We were up before daylight the next morning. It had snowed heavily in the night, so our descent to the plain was slow, and not unattended with danger. Our good-byes at Castrati before starting were affectionate and protracted. "Me teneson miku idaxtun!" (Good-bye, dear friends), were the last words of our pretty hostess, as she waved her hand to her departing admirers.
At the khan of Koplik, where we were beginning to be well known (this was our fourth visit to it), we lunched off the fragments of the sheep which our host had thrown into our saddle-bags in the exuberance of his hospitality on the previous night. It was dark long before we entered the intricate lanes of the faubourg of Scutari. So here we were once again, having failed in our attempt to reach Gussinje. However, the expedition had not been altogether a vain one. We had seen a good deal of the manners and customs of the Arnaut; had journeyed away from the main roads into the heart of the great mountains, where, I believe, none of our countrymen had ever ventured before; and again, we had learnt a good deal more of the real strength of the league than a month's inquiries at Scutari could have taught us. Not that I did not take the Franciscans' account with a few grains of salt. The fathers hated the Mussulmen, and were anxious to withdraw our sympathies from the defenders of Gussinje.
The world will hear a good deal of the doings of this Albanian League some day, so a few remarks on what, from my observations, I consider to be the real condition of affairs, will not, I think, be here out of place.
The chiefs of the association are, I believe, honest men, patriotic, and determined to carry out their programme to the death.
Ali Bey is spoken very highly of even by the Montenegrins, and if reports prove true, will show himself no indifferent general.
Nearly every Mussulman in Albania is a member of the league, and its forces are daily swollen by refugees from Bosnia and deserters from the Turkish army.
That Turkey at first secretly assisted and encouraged the movement, I think there can be no doubt. At any rate it is certain that the Porte's representatives, even her highest officers in this country, openly sympathized with it.
But the league has waxed too strong for the government, who could not crush it now were it desirous of doing so. The leaguesmen, feeling their strength, have extended their programme. Defence of their native land against foreign invasion is now not their only cry, but Autonomy, and the shaking off of the Turkish yoke are boldly discussed in the bazaars of the garrison towns.
The Montenegrin difficulty may be settled; the principality may agree to take some lands near Antivari in lieu of the Gussinje and Plava district; but there are other and more serious complications behind.
To resist the advances of Austria on the north and Greece on the south are the avowed objects of the league. It is only too probable that the dual empire will be compelled to carry her arms into this province; for a lawless, fanatical, self-ruling Albania will be far too troublesome and dangerous a neighbour for her disaffected Bosnia. An occupation of Albania is confidently spoken of by all the Austrian officers I met in Dalmatia.