The relations between Italy and Yugoslavia have been treated at some length, for it would require but little to bring a gathering of storm-clouds to the sky. One even hears of Roman Catholics in Istria and elsewhere abjuring their Church and—for the national cause—adopting the Serbian Orthodox faith. Twenty years ago it happened that two Istrian villages, Ricmanje and Log, went over to the Uniate and thence to the Orthodox Church. This was on account of a quarrel with the Bishop of Triest, who wanted, against the wishes of the people, to remove their priest, Dr. Pojar. But now we have priests in the provinces given to Italy who are openly calling on their flock to go over with them to their Orthodox brothers; and this is a movement which, it is thought, will merely be postponed by the introduction of the Slav liturgy. To take a single sermon out of many, we may mention one which in the summer of 1920 was preached in a church of the Vipava valley. The clergyman, after lamenting that the chief dignitaries of the Roman Catholic Church are Italians, gave it as his opinion that there was nothing to choose in point of goodness between that particular Church and the Orthodox Church. "And," said an old peasant who came to Triest with the story of what had happened, "never in my life did I hear so fine a sermon and one that did me so much good."
FOOTNOTES:
[72] The Italians had originally landed a "hygienic mission" at Valona early in the European War, and this of course developed into something else. That ingenuous propagandist, Mr. H. E. Goad, tells us (in the Fortnightly Review of May 1922) that while Nature had made the innumerable deep-water harbours on the eastern coast of the Adriatic practically immune from Italy's attack, a landing or raid from one of them at Ancona, Bari or Barletta would be a vital blow at Italy, severing vital communications. He therefore justifies Italy's landing at Valona in that it was a purely defensive step, made to ensure that its harbour should not be used against her. He may hold that the seizure of one town is better than the seizure of none, but from the strategic and political point of view it would seem that Mr. Goad is an injudicious advocate.
[73] Albaniens Zukunft. Munich, 1916.
[74] La Sera, August 6, 1920.
[75] Giornale delle Puglie, September 6-7, 1920.
[76] The delegates of the League of Nations were told, at the beginning of 1922, by the authorities in southern Albania that it was iniquitous to believe that they would employ this kind of punishment for political refugees. Did they not advertise an amnesty to all those who returned within forty-five days? And in what newspaper, they indignantly asked—in what newspaper had they published the slightest threat of arson?
[77] In the winter of 1921 this gentleman was expelled from his country.
[78] Albanesische Studien. Jena, 1854.
[79] Albanien und die Albanesen.