France, as Russia's ally, had sprung into high favour and was contemplating the erection of a "nouveau art" Legation. And the new French Minister's little boy put his hands behind his back when introduced to me, and said: "I cannot shake hands with you, Mademoiselle, till you assure me you are not the friend of the Yellow Monkeys." Thus are peace and goodwill taught to children in the "civilized" lands of West Europe.
I started for Vuchidol, which the Prince had expressly desired me to visit, by way of Grahovo. Each village knew of my ride to Ipek, and received me with enthusiasm. Each told the same tale. The rising planned to take place throughout the Balkans in 1904 had been stopped by the misfortunes of the Russo-Japanese War. Montenegro was aghast at the duration of the war, and her faith in Russia as a God Almighty was badly shaken.
Feeling ran high against Bulgaria, for a rumour, started, it was said, by Chedo Miyatovitch, declared that England had promised Constantinople to Prince Ferdinand, and this would interfere with the reconstruction of Great Serbia, which was to be made at all costs. We little thought then the stupendous price the world would pay for it!
There was some dread lest, Russia being now occupied in the Far East, Austria should move. On the way we picked up an old man of the Banyani tribe, over six feet, and hook-nosed. He pointed out landmarks with his long chibouk, carried an old flintlock, and seemed to live in terror of enemies. "Golden pobratim!" he said earnestly to Krsto, "dear brother, listen! My house is but two hours from the frontier. The Austrians can come. Thank God I have this gun! The Tsar of Russia should send plenty of soldiers, then we could live in safety." Nor could we reassure him. He was going to Cetinje to beg the Gospodar to write to the Tsar for troops. "May God slay me, dear brother, but the clanger is great." I stood him a drink and he went tracking over the mountains Cetinje-wards with his antique weapon.
We went on through a land the filth and poverty of which Is unimaginable to those who have never left England. The sterile waterless rocks make it impossible to live with any decency. The worst English slum is luxury in comparison. Barely enough water to drink. None to wash in. One day I had nothing but dirty melted snow out of a hole. Vermin swarmed and no one worried about them. "If we had only as many gold pieces as lice," said folk cheerfully, "this would be the richest land in Europe." The population, in truth, was probably better off in Turkish times, when it lived by sheep-stealing and raiding caravans. Montenegro has never been self-supporting, and since frontier raids were stopped the chief trade of the people had been smuggling tobacco and coffee into Austria. Krsto and his relative were keen smugglers, and knew every nook in the Bocche di Cattaro. Now, in return for various works that she was to do, Italy had been given the tobacco monopoly and a duty was imposed. Montenegro was furious. The vigilance of the Austrian police had made it hard enough to earn a living before. This made this worse. Death to the Italians! God slay Austria! And Russia actually looking on and doing nothing.
We arrived one evening at Crkvitza, near the Austrian frontier. A dree hole; a han filthy beyond all words; no horse fodder, the Kapetan absent and his secretary drunk; a lonely schoolhouse to which some fifty children descended daily from the surrounding mountains. To spare me the horrors of the han, the schoolmaster kindly offered to put me up. But even his house swarmed with bugs and ticks. I rose very early next morning, saddled and packed, and was about to flee from the place, when the secretary came triumphantly waving a telegram and told me I was under arrest. The drink-fuddled creature, thinking to "cut a dash" during his chief's absence, had wired to the police at Nikshitch, "A man dressed as a woman has come from across the Austrian frontier." The reply said, "Detain him till further orders." The telegraph station was eight hours' march distant, but he had sent some one in haste on horseback. There was a terrible row. The populace was on my side. My British passport was, of course, useless. Krsto thought his honour impugned, and I feared he would shoot. Might I return under armed escort to the village of the telegraph office where they knew me? No. All I was allowed to do was to send a man on foot with a telegram for the Minister for Foreign Affairs and await the reply. So I was interned for nearly twenty-four hours in the han and spent the night in a filthy hole with a man, a boy, a woman, a quantity of pigeons, and swarms of lice and bugs. When the reply came from Voyvoda Gavro saying I was free to go where I pleased, the secretary was flabbergasted. It sobered him, and he was afraid of what he had done. I went on to Vuchidol as I had promised, though the Prince little knew what he was letting me in for.
The affair excited Cetinje wildly. Before I left every one had been lamenting that there was now no English Minister in Montenegro. I had been prayed, by Dushan Gregovitch and others, to write to The Times on the subject, to arouse Parliament, and somehow or other get England represented in the country. Now the cry was changed: "God be praised," cried they fervently, "there is no British Minister in Cetinje." "Thanks be to God, there is not even a British Consul." Voyvoda Gavro put his head out of "Foreign Affairs," which was then a cottage in the main street, and shouted for explanations. The dismay was comical. Early next morning an officer pursued me in the street and said the Prince wanted to see me, at once. He was sitting on the top of the steps as he was used to do before the palace was altered, and he too seemed quite overwhelmed with the international complication. Krsto had already given the police a highly coloured account.
The secretary of Crkvitza, the Prince hastened to assure me, would be punished. I said that if he were punished the result would be that when a real spy arrived he would Hot be arrested. For me the affair was a mere travel episode, not worth troubling about.
Then came the crux. The Prince was terrified lest I should write to The Times and shatter his golden dreams of wealthy tourists. The whole Montenegrin Government trembled before the possibility of such a catastrophe. I promised cheerfully not to write to any paper at all. |Nor till now have I mentioned the affairs.
So the matter was settled, to the obvious relief of poor old Nikita, who was most grateful and seemed much surprised that I required no vengeance.