CHAPTER XV.
To Gussinje—The valley of the Drin—A rough road—In the mountains— Hospitality—A pretty woman—A scientific frontier—Franciscans—Dog Latin—Marco Milano.
It was settled that we should start early on the following morning. Then the boulim-bashi bowed low, shook hands, and left us. We had learnt something of the nature of the place we were about to visit from Mr. Green and others. About three days' march from Scutari, across the great Klementi mountains, there is a long and beautiful valley, which penetrates deeply into the central range of the Mount Scardus. Down this valley flows the White Drin, a stream of considerable importance, that flows into the Adriatic, near Alessio. In this valley are Ipek, Jakova, and Priserin, three of the most interesting cities of Albania, inhabited by a population very skilled in the working of metals. The most beautiful saddlery, filigree work, gold-hilted and jewelled yataghans and pistols, are here worked by an industrious people.
But the population of these towns is ferociously fanatical. Surrounded as they are by Christians, knowing that the day is not far off when the rising ambitions and energies of the oppressed race will drive them from their homes eastwards and southwards, the Mohammedans here hate the Christians with a hatred more intense than even the followers of this fanatical creed entertain in other parts. At the very head of this valley of the Drin, where the river springs out from the grey rock, is a ridge of forest-clad mountain, the ancient Pindus, which forms the watershed of the tributaries of the westward-flowing Drin, and Bojana, and the Lim, a river that flows northwards, joining the Drina and the Save, across Bosnia and Servia, till it ultimately pours its waters into the mighty Danube at Belgrade. At the head of the valley of the Lim, situated in the centre of a green and fertile cirque, surrounded by stupendous mountains, is the little town or village of Gussinje, a congregation of sordid wooden huts. It is a place of great strategic importance, for just behind it, on the ridge of the forest-clad mountains, Montenegro, Bosnia, and Albania join.
By the provisions of the treaty of Berlin, Gussinje and its neighbourhood was handed over to the Black Mountaineers—wherefore it is difficult to see.
As conquerors in the war, it seems just enough that the Montenegrins should have acquired Antivari by that treaty, a place of no strategic importance, yet which gave them what they so long and eagerly thirsted for, a seaport. But it was decidedly a mistake to extend Prince Nikita's territory beyond the mountain ridge, a natural frontier, down into the valley of the Lim, giving a command of it—a standing menace to Turkey and Bosnia, a bone of many future contentions. It must be remembered, too, that the inhabitants of the district to be given up are not Sclav in race or language—not of the Greek church—but Mussulmen or Roman Catholics. The Montenegrins have been made too much of lately. They now imagine that they are a great people, and have a holy mission of aggrandisement at the expense of Turkey.
Gussinje is a curious sort of a place, and has never enjoyed a very sweet reputation. As in all parts of Northern Albania, the people do pretty much what they like, and do not feel the Turkish yoke very heavily. Situated as it is on the frontier, it has become a city of refuge. Montenegrin renegades whose country has become too hot for them, Bosnian Mohammedan refugees, and vagabonds of all sorts, have flocked hither. It is in this town of Gussinje that the chiefs of the Albanian League have concentrated their forces, determined to fight to the bitter end, in spite of the Austrian troops in Bosnia to the north of them, Turkish troops in their rear, Montenegrins before their walls, and the doubtful neutrality of the Christian Arnauts, who are all round them in the mountains, lying in wait to murder and strip small parties of either side—for this is the idea of neutrality among these people, an armed neutrality with a vengeance. Thirty-five thousand Albanians, we were told, occupy Gussinje, at the head of whom is Ali Bey.
Ali Pasha, as he has styled himself, is a Gussinian of rank, owner of lands and houses in the town and neighbourhood, a man of great intelligence, and a devout Mussulman.
He was one of the principal people implicated in the assassination of Mehemet Ali at Jakova.
This general, as my readers will remember, was sent by the Porte on the dangerous mission of negotiating the transfer of Turkish territory to her enemies. He was strongly advised not to venture into that hotbed of fanaticism and fierce patriotism, Jakova. The League held possession of the town; the population was worked up to the highest pitch of excitement; every one knew the history of the envoy. As a foreigner, a Pasha's favourite boy, a renegade, he was certain to be disliked and suspected by rigid Mussulmen, and was the very last man that should have been sent on so delicate an errand. It is rumoured that the jealousy of his enemies at Constantinople sent him on this surely fatal journey.