On our return to the inn several hours later the three men were standing stiffly outside the door, cap in hand and thoroughly scared. He who had attacked us spoke tremblingly, offering as an excuse that they had fished all night and had but gone for some food before taking us out again. They were direly poor, he said, and the fear of losing their wages had upset them, the long night without sleep had destroyed their powers of reasoning, and—would we forgive them for the dastardly outrage? Needless to say we dismissed them, as do the magistrates, with a caution.
We met amongst other Montenegrin officials the district doctor, an interesting man of varied experience. At his invitation we witnessed the annual vaccination, which is compulsory in Montenegro.
VACCINATION
BAZAAR LIFE, DULCIGNO
Outside the door of the principal mosque thedoctor and his assistants and some other officials took up their position one morning and waited. Shortly afterwards crowds of children appeared on the scene, mostly in charge of their Turkish fathers or elder brothers, some of the latter scarcely able to carry their little burdens. Very rarely a Turkish mother appeared, closely veiled, but the Christian mothers invariably came; that is, the Albanian Christians from the outlying villages. Very quaint are these women in a most picturesque costume and carrying their infants in a cumbersome and unwieldy cradle slung on their backs. It was a very varied assortment of babies which was presented to the doctor, many of the Turkish children being so emaciated and such a mass of repulsive sores, that many were sent away as too weak. Most of them shrieked with fear, but a few came up smiling, one and all comforted by their protector, either Turk, child, or fond mother. The fathers invariably showed the most distressed concern. It was a comical sight; outside the rails a motley crowd of interested spectators and waiting children, and in the inclosure the doctor pricking his patients one after the other in a most indifferent manner. His clerk noted the names, and we, with some of the local grandees, drank tiny cups of coffee and looked on.
The Albanian or Turkish element is very strong in Dulcigno, and they are the only Montenegrin subjects exempt from compulsory military service. The Montenegrin authorities told us that they were very peaceable and industrious, giving no trouble whatever. It is, after Podgorica, the largest town in Montenegro, and does a lot of trade in small sailing-boats down the coast. As many as seventy-five per cent of the men are usually away at sea, carrying the Montenegrin flag as far as Constantinople. It is quite cut off from the rest of Montenegro, except by a mule track connecting it over a difficult mountain path with Antivari and the rest of the country. By sea it is connected by the Austrian-Lloyd weekly Albanian Line, and by one or two smaller steamers which occasionally call there, with Cattaro and the Albanian coast towns.