Peaks of Shala

by Rose Wilder Lane

THE BANDIT WHOM WE MET IN THE CAVE ABOVE THE LUMI SHALA AND WHO SANG US THE SONG OF DURGAT PASHA
A letter just received from Albania brings the news that he has cut his beard, hung his rifle on the wall (when disarming the mountaineers the Albanian government made an exception in his case), and is now running, with considerable success, a sawmill in the Mati.

Yes, he said, he liked it very much. He became even poetic about it. I admit I took no notes of what he said. But I recall Rexh’s voice repeating lyrical words about life on the mountains, camp fires and stars, freedom and fighting—the only life for a man, he declared. Once he had stopped being a bandit and gone back to the life of houses, but he was glad when the time came to be a bandit again.

I had not thought that being a bandit was a seasonal occupation, and I begged an explanation of these mysterious words. It developed that they referred to wars unknown and unrecorded save in the songs of the mountaineers, and we became so involved in references cryptic to me, but clear to the listening Albanians, that at last I was obliged to beg him to begin at the beginning and tell the straight story of his life. This he did, with the modest reluctance of a hero surrounded by admirers.

“I was not a rich man,” he began, “but as our saying is, ‘The smallest hair has its own shadow.’ There were sheep in my house, and it was a house of two rooms, and the fields repaid our labor. The tobacco box in my sash was never empty, and there was bread in the baking pan. There was a son in the cradle and another by the fire, and life was as smooth as the Lumi Shala in summer, until the coming of Durgat Pasha.

“After that came the treason of Essad Pasha, and, having then neither house, nor sheep, nor sons, nor tobacco, but only my rifle——”

We must interrupt, to bring him back to Durgat Pasha, and he was astonished that more than that name was needed to make us understand. Had we never heard the songs of Durgat Pasha? Durgat Pasha, who in 1912 came from the Sultan of Turkey to subdue the Sons of the Eagle? Durgat Pasha, who burned and killed, from the Mali Malines to the Malit Shkodra? He bent over the instrument on his knees, twanged three wild notes from it, and sang:

“Seven Powers had called a council,
Seven Powers met and said,
‘Shqiperia is no more in our hands,
All Shqiperia is not in our hands.’
Then rose Durgat Pasha and took his gun.
‘Leave this to me for three years.
O Sultan, I go for three years.
When I return the Shqiptars are yours.’
Durgat Pasha came past the white lake,
Durgat Pasha to the Mali Malines,
Durgat Pasha to the Mali Shoshit,
Durgat Pasha and five thousand soldiers.
He sends word to Hasjakupit,
‘You shall send your rifle to me.
Thirty Turkish pounds have I paid for my rifle,
Thirty pounds for my own rifle,
But I leave houses and lands and go with my rifle.
Thirty houses I leave behind me.’
These were the words of Hasjakupit.
‘Thirty houses I leave behind me,
And into Montenegro I go.
I go to King Nichola of Montenegro;
He will give me meat and bread.’
Durgat Pasha on the top of the mountain,
Durgat Pasha with Shala around him,
Durgat Pasha had no bread or water,
Durgat Pasha’s rifles had nothing to eat.
And the fighting men of Shala were all around him,
The fighting of Shala was terrible.
Durgat Pasha went out of his way to Puka.
Puka and Iballa greeted him.
When he came to Bashchellek
All of Scutari came to greet him.
The people of Scutari were frightened.
Durgat Pasha was going to die,
And Scutari rubbed his face with a sack,
Scutari gave him food and drink.
Then rose Salo Kali of Scutari.
‘My rifles I cannot give,
I have made besa with one hundred men;
Our rifles are not for Durgat Pasha.’
‘Leave the besa, Salo Kali,
Take your hammer and shoe the horses.
That is your business, Salo Kali.
What have you to do with rifles?’
‘I have made besa with one hundred men;
Our rifles are not for Durgat Pasha.’
Durgat Pasha rubbed his forehead.
‘I have never seen this kind of people,
I never saw a nation like Shala or Shoshi.
What can be done with the Shqiptars?’
These were the words of Durgat Pasha.

“That is the song of Durgat Pasha,” said the bandit. “When I came home from the fighting, the men of Durgat Pasha had burned my house, and my wife and my sons were dead. It was then I gave besa to myself never to hang my rifle on the wall and never to cut my beard until all Albania was free. And I went to fight the Serbs at Chafa Bullit. That was good fighting. All day we fought, and at night we lay by the camp fires and the women gave us bread and meat. All day long, while we were fighting, the women were on the trails bringing us bread and meat. Then we were tired and slept, and the air was good, not like the air in houses. And in the morning, when the stars were pale, we raised the war cry and killed more Serbs. It was a good life.

“It was at this time that the chiefs of Kossova came secretly by night through the Serbian lines to the house of Ahmet Bey Mati, and I was called by Ahmet to take them to Valona. He said that a word would be spoken in Valona to make Albania free. I said to Ahmet: ‘The Montenegrins hold Scutari and the seacoast even to San Giovanni, the European Powers are in Durazzo, the Serbs have Kossova and the Dibra, the Greeks are in the south. What is talk of freedom? This is not a time to talk; it is a time to fight.’ Ahmet said, ‘Before the war cry, the council of chiefs.’ Ahmet is chief of the Mati, head of the family that has ruled the Mati since the days of Scanderbeg. He was a boy of sixteen, newly come from the court of Sultan Abdul Hamid; he did not wear the clothes of the Malisori, and the chiefs of the Mati laced his opangi before every battle, because he did not know how to lace opangi. Yet it must be said that it was his coming that saved the Mati from the Serbs. He came quickly, killing seven horses between Monastir and Borelli, and he told the chiefs what to do, and they saved the Mati. It was hot fighting. For five months he had been fighting and sleeping on the rocks. His chiefs loved him.

“I said, ‘I am killing Serbs, and have no wish to go to Valona.’ Ahmet said: ‘When my father died, my older brother sent me from my country to the Turks. I do not know the trails. The chiefs of Kossova are my guests, and they do not know the trails. We must go to Valona through Elbassan, where the Serbs are. There is a meeting of all the chiefs of Albania in Valona. If we are killed by the Serbs, there will be no chiefs of the Malisori at that meeting. There will be only Toshks—men of the plains.’ I said: ‘To-night the moon will be dark. We must start as soon as we can see the small stars.’