simple, rather French. I glanced in a glass at my begrimed condition — countenance unrecognisable, hair grey with dust. A bath ! Ah , a bath was ready ! And then a little dinner. Capital ! And a good bottle of wine, eh? No; a pint of the local wine. By all means ! So a change, and then to the courtyard. Picture the scene. A garden, lit with many lamps. Beneath the trees innumerable tables. At the tables sat "all Philippopolis," sipping coffee, drinking beer, toasting one another in litres of wine. At one end of the garden was a little stage. There was a Hungarian band which played rhapsodically, there was a skittish damsel in short skirts who sang songs, there was a big basso prof undo who roared, then there was more gipsy band, and more of the young lady in short skirts. It was Sunday night and Philippopolis was enjoying itself. I suppose anything like that would be considered wicked in England. But it did not strike me that the folk of Philippopolis were enjoy- ing the cool evening in anything but the most innocent of ways. As I sat enjoying the happiness around me, I thought that in my own land of England, far off, there were perhaps other ways of checking the evils 102 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. and the degradation of drunkenness besides the closing of public houses and the shrieking denuncia- tion of those who make no pretence to be strictly teetotal. I mused that maybe in time my own countrymen would get more sense, when the stand- up bar would be abolished, when there would be no private bars, no shutters to hide from others your countenance when having refreshment, no general atmosphere of discredit about drinking. I thought perhaps we shall see places where a man can take his wife, yes, and even his children, of an evening; where they may have a little table, the husband have his glass of ale if he wants it and his pipe, the wife her cup of tea, and the children their cakes, and they may all listen to a band. It is our rigorous puritanic system which sends the workman — who has no wish in his heart to neglect wife and bairns — to seek relaxation in an over-crowded, ill- ventilated bar, where he meets mates and drinks more than he intends ; finds, when it is too late, that drink is his curse, and becomes the subject of a temperance leaflet. A man would not drink so much if he had some inducement to spend his evenings with his wife and children. The gentleman we Britons call " the foreigner" is no more virtuous than ourselves, but he has not the drunkenness we have, simply because the customs of his country provide he shall drink in full view of the public, and nobody wag the head and think he is going to the devil. I thought this, as, in the ease of laziness after a hard day, I watched the Bulgarians enjoying them- selves. But I was drowsy. I went off to my neat 1 fiiywI^^i&^jS^ i [^ A BULGARIAN DANCE. A CORNER OF OLD BULGARIA. THE CITY OF THE PLAIN. 103 little room, and fell asleep to the strains of gipsy dance music. Philippopolis has individuality. It has certainly more character than Sofia, because whilst Sofia has been making itself over again in likeness to other European capitals, Philippopolis has remained itself, and is proud of the distinction. Its inhabitants have something of the superior air of folks in an English cathedral city for the neighbouring parvenu town of go-ahead manufacture. Its commerce is not large, but it congratulates itself on the excellence of its productions. An interesting institution is the Alexander Gymnasium, which, founded in 1885, cost nearly £26,000, and is maintained at an annual expense of over £5,000. It gives instruction to youths from ten to twenty-two years of age, quite free of charge, except twenty francs per annum in the higher and ten francs per annum in the lower classes, the money going towards providing the poorest children with books and clothes. The Lycee is a similar institu- tion for girls, where they are educated on a cor- responding plan in all subjects, except, apparently, classics. The Bulgarians have a positive passion for education. What impressed me forcibly in my wanderings through Bulgaria was the absence of people who are either very rich or very poor. I doubt if throughout the whole of the Principality more than half a dozen persons can be found with a capital of over £50,000. On all hands I heard laments that the com- mercial expansion of Bulgaria was hindered by the 104 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. lack of capital. But if the Bulgars had it, I doubt whether they possess the qualities necessary for modern success in business. They are not a specu- lative race. There is an absence of lively com- petition. A merchant asks a price for a thing. It is too high, and he will not yield, though he knows it is probable you will get the same thing cheaper elsewhere. He does not yet grasp the advantages of small profits and quick returns. The consequence is that most of the big businesses are in the hands of foreigners. Twenty years ago England led the way in the Bulgarian market. Now England has fallen behind. France also has not been able to hold her own. Austria has been improving her trade re- lationship all the time. Though, of course, the ambitious Bulgars would like to jump to the front as a manufacturing country, the wise spirits do well in focusing the national energy upon the develop- ment of its agricultural resources. Bulgaria has immense opportunities in agri- culture. Its size, including Eoumelia, is about that of Ireland and Wales. Everywhere the soil is fertile, though in places I saw tracts most difficult of cultivation, because of the mixture of stones with surface soil. It is a land rich in the smaller timbers ; its vegetables and fruits, including vineyards, are excellent ; not only are there wheat but also many tobacco fields. Of cattle there is plenty. Concerning the industry of the peasants I have already written. The tenure under which they hold their land is partly a remnant of the system when the Turk held sway. In those old days THE CITY OF THE PLAIN. 105 holders of land were obliged to pay a tithe of the gross produce of their farms to the tax-collectors of the Sultan. When this tithe was not paid, or the land remained uncultivated for three years, or the owner died without heirs, the Sultan became the possessor. Since the Liberation, the only material change is that the State occupies the place formerly held by the Sultan. Under the Turkish regime, payment was usually in kind. Of recent years the Bulgarian Government has endeavoured to secure payment in cash, but not very successfully. To , part with a tenth of the produce does not seem hard to the peasant, but when he has converted the produce into hard cash, then, in truth, it wrings his very heart to open his purse. All along the Turkish borderland there is a mixture of Christian and Mahommedan villages. Naturally, when the rule of the Sultan was broken, there was a great rush of Turks out of Bulgaria into Turkey, because they dreaded reprisals for the atrocities to which the Bulgars had been sub- jected. Now, however, that Bulgaria is more or less settled, there has, certainly of recent years, been a considerable reflux of Turks. Out of the three and a half million population of the Principality there are, I believe, something like three-quarters of a million of Mahommedans. I made an excursion into the mountains south of Philippopolis — a region practically unknown to the rest of Europe — and there saw something of the Pomaks, or Bulgarian Mahommedans. Some authorities are of opinion they are a separate race. 106 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. Personally, I am inclined to the belief they are just Bulgarians whose ancestors changed their religion. Going about the country, I got to admire the characteristics of the Bulgars. I do not say they are a lovable people. Indeed, their taciturnity, their suUenness, even their uncouthness — especially the Bulgars outside the towns — have produced a feeling in some travellers amounting almost to dislike. But though stolid they are solid, and they have a virtue which is really above all price in a land so near the East — they are truthful. They are all keen on the ownership of land, and every Bulgar is a politician. At times the heat from the plains of Thrace makes the atmosphere of Philippopolis as hot and clammy as a Turkish bath. I remember one day, having panted and perspired in the palpitating heat, a Bulgarian friend — a journalist — and I decided to escape by hastening to a monastery in the hills, and there secure a night's sleep in coolness. We rode south, where lies Macedonia. Part of the way was along the old main road to Constantinople. It was at least a foot deep in dust. Any buffalo-cart or horseman was only distinguished by a cloud of dust. Trying to overtake a cart or jog- trot equestrian was to push through a white, choking, blinding, tongue-coating cloud. We were making for the little monastery of St. Petka. There had been one of the innumerable church festivals, and crowds of gaudily-clad peasants were returning home from their junketings. Here was no trifling with the garb of civilisation. The THE CITY OP THE PLAIN. 107 shirts and waistcoats of the men were radiant with ornamentation. The women all wore " the fringe," long and greasy ; their jackets were green, and their wide bulging petticoats were staring red ; on their heads, round their necks, encircling their arms, were masses of sUver decorations made of coins— a simple way of holding wealth, easy to disperse when money is wanted, and explaining why nearly all the Bulgarian and Turkish coins you get in the border- land are pierced. On patches of withered, dust- soaked grass, groups were enjoying themselves. A man sitting on the ground droned at the bagpipes. A big circle was formed, and in the furious heat the peasants were slowly and monotonously stamping round, going through the hora dance. We got to a dirty village called Stanimika — inhabited by Greeks who make wine and silk, and idle their time in the vile caf^s. I sipped cherry syrup whilst my friend went out to bargain for mules to take us to the monastery. There was much haggling. No riding saddles being procurable, we got pack sa-ddles, borrowed greasy pillows and rugs from an inn-keeper, and set off. Stirrups were formed of rope. My mule was a huge and gaunt animal, and when I was perched on the top of the packing the sensation was like that of being stuck on the summit of a camel's hump. In the glowing warmth of the fading day, we clambered the steep and rocky path. At places the going was slow ; the mules had to pick their steps gingerly up the staircase of broken boulders. The hoofs clattered with an echo as we cantered 108 PICTURES FROM THE BALKANS. into the courtyard of the monastery of St. Petka, a plain, bare-walled retreat built long ago by a brigand who had done well in business, and wanted to do something for the peace of his soul before he passed into the shadow to settle his account. Monks bubbling with greeting ran to give us welcome, all save the chief — a short, shaky, ghost- like old man, ninety years of age, who had lived here for forty years, and decided twenty years ago that descending and ascending the mountain path were too much for his age, and had never descended or ascended since. I went upon a balcony perched like an eagle's eyrie on a jut of rock. The plain of Thrace lay dun, like a faded carpet, before me. Suddenly through the hot breath of the atmosphere came a long-drawn icy sigh which made the trees shiver. Through the opaque glow crawled a leaden bar, which broke and showed an amber sky streaked with blood. The world was clouded with grey, the spirits of tempest shrieked along the mountains, the trees groaned. Then came the rain, in slow heavy blobs at first, but hastening to a deluge. The world was obliterated. There was nothing but an awesome cavern cracked with lightning streaks, and shaken by the mighty turmoil of thunder. It was grand. Then it all ceased. A pale blue sky peeped through a cloud-rift. The birds, which had been terrified, carolled again. Evening came like a prayer. I had gone to the monastery to get a night of cool sleep. But, high -perched though my chamber was, the night was sultry and listless, and sleep was 1 ■ 1 ^ffij'j^^^^B ^^^^^^^BB^S oHm ■^i^jBB^^HB ^^^^^^^^^^HhhBB g^^BU Bu^SHH HH|^^^^^^ &