FOOTNOTES:

"At the table also sat the sage Pribičević,Who can converse with Emperors...."

There are some who, curiously, have compared Radić's party with the Sinn Feiners; Radić may have announced that he would approach the Serbs as the representative of an independent country, but he never proposed, even when his views were most extreme, to realize them with physical force. At a great open-air meeting of his adherents the speeches were so mild that only twice did the Chief of Police, who was next to me, raise a warning finger, and on each occasion to keep the orator from very innocent digressions. Nevertheless, there is no concealing the fact that even in these unsatisfactory times—"It seems to me," said a philosophic peasant recently at Valjevo, in the heart of Serbia, "it seems to me that if we had a plebiscite then Valjevo might not wish to remain with Serbia!"—even in a world that is so awry the Croats are more reserved towards the union than is good for the State. Perhaps they would cherish fewer grievances if they had gained their freedom with greater difficulty; and surely they need have no more uneasiness than have the Scots that their name and nationality will be swamped, for what the Magyars were unable to do, that the Serbs do not wish to do. There are among the Serbs a few extremists, such as a pernicious editor or two, but their anti-Croat tirades find extremely little favour anywhere. Last autumn when the Prince-Regent (now King Alexander) visited the Croat capital his reception was most enthusiastic. "Let us keep him here!" cried the people, "and let King Peter stay in Belgrade!" The Prince by his tact brought the Croat out of his tent; he must not be allowed to go back again—let the Southern Slavs observe what each of their provinces can bring towards the common good. The Croats acknowledge that the military system of Serbia is more endurable—only one son is taken out of each family—and that whereas in Slovenia a lawsuit can be settled in fourteen days it has beenwont in Croatia to take as many years. Unfortunately human nature, in Serbia, Croatia and everywhere else, finds that the bad points of other people are more worthy of comment than the good. When two brothers have been brought up in very different circumstances there will be so many points on which they differ; and when a Serb taking part in a technical discussion of scientists wishes to say that he differs from the previous speaker he will commonly observe that that person has made a fool of himself. When an editor alludes to a political opponent he may call him an assassin and be much astonished if this is resented. "Je suis un ours," said a Serbian savant of European repute; occasionally he behaves like one and is rather proud of it. The Serbs of Croatia have been imitating, nay exaggerating, the emphatic manners of their countrymen in the old kingdom. And Pribičević, as Minister of Education, has not attempted to give the Croats a tactful course in courage, patriotism and morality, where they have much to learn from the less civilized Serbs, but scowling at them he has made up his mind that, in and out of school, they must straightway be the closest of companions.

However, the Serbs and Croats have a man whose counsel is more worthy of attention. Dr. Trumbić, formerly the Minister of Foreign Affairs, had been elected at the head of four different lists in his native Dalmatia but had entered the Constituent Assembly without giving his allegiance to any party. And in April 1921 he made a speech as memorable as it was long, for it occupied the whole of one sitting and was continued the next day. Careless of the applause and the antagonism which he excited, the serene orator pointed out that the conflict between Serbs and Croats was based on their different psychology. Croatia had had her independent life and must be considered as a factor in Yugoslavia; but having come in, like Montenegro, of her own accord, she had not wished to be a separate factor. Traditions should not be so lightly set aside; and while there was perhaps no people more homogeneous than the Yugoslavs it should be remembered that none was more ready to resist the application of force.

LESSONS OF THE MONTENEGRIN ELECTIONS

Except at Kolašin, where a few friends of Nikita tried their brigand tactics, there was perfect calm in Montenegro during the elections. As elsewhere in Yugoslavia, there was a general amnesty and a prohibition, for the three preceding days, to sell wine or rakia. The ten elected candidates, all of them for the Yugoslav union and against Nikita, were equally divided between Radicals and Democrats on the one hand and Communists and Republicans on the other. The authorities took not the slightest step to favour any candidate; various prominent deputies, such as Dr. Yoyić, the Minister of Food Supply, were beaten. And in a letter to the Press we were told by Mr. Ronald M'Neill, M.P., that these elections were certainly both "farcical and fraudulent." He is contradicted by Mr. Roland Bryce, who, after his excellent work on the Allied Plebiscite Commission in Carinthia, was sent by the Foreign Office with Major L. E. Ottley to report on the Montenegrin elections. He says (in Command Paper I., 124) that "in actual practice the method of voting prescribed by the electoral law was found to ensure absolute secrecy (the system adopted being the only feasible one in a country where the proportion of illiterates is great), and the manner in which the ballot was supervised and carried out was unimpeachable and proof against the most exacting criticism." Mr. M'Neill is also contradicted by the Republican candidate, M. Gjonović, who in a manifesto drawn up after the election declares that "none can say that the elections were not free, or that anyone who wished could not make up a list. At the elections only the lists and boxes of the Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Radicals and Communists were represented. All of these parties had in their programmes the motto 'The people and State union,' with, of course, different points of view and different opinions as to the organization of our national and State forces, except the Communists, who go further and desire the union of all peoples."

WHICH ONE GENTLEMAN REFUSES TO TAKE

It will thus be seen that the friends of Nikita were altogether wrong in suggesting that those who voted for the Republicans or Communists were opposed to the union with Serbia in Yugoslavia. Both Republicans and (paradoxical though it sounds) the Communists resented this insinuation very bitterly; and considering that the leaders of both parties are pronounced antagonists of the old régime, and were indeed severally condemned to death by Nikita, it would have been strange if they now supported him. Thus every single programme put forward by the different parties included, in some form or other, union with Serbia. The candidates themselves explicitly said so; but Mr. M'Neill knows better, and informs us how very hostile to the Serbs they really were. He is a wonderful man, Mr. M'Neill. Standing up in the House of Commons he directs his penetrating gaze upon the Black Mountain, and with such effect that he can see in the minds of Montenegrin politicians what they themselves had never dreamed of. Since we have such a man as Mr. M'Neill in the country, one would think that the Foreign Office might have saved itself the expense of sending out Mr. Bryce and Major Ottley.

But since we have it, let us look at Mr. Bryce's very interesting and detailed report. After explaining that both Republicans and Communists were in favour of union with Serbia, he tells us how it happened that so many people voted for these two lists instead of for the orthodox Radical and Democratic parties. The Communists, according to Mr. Bryce, were benefited by a party organization, a vigorous canvass and a better discipline than that of any of their opponents. Their policy won the support of many ardent and very patriotic Nationalists, who voted in many cases for Communism on the ground that it was the Russian policy—out of gratitude for what the Tzars had done for Montenegro in the past! Major Temperley, assistant military attaché, in another report (Command Paper I., 123) observes that some local discontent had arisen in Montenegro because the native does not understand, and has never experiencedbefore, a really efficient system of government, and because the introduction of conscription was not well adapted to the national tradition of lawless and untrained vigour. Major Temperley testifies that the Republican party gained the suffrages of numerous returned emigrants who admired the state of things in America. He shares Mr. Bryce's opinion as to the insignificance of the pro-Nikita party. "Even making large allowances," says he, "there seemed to me to be no doubt that the pro-Nicholas party were the weakest in Montenegro." Certain of his devotees were simply brigands who, like the Neapolitan miscreants after 1860, sought to cast a glamour over their depredations by affecting to be in arms on behalf of their former King. This personage himself was so well aware of his unpopularity that he was prudent enough to tell his supporters to abstain from voting. Those who did abstain were altogether only 32·69 per cent. of the electors, though one would have been justified in expecting a much higher proportion, since the people have not yet fully grasped their rights and duties with respect to the franchise; the distances to the booths were often very great, and the peasants were often indifferent as to whether one candidate or another with a very similar programme should be elected. The tribal or family system is still so prevalent in the villages that one member of a family would be sent to express the considered views of his fellows. The effect of the elections being held on a Sunday was to increase rather than diminish the number of abstainers, for although Sunday is a public holiday the Christian Montenegrin is under no obligation to hear Mass and for that reason travel to the village. The churches are practically deserted, for he is accustomed on that day to remain at home; while the Moslem voters largely declined to vote because there were no Moslem candidates. That is why it would appear that those of the 32·69 per cent. who abstained because they were in favour of Nikita were extremely few. Their simple-mindedness has its limits, while that of good Mr. M'Neill believes that because France, Great Britain and America undertook to restore Montenegrin independence, they were still obliged to do so after they perceived at the conclusion of the War that an overwhelmingmajority of Montenegrins did not desire it. This majority dethroned its traitor-king; but Mr. M'Neill maintains that France and England have dethroned "a monarch who was a friend and an ally."[64]Because M. Poincaré, in the days before the Montenegrins had rejected Nikita, addressed him as "Very Dear and Great Friend"—the ordinary form of words for a reigning monarch—Mr. M'Neill actually seems to think that France was for evermore compelled to clasp Nikita to her bosom. He clearly admires those who, since the end of the War, have risen in the cause of their old King; and I suppose that in consequence he disapproves of the Omladina, the voluntary association of men who banded themselves together to resist the terrorism of the pro-King komitadjis. If he had been in Montenegro during the years after the War he would possibly agree that komitadji is the proper name for the many lawless elements who have found the traditional fighting life more congenial than the thankless task of tilling their very barren land. The moral effect of opposing to these the Montenegrin Omladina instead of Serbian troops was to destroy all pretence of the movement being a national Montenegrin insurrection against the union, and the cessation of assistance from Italy resulted in the complete suppression of the movement. The few outlaws who still remain at large, said Mr. Bryce in December 1920, are in no sense political, but are merely bandits. And as the Omladina has now noraison d'êtrethey have disbanded themselves. Much now depends on the Constitution. If it gives them equal rights—and naturally it will—with the other inhabitants of Yugoslavia the Montenegrins will be content.

In August 1921 theSecoloof Milan sent a famous correspondent to Montenegro. He came to much the same conclusions as Messrs. Bryce and Temperley. Not a single political prisoner was to be found, and not one of the ex-soldiers who returned from Gaeta had been molested. The correspondent thought that the Serbs had been ill-advised at the beginning to employ forcible methods against the pro-Nikita partisans who wereopposed to Yugoslavia; they should, said he, have let the pear ripen spontaneously and fall into their lap. But now their policy had become one of conciliation: during the last two and a half years Montenegro had received from Belgrade for public works, pensions and subsidies, 93 million dinars, and had paid in taxes only 5 millions. Secondary education had been increased, and 700 Montenegrin students (of whom 500 are allotted a monthly grant) frequent Yugoslav universities. The fertile lands of Yugoslavia were open to Montenegrin emigration. In fact an isolated, independent Montenegro was no longer needed. With the disappearance of the Turk from all Serbian territory in 1913 a return to the union of the Serbs, as in the days of Stephen Dušan, was only hindered by historical, sentimental and, above all, by dynastic reasons. It was sad, quoth the correspondent, that the glorious history of Montenegro should have come to such a tame end, but her historic mission was closed in 1913, even as that of Scotland in 1707, to the benefit of both parties. Now the Serbs were leaving them to manage their own affairs; many ex-Nikita officials had been confirmed in their posts, while officers were given their old rank in the Yugoslav army. It is unfortunate for itself that the "Near East" (of London) does not employ so discerning a correspondent. We should then hear no more of such folly as that which—to select one occasion out of many—caused it in November 1921 to speak about "the forcible absorption of Montenegro." And the world may be pardoned if it is more ready to accept the observations made on the spot by an expert Italian correspondent rather than the futile remarks sent by the Hon. Aubrey Herbert from the House of Commons, also in November 1921, to theMorning Post. This gentleman informs us that "it was probably because the Yugoslav Government was allowed to annex the ancient principality of Montenegro, exile its King, and subjugate its people, without any interference from the Great Powers, that M. Pasitch thought that he could do as he liked in Albania." That is the sort of statement which one may treat with Matthew Arnold's "patient, deep disdain."

MEDIÆVAL DOINGS AT RIEKA

On July 14, 1920, a letter marked "urgent" (No. 2047) was written by Colonel Sani, the Chief of d'Annunzio's Cabinet, in which he confirmed the orders which he had already given verbally, to the effect that all the foreign elements, especially the Serbs and Croats, who "exercise an obnoxious political influence," should be expelled from Rieka at the earliest possible date; he mentions that this is the command of d'Annunzio, who is in full accord with the President of the Consiglio Nazionale. This was the continuation of a practice which the Italian authorities had carried on in a wholesale manner. Father J. N. Macdonald, in his unimpeachable little book,A Political Escapade(London, 1921), gives us numerous examples of persons who in the most wanton fashion were expelled from the town. Thus a merchant called Pliskovac was arrested by the carabinieri, while talking to some English soldiers. After three days, spent under arrest, he was told that he would have to depart "from Italy" (sic). He was given afaglio di via obligatorioby the carabinieri, according to which he was banished on the ground of being "unemployed." Yet this man had had a fixed residence in Rieka for thirty-six years, was employed as a merchant, and furnished with a regular industrial certificate.... His name had been found on one of the lists in favour of annexation to Yugoslavia. When the world in general turned its attention away from Rieka, very much relieved to think that there would be an end to all the turmoil now that an agreement had at last been reached and the poor harassed place was to be neutral, it presumed that those among her citizens who had been openly in arms against the other party would as soon as possible resign. They would have been astonished to be told that the notorious self-elected Consiglio Nazionale Italiano, under the selfsame President, Mr. Grossich, cheerfully remained in office. It is true that they now called themselves the "Provisional Government"; in Paris and London this change of title made a good deal more impression than upon the local Yugoslavs, whose treatment did not vary. A decree was printed on January 21, 1921, in theVedetta,which laid it down that the expulsions ordered by the previous Government retained their force, but that appeals might be addressed to the Rector of the Interior. A deputation was received by this gentleman, and was told that the procedure would be so complicated and so lengthy that it would not permit any one to return until after the elections. These elections had been fixed for the end of April, and it seemed as if France and England were so blinded by the blessed words "Provisional Government" that they could see nothing else. That over 2000 arditi, clothed in mufti, had either stayed from the d'Annunzian era or been since introduced was surely gossip, and how could anyone believe that those men had been granted citizenship on the simple declaration of a Rieka shopkeeper, or some such person, that the applicant worked under him? These declarations, by the way, must have refrained from going into details, for there was an almost total lack of work—except in the political department of the police. Rieka was to all intents in the possession of Italy, and she was learning what that meant. The town was like a dead place, shops were only open in the morning, and if the shopkeepers had not been compelled by the authorities to remove their shutters they would have strolled down to the quays where the grass was growing—"but, thank Heaven," cried Grossich, "thank Heaven, it is Italian grass!" (If he ever recalls that long-distant day, when, as a student, he fought for his fellow-Croats, and when, as a young doctor, he was an enthusiastic official of the Croat Club at Castua near Rieka, perhaps this gentleman thanks his God for having led him to Rieka and turned him into an Italian.) Cut off from its Yugoslav hinterland the population of Rieka, which consisted more and more of arditi and fascisti, less and less of Yugoslavs, the population had nothing to do save to speculate in the rate of exchange (but not in the local notes which no one wanted) and to prepare for the elections. Thus, with time very heavy on their hands, there was a great deal of corruption; cocaine could be obtained at nearly all the cafés. The elections drew nearer, and one wondered whether the Entente was going to look at the lists of voters and to inquire how it came that many natives of the town were not inscribed. Whatwas likely to happen if the place was delivered altogether to the C.N.I. could be seen when the harbour of Baroš, given by the Rapallo Treaty to Yugoslavia, was demanded, simply demanded, by the Italian Nationalists; those ultra-patriots the fascisti, in Italy and in Rieka, when they saw that in the "holocaust city" everything was going just as well for them as in the brave days of d'Annunzio, persisted loudly in claiming Baroš as an integral part of Rieka. The Yugoslavs must be prevented, wherever possible, from approaching the Adriatic—this being the furious policy of the Italian capitalists who had succeeded in sweeping most of the Italian people off their feet. With Baroš, a port of limited possibilities, in the hands of the Yugoslavs, it would mean that the adjacent Rieka through its Yugoslav commerce would prosper; but anything that savoured of a Yugoslav Rieka was obnoxious to the capitalists and their wild followers, since they feared that in the first place it would raise a grievous obstacle to their penetration of the Balkans, and secondly it would involve the ruin of Triest, where German capital still plays a predominant part. So in their folly they strenuously fought for the Germans, spurred on by the terrible thought that Rieka might become predominantly Yugoslav. They refused to listen to their wiser men, who pointed out that the possession of an odd town or island was to Italy of not so much importance as friendship with their Slav neighbours. When, at the beginning of April 1921 a large sailing boat, theRad(Captain Vlaho Grubišić) came into Baroš, the first ship to bring the Yugoslav flag to that port, there was intense commotion among the fascisti. Forty of them with weapons ran down to the harbour, but Grubišić told them that he saw no reason why he should not fly the flag of his State. A number of workmen, Italians and Yugoslavs, then appeared and made common cause against the fascisti, so that the latter withdrew. And the captain of the Italian warshipCarlo Mirabellosent to ask Grubišić if he had removed the flag. On hearing that he had not done so the captain said that he had acted perfectly correctly. It seems to be too much to hope that such honourable Italians as this captain and these workmen will be able, without certain measures on the part ofFrance and England, to prevail over those elements who have dragged Rieka down to death and to dishonour.

At last, on April 25, the elections were held. There were two parties, that of the C.N.I., swollen with arditi and fascisti, who would have nothing to do with the Treaty of Rapallo—their programme consisted in annexation to Italy—and the other party, whose object was to carry out the provisions of the Treaty. Professor Zanella was its chief. There did not seem to be much hope that it would be successful, although it contained what was left of the Autonomists, who in 1919 were the largest party—desiring that the town should be neither Yugoslav nor Italian—and these Autonomists were now reinforced by the Yugoslavs. But so numerous had been the expulsions that many of the survivors feared that it would be futile to vote, and on the other hand the Annexionist party was quite confident that it would win. During the afternoon of the election day, however, they perceived that the impossible was happening, and that Zanella was marching to victory. Thereupon the enraged fascisti had recourse to violence. "Zanella's victory was intolerable to these patriots," saidLa Nazione,[65]"because they remembered the two years of tenacity and of splendid Italian spirit and of suffering which the town had lived through." Most of the electors remembered the suffering. The fascisti seized a number of urns and made a bonfire of them; there was presented the spectacle of Signor Gigante, d'Annunzio's obedient mayor, bursting with armed companions into that room of the Palace of Justice where the votes were being scrutinized. "I yield to violence," said the presiding official; and twenty minutes afterwards the contents of the urns were burning merrily. But these measures did not help the cause of the fascisti, no more than did their screams that they had been betrayed. And if Zanella had to fly from Rieka because, as the Nationalist paper put it, he could not stand up against the vehement indignation of so many of the citizens, yet he and his party have triumphed. "Fiume or Death," used to be the device dear to d'Annunzio. He placarded the long-suffering walls with it, and it wason the lapels of the coats of his adherents. "Fiume must belong to Italy or be blown up," cried the poet. But, strange to say, a majority of the inhabitants prefer that their town should continue to exist, and this it can only do if, in accordance with the Treaty of Rapallo, it becomes a neutral State on friendly terms with both its neighbours, Italy and Yugoslavia. The Italian Government desires, of course, to execute its Treaty obligations,[66]and if it finds too painful the task of moderating the ardours of its own super-patriots, it will no doubt be glad to have this done by an International force. That method, which was only prevented by d'Annunzio's arrival in 1919, offers the speediest and most efficacious solution of Rieka's troubles.

THE STRICKEN TOWN

If anyone imagined that they would be ended with the installation of Zanella he was wrong. At the municipal elections 90 per cent. voted for the Autonomist party, the Yugoslavs having had the good sense to join them. But the Italian Nationalists were not going to yield to moderation, and immediately after the elections Zanella was obliged to flee for his life, so that he was not installed in office until October 5. He struggled manfully to clear away the chaos and to make such economic arrangements as would eventually convert Rieka into a prosperous port. This the fascisti of Triest and Venice could by no means tolerate, and on January 31 an unsuccessful attempt was made by them on his life as he was leaving the Constituent Assembly. On February 16 the Anai (Assoziazione Nazionale fra gli Arditi d'Italia) sent out a very urgent message from their headquarters in the Via Macchiavelli in Triest. They informed the subsections that not only was Zanella preparing to deliver Rieka to the Croats, but that the army of the "globe-trotter" Wrangel was waiting in Sušak to seize the wretched town. Therefore Gabriele d'Annunzio had commanded that every loyal servant of the cause was to be mobilized. And after a few rhetorical sentences it continued, "I will give the marching orders by telegramas follows: 'Send the documents. Farina.' If only a small number of people are needed I will telegraph, 'Send ... Quintal. Farina.'" The men were to assemble at the Italian Labour Bureau, 9 Via Pozza Bianca in Triest. They were to be clad in mufti, to be armed so far as it was possible and to have with them three days' provender.... The subsections are asked to telegraph the approximate number of those on whom they can rely. And this memorandum should be acknowledged. It is signed, "With brotherly greetings. Farina Salvatore." About ten days later—between February 26 and 28—there was a meeting at the Hotel Imperial in Vienna, under the presidency of Vilim Stipetić, formerly a major of the Austrian General Staff. Some dissident Croats—among them Dr. Emanuel Gagliardi, Captains Cankl and Petričević, Gjuro Klišurić, Josip Boldin and Major-General Ištvanović—two dissident Montenegrins, Jovo Plamenac and Marko Petrović, together with two Italian officers, adherents of d'Annunzio, Colonel Finzi of Triest and Major Ventura of Rome, ... assembled for the purpose of stirring up trouble for the Yugoslavs in the spring. They referred with pleasure to the presence of sundry Bulgarian komitadjis in Albania, Finzi declared that the Italian Government would satisfy the Croats and give them Rieka as soon as Croatia had achieved her independence and a less visionary promise was made of disturbances in Rieka. On March 1 the two Italian officers left for Triest and on March 3 Rieka was confronted with anothercoup d'état. The fascisti of Triest and of Gulia Venetia descended on the town in two special trains of the Italian State Railway. They had not the slightest confidence in Zanella, who was an honest man, working on the basis of the Treaty of Rapallo, whereby Italy and Yugoslavia recognized the Free State of Rieka. In their eyes it was a monstrous thing that Italy should be expected to observe this instrument. So let the town be freed, let Zanella be expelled. And as he only had at his disposal a force of about three hundred local gendarmes, with rifles but without munition, it was not particularly difficult for the fascisti heroes to accomplish their task. Zanella had to fly once more.

"If Italy were to offend against the freedom andindependence of the State of Rieka she would deprive herself," said Signor Schanzer, the Italian Foreign Secretary "she would deprive herself of the name of a Great Power and in the Society of Nations she would retain no authority." Thus did the successor of the relentless but unavailing della Torretta try, with eloquent and noble words, to wipe the blot from Italy's scutcheon. She could scarcely have the nations coming to the Congress of Genoa, there to debate with regard to the economic re-establishment of Europe, while her own conduct was so very much under suspicion. It would have been rather curious, so theZagreber Tagblatt[67]pointed out, for a robber to invite you to his house with a view to taking steps against robbery. Something drastic had to be done, so that Europe would not look askance at the Italian Government. Zanella, it was true, had been thrown out—but why should not the world be told that this had been effected by the people of the town? A very excellent idea! And so a certain Lieut. Cabruna of thegendarmeriemade a plan to get together the Constituent Assembly and then—well, there are always methods by which resolutions can be passed. Perhaps it would not even be necessary for a single rifle to be fired at the deputies from the Distinguished Strangers' Gallery. But most of the deputies succeeded in escaping from the town, although frantic efforts were made to prevent them. Out of the threescore only thirteen poor devils were held fast and came to the futile meeting. The others, with Zanella, assembled on Yugoslav territory at a place called Saint Anna.

And Signor Schanzer went on talking. Officers and men of the Italian army and navy, said he, had shown perfect discipline. Signor Schanzer may not be an expert on discipline, but as a humorist he wins applause. One's ordinary notions of discipline do not include the seizure of a warship by a handful of bandits, the cannons of the vessel being afterwards directed against the Government palace of a neutral State. The fascisti, with the help of Italian troops and accompanied by several Italian deputies, eject the legal Government of Rieka. One of these deputies, Giuratti, is chosen by his friendsto be President of the Free State—Giuratti of the fascisti, Giuratti who most barbarically had ill-treated the Istrian Slavs, but—for we will be just—this was when he believed they were barbarians, savages, quite common, brutal men; well, he had learned, he wrote,[68]that this was not the case, they had adopted Western culture, they had raised the revolutionary flag against the dynasty of Karageorgević and if Yugoslavia's dismemberment should ever come to pass, "then, as I confidently hope," said he, "the Croats with their righteous national aspirations will unite with their great neighbour Italy. We salute the Croat Revolution with sincerest sympathy..." and so on and so on. That was the kind of calm, impartial personage to have as Governor of the distracted Free State, where in one point anyhow most of the population think the same, and that is that their union with Italy would be an absolute disaster. Behold this Giuratti posing his candidature, Giuratti whose patriotism and idealism are, says the Italian Government, fully appreciated by them; nevertheless it has advised him to refuse the suggested honour. That he should be punished did not occur to them; but what would they have said if a Yugoslav—surely with more right than an Italian and certainly with a larger following of townsfolk—had been selected as President? "The proceedings of the Italian Government," said Schanzer, "are clear, speedy and determined." But did anything unpleasant happen to Commandant Castelli, an officer sent to make order, when he quite openly placed himself on the side of the fascisti? Would degradation be the lot of any officer or soldier who "mutinied" and joined the fascisti?... Apparently it was due to the unhappy political condition of Europe that the whole civilized world did not launch an indignant protest against the baseness and cynicism of the Italians. But how utterly they failed to persuade others that the wishes of Rieka were as they represented them! Rieka desires to remain independent and this desire the Italians will have to respect. And the later they make up their mind to keep their promises, so much the worse for them. The Yugoslavs can wait, for theirsis the future. A cartoonist in the BelgradeVremedepicted a rough old Serbian warrior holding on his open hand a very neat little Italian soldier. "Now listen to me," he was saying, "and I will tell you a story. Once upon a time there was a country called Austria...."

There was a characteristic little affair at Saint Anna on March 23. A few minutes after Zanella had left the Lubić Inn a suspicious-looking person appeared. He began observing the customers and their surroundings, when the Police-Commissary Peršić came up to him and asked for his passport. "Take yourself off!" shouted the intruder, as he pulled a bomb out of his trouser pocket. Peršić grappled with him and soon overpowered him. And outside the house four other fascisti, Armano Viola, Carpinelli, Bellia and Murolo, were captured. They claimed to be journalists, and it is quite true that Viola is on the staff of the notoriousVedetta Italiana; but when he comes into a foreign country as a special correspondent and is teaching others how to go about that business—for until then they had been otherwise engaged, Murolo being charged with numerous thefts and attempted murders, while Bellia and Carpinelli were accused of breaking into the Abbazia Casino—if Viola was teaching them how to be journalists he would on this occasion have been better advised if he had restricted them to the conventional tools of the profession instead of bombs, revolvers and daggers. Little use did they get out of them, for a trio of these armed individuals were seized and disarmed by one Yugoslav gendarme, who was himself very meagrely equipped. With tears in their eyes they begged for mercy. "Pietà, Pietà!" they exclaimed. So long as their own lives were spared they were very willing to forgo the 60,000 lire which had been put on Zanella's head.

Unfortunately it seems obvious that this exploit, if not ordered by the Italian Government was, at any rate, permitted by them. How otherwise could the automobile containing these men have got past the sentries at the Sušak bridge and two other Italian sentry posts? Moreover, these men were in possession of documents which proved that official Italian circles at Rieka were privy to their undertaking, and that they proposed toinvestigate the Yugoslav military positions on the frontier.... These five fascisti brigands—who were also lieutenants of the Italian army—would therefore have to be tried not only for attempted murder but for attempted espionage. They were put into a train and transported to the prison at Zagreb. "If once we begin to march," so the Italian soldiers at Rieka had over and over again been telling the Croats, "then we shall not halt before we come to Zagreb, your capital." Those five will perhaps some day explain to their comrades how quickly Zagreb can be reached.... As yet those whom they left behind them had not lost their bombast: a manifesto was issued by them which declared that five true patriots had sallied forth to Saint Anna, for the purpose of parleying with the Constituent Assembly, and that in a barbarous fashion they had been arrested, maltreated and possibly killed. Let the people avenge the shedding of such noble blood. Everything, everything must be done in order to liberate the captured brethren. And so, towards eleven at night, about sixty fascisti and legionaries came together. Armed to the teeth, they designed to cross over into Yugoslav territory, but when they noticed that the sentry posts had been strengthened they went home to bed.

A number of American and European journalists rushed out to Belgrade, under the impression that the Yugoslav-Italian War could now no longer be avoided. But they did not realize how great a self-control the Yugoslavs possess. It may be, as a commentator put it in theNation,[69]that Italy "is practically at war with Yugoslavia," for she is obsessed by the "Pan-Slav menace"; but if they insist on the arbitrament of arms they will have to wait until the Yugoslavs have time to deal with them.... The Free State of Rieka owes its existence to a Treaty between Italy and Yugoslavia; both of them should therefore guarantee its freedom. Italian and Yugoslavgendarmerieand troops should resist together the incursions of fascisti; and if the two races cannot work in harmony, then let the administration of the town be entrusted to neutral troops; and asHigh Commissioner one would suggest Mr. Blakeney, the British Consul at Belgrade. If this imperturbable and most kindly man were to fail in the attempt at repeating in Rieka what has been accomplished in Danzig, then, indeed, one might despair; but he would brilliantly and placidly succeed. All the other qualifications are his; an intimate knowledge of every Near Eastern language—and, of course, Italian; a perfect acquaintance with the mentality of all those peoples; common sense of an uncommon order, and the whole-hearted confidence of those with whom he comes into contact. Great Britain and France compelled the Yugoslavs, at enormous sacrifices, to sign the Treaty of Rapallo; they are, therefore, morally obliged to see that it is executed. For too many months the Italians were saying that they would carry out their part of it and leave the third zone in Dalmatia if the Yugoslavs would agree to a few more concessions, commercial and territorial, that were not in the Treaty. During the Genoa Conference in the spring of 1922 the Italian authorities confessed to the Yugoslav delegates that their hands were bound by the fascisti. These elements would certainly object to the execution of that part of the Treaty of Rapallo which refers to the port of Baroš. Accurately speaking, the arrangements with regard to Baroš are embodied in a letter from Count Sforza, the then Foreign Secretary, and are added to the Treaty as an appendix. Both were signed on the same day, and apparently this plan of an appendix was adopted on account of the fascisti. Yet if Count Sforza had not signed that letter it is safe to say that the Yugoslavs would not have signed the main body of a Treaty which to them was the reverse of favourable. And at Genoa the Italians started haggling about a strip of land near Baroš, in the hope that some success would stay the zeal of the fascisti. Furthermore they pleaded that Zadar could not live if Yugoslavia did not, in addition to supplying it with water, give it railway communication with the interior. The Yugoslavs were thus invited to construct at great expense a railway to a foreign town which their own Šibenik and other Adriatic towns did not possess. This, naturally, they refused to undertake, as also to agree to the Italian suggestion that a freezone of some twenty kilometres should be instituted at the back of Zadar. One might safely say that the Italian agents in this region would not have confined themselves to salutary measures for the welfare of the town. It is stated in the Treaty of Rapallo that in case of disagreement either party could invoke an arbitrator, and the Yugoslavs, who happen now to be the weaker party, have been contemplating application to the League of Nations. Well, in Genoa it was proposed by Italy that Yugoslavia should renounce the clause which deals with an eventual arbitration. If you make a large number of demands—never mind that they should be in opposition to a Treaty you have signed—then you may gain a few of them—and Italy was hoping that the Free State would repay the costs which she incurred there on account of her unruly son d'Annunzio, and, likewise, that the good Italianists who at the end of the Great War committed wholesale thefts from the State warehouses should not be made to pay for it. With all their guile and strength the Italians were endeavouring to avoid the execution of her Treaty of Rapallo. "Italy is the one Power in Europe," says Mr. Harold Goad[70]who thrusts himself upon our notice, "Italy is the one Power in Europe that is most obviously and most consistently working for peace and conciliation in every field."

HOPES IN THE LITTLE ENTENTE

The complicated troubles, avoidable and unavoidable, that have been raging in Central Europe after the War are being met to some extent by the Little Entente, an association in the first place between Yugoslavia and the kindred Czecho-Slovakia, and afterwards between them and Roumania. The world was assured that this union had for its object the establishment of peace, security and normal economic activities in Central and Eastern Europe; no acquisitive purposes were in the background, and since these three States now recognized that if they try to swallow more of the late Austro-Hungarian monarchy they will suffer from chronic indigestion, we need not be suspicious of their altruism. It is perfectlytrue that the first impulse which moved the creators of the Little Entente was not constructive but defensive; their great Allies did not appear, in the opinion of the three Succession States, to be taking the necessary precautions against the elements of reaction. Otherwise they, especially France (which was naturally more determined that Austria should not join herself to Germany), would not have favoured the idea of a Danubian Federation, in which Austria and Hungary would play leading parts. The Great Powers would also, if they had been less exclusively concerned with their own interests, have handled with more resolution the attempts of Charles of Habsburg to place himself at the head of the present reactionary régime at Buda-Pest; and if it had not been for certain energetic measures taken by the members of the Little Entente it may well be doubted whether the Government of Admiral Horthy, which does not conceal the fact that it is royalist—the king being temporarily absent—would have required Charles to leave the country. The Little Entente pointed out to their great Allies what these had apparently overlooked, namely, that the return of the Habsburgs was not opposed by the Succession States out of pure malice but for the reason that it would inevitably strengthen the magnates and the high ecclesiastics in their desire to bring about the restoration of Hungary's old frontiers. As the frontiers are now drawn there dwell—and this could not be prevented—a number of Magyars in each of the three neighbouring States (the fewest being in Yugoslavia), just as the present Hungary includes a Czech-Slovak, Roumanian and Yugoslav population.[71]But the Great Powers agree that if this frontier is to be changed at all, every precaution should be taken against having it changed by force. It is no exaggeration to say that there can be noreal peace in Central Europe until normal intercourse with Russia is re-established, but let it in the meantime be the task of the Little Entente to guard the temporary peace from being shattered.

Apart from this defensive object the countries of the Little Entente have the positive aim of a resumption of normal economic conditions and the institution of a new order of things in accordance with the new political construction of Central and Eastern Europe. It is obvious that these three States have numerous interests in common which make their co-operation very natural, if not indeed indispensable.

FOOTNOTES:[46]April 16, 1920.[47]January 22, 1920.[48]According to the Rome correspondent of thePetit Journal.[49]But the wind was considerably tempered for him: vessels laden with his precise requirements sailed over from Italy and said they had been captured by d'Annunzio's arditi. General Badoglio, in command of the royal troops outside the town, ascertained in November 1919 that Rieka's coal-supply was nearly exhausted and 7000 tons per month were required for the public services alone. He accordingly informed a syndicate of coal merchants in Triest that he would be personally responsible for the first consignment of coal to d'Annunzio. A month earlier, when the town was supposed to be blockaded, it was announced that a limited supply of food-stuffs would, nevertheless, be introduced, through the Red Cross, for very young children. This amounted, as a matter of fact, to 21 truckloads a week. It is significant that there was no rise in the prices charged in the public restaurants of Rieka, and that persons living outside the line of Armistice found it cheaper to do their shopping in the besieged city.[50]February 20, 1920.[51]September 1921.[52]However, in the Yugoslav Parliament, although some of the deputies have spent their lives in far-off, primitive places—by no means all of those who represent the Albanians can read and write—one does not hear such deplorable language as that which, according to theGrazer Volksblattof January 19, 1922, disgraced the Austrian Assembly. A certain Dr. Waneck, of the Pan-German party, wished to criticize the Minister of Finance, Professor Dr. Gürtler of the Christian Socialists. He remarked that one could not expect this Minister to be sober at four o'clock in the afternoon, and went on to say that no less than five banks, whose names he would give, had received early information from the Minister, which enabled them to speculate successfully. He repeated this accusation several times and with great violence, but when he was invited to reveal the names of these banks—"No, sir!" he cried. "I will not do so, because I don't want to."[53]Cf. "The Tri-Une Kingdom," by Pavle Popović and Jovan M. Jovanović, in theQuarterly Review, October 1921.[54]He was kept for some time in confinement at Mitrovica, in Syrmia, and in November 1920 he was liberated in consequence of the great amnesty.[55]Cf.Spectator, July 17, 1920.[56]Cf.Edinburgh Review, July 1920.[57]A few months after this, in the course of a little controversy in theSaturday Review(which arose from an unsigned and, I hoped, rather reasonable article of mine on the Adriatic Settlement) I quoted from memory this passage of Mrs. Re-Bartlett's and said that the Italian captain was giving chocolates to the children at Kievo. Thereupon Mr. Harold W. E. Goad of the British-Italian League wrote a highly indignant letter to the editor, and in the course of it he denounced me for having egregiously invented the chocolates "for the sole purpose of throwing her testimony into ridicule.... What do you, Sir, think of such methods as that?" And he concluded by declaring that I wallowed in a "truly Balkan slough of distortion and calumny." Well, on referring to Mrs. Re-Bartlett's article I find that there is no mention of chocolates, and I apologize; presumably the children were crowding round their adoredCapitanoin order to thank him for the bridges and waterworks which were being built in Dalmatia.[58]During the Italian occupation, said Professor Salvemini, teachers, doctors and priests were deported or expelled from the country, while the Italian Government had to dissolve 30 municipal councils out of 33, so that at the head of the communes were Italian officials and not properly elected mayors. Moreover, all liberties were suppressed. No Slav newspapers, no Slav societies were permitted, and 32 out of 57 magistrates were dismissed—these methods being due not to cruelty or folly, said the Professor, but to the necessity of keeping order by forcible means in a country which was wholly hostile.[59]November 13, 1920.[60]November 15, 1920.[61]This, of course, did not meet with the approval of Signor d'Annunzio. He made numerous pronouncements with regard to his inflexible desires, saying that, if necessary, he would offer up his bleeding corpse. And his resistance to the Italian Government did not confine itself to rhetoric. During his usurpation of Rieka this man had done his country grievous harm. It was not only that he held her up to the smiles of the malicious who said that she could not keep order in her own house, but he was guiding the people back to barbarism. When sailors of the royal navy deserted to his standard, he knelt before them in the streets of Rieka at a time when from Russia Lenin was inciting the Italian Communists to revolution and to the conquest of the State. He refused to deal with Giolitti, even as he had rejected the advances of Nitti. But the aged Giolitti grasped the problem with more firmness, which was what one might expect from the statesman who, after his return to power, had leaned neither on the industrial magnates of Milan nor on their Bolševik antagonists. Giolitti was resolved to put an end to the nuisance of d'Annunzio; in no constitutional State is there room for a Prime Minister and such a swashbuckler. The Nationalists of Italy were furious when they perceived that the Premier was in earnest and that force would be employed against their idol. And it had to come to that, for the utterly misguided man continued to resist—hoping doubtless for wholesale desertions in the army and navy—with the deplorable result that a good many Italians were slain by Italians. Orders were issued by the Government that all possible care should be taken of d'Annunzio's person; and eventually when Rieka was taken by the royalist troops the poet broke his oath that he would surely die; he announced that Italy was not worth dying for and it was said that he had sailed away on an aeroplane. He had accomplished none of his desires; the town had not become Italian, though he had bathed it in Italian blood. His overweening personal ambitions had been shipwrecked on the rock of ridicule, for as he made his inglorious exit he shouted at the world that he was "still alive and inexorable." But yet he may have unconsciously achieved something, for his seizure of what he loved to call the "holocaust city" provided the extreme Nationalists with a private stage where—in uniforms of their own design, in cloaks and feathers and flowing black ties and with eccentric arrangements of the hair—they could strut and caper and fling bombastic insults at the authorities in Rome, until the Government found it opportune to take them in hand. The greatest Italian poet and one of the greatest imaginative writers in Europe will now be able to devote himself—if his rather morbid Muse has suffered no injury—to his predestined task. Those—the comparatively few that read—whose acquaintance with this writer's work usually caused them to regret his methods, could not help admiring his personal activities, his genius for leadership and his vital fire during the War. But, once this was over, he relapsed; and expressing himself very clearly in action, so that he became known to the many instead of the few, he lived what he previously wrote, and now it is generally recognized that Gabriel of the Annunciation, as he calls himself, who produced a row of obscene and histrionic novels, is a mountebank, a self-deceiver and a most affected bore. When he came to Rieka he thought fit to appeal to the England of Milton. And, like him, Milton lived as he wrote. Milton, Dante and Sophocles—to mention no others of the supreme writers—were as serious and responsible in their public actions as in the pursuit of their art.[62]Whatever be the limitations of theDomas a newspaper—it is almost exclusively occupied with the person and programme of Mr. Radić—yet that brings with it the virtue, most exceptional in Yugoslavia, of refusing to engage in polemics. This would otherwise take up a good deal of its space, as Radić has become such a bogey-man that nothing is too ridiculous for his opponents to believe. A Czech newspaper not long ago informed the world that this monstrous personage had told an interviewer that not only had Serbian soldiers in Macedonia been murdering 200 children but that they had roasted and consumed them. Furthermore Radić had said that the British Minister to Yugoslavia had called upon him and had asked his advice with some persistence, not even wishing to leave Radić time to reflect, as to whether the Prince-Regent should rule in Russia, while an English Prince should be invited to occupy the Yugoslav throne. The first of these remarks proved conclusively, said a number of Belgrade papers, that Radić was a knave and by the second he had demonstrated that he was an imbecile. And my friend Mr. Leiper of theMorning Postspeculated as to whether he was more likely to end his days in a lunatic asylum or a prison. But Radić was caring about none of these things; his birthday happened at about this time and some 30,000 of his adherents came to do him honour at his birthplace, over 500 of them on decorated horses having met him at Sisak station the previous evening. When I asked him what he had to say about the two afore-mentioned remarks he gave me an amusing account of how the interviewer had appreciated the various samples of wine which he (Radić) had just brought down from his vineyard. The conversation lasted for about four hours, and in the course of it Radić mentioned that a certain Moslem deputy from Novi Bazar, irritated by the fact that Mr. Drašković, Minister of the Interior, found no pleasure in his continued presence on a commission of inquiry in the region of Kossovo, had been throwing out very dark hints about a child which he accused the Serbs of killing in the stormy days of 1878, and then relating to the Tsar that this dastardly deed had been committed by the Turks. This was the basis of that part of the interview. As for the other absurdity, it was mentioned that some courtiers had told the Prince-Regent that he alone could establish an orderly Government in Russia, whereupon Radić observed that England and France were not likely to allow one person to reign both there and in Yugoslavia. And when I asked why he had not published this explanation in his paper, he said that he couldn't very well charge a guest with having liked his wine too much.[63]Cf.The Quarterly Review(October 1921), in which Messrs. Pavle Popović and Jovan M. Jovanović published a very able survey of Yugoslav conditions.[64]Cf.Nineteenth Century and After, January 1921.[65]April 26, 1921.[66]Unhappily it became apparent that the Italians were not disposed to have the Treaty put in force[67]March 23, 1922.[68]Cf. an article in a fascisti newspaper, quoted by theZagreber Tagblattof May 14, 1922.[69]Cf. "The Rise of the Little Entente," by Dorothy Thompson. April 1, 1922.[70]Fortnightly Review, May 1922.[71]The magnates of Hungary and their friends do not grow weary of lamenting the sad fate of the Magyar minorities. Whatever may be happening in Transylvania, they have a very poor case against the Serbs. In the Voivodina there are, according to Hungarian statistics, about 382,000 Magyars out of 1·4 million inhabitants. These Magyars have their primary and secondary schools, their newspapers and so forth, whereas in the spring of 1922 the schools in various Serbian villages near Budapest were forcibly closed, the lady teachers being told that if they stayed they would have to undergo the physical examination which is applied to prostitutes.

[46]April 16, 1920.

[47]January 22, 1920.

[48]According to the Rome correspondent of thePetit Journal.

[49]But the wind was considerably tempered for him: vessels laden with his precise requirements sailed over from Italy and said they had been captured by d'Annunzio's arditi. General Badoglio, in command of the royal troops outside the town, ascertained in November 1919 that Rieka's coal-supply was nearly exhausted and 7000 tons per month were required for the public services alone. He accordingly informed a syndicate of coal merchants in Triest that he would be personally responsible for the first consignment of coal to d'Annunzio. A month earlier, when the town was supposed to be blockaded, it was announced that a limited supply of food-stuffs would, nevertheless, be introduced, through the Red Cross, for very young children. This amounted, as a matter of fact, to 21 truckloads a week. It is significant that there was no rise in the prices charged in the public restaurants of Rieka, and that persons living outside the line of Armistice found it cheaper to do their shopping in the besieged city.

[50]February 20, 1920.

[51]September 1921.

[52]However, in the Yugoslav Parliament, although some of the deputies have spent their lives in far-off, primitive places—by no means all of those who represent the Albanians can read and write—one does not hear such deplorable language as that which, according to theGrazer Volksblattof January 19, 1922, disgraced the Austrian Assembly. A certain Dr. Waneck, of the Pan-German party, wished to criticize the Minister of Finance, Professor Dr. Gürtler of the Christian Socialists. He remarked that one could not expect this Minister to be sober at four o'clock in the afternoon, and went on to say that no less than five banks, whose names he would give, had received early information from the Minister, which enabled them to speculate successfully. He repeated this accusation several times and with great violence, but when he was invited to reveal the names of these banks—"No, sir!" he cried. "I will not do so, because I don't want to."

[53]Cf. "The Tri-Une Kingdom," by Pavle Popović and Jovan M. Jovanović, in theQuarterly Review, October 1921.

[54]He was kept for some time in confinement at Mitrovica, in Syrmia, and in November 1920 he was liberated in consequence of the great amnesty.

[55]Cf.Spectator, July 17, 1920.

[56]Cf.Edinburgh Review, July 1920.

[57]A few months after this, in the course of a little controversy in theSaturday Review(which arose from an unsigned and, I hoped, rather reasonable article of mine on the Adriatic Settlement) I quoted from memory this passage of Mrs. Re-Bartlett's and said that the Italian captain was giving chocolates to the children at Kievo. Thereupon Mr. Harold W. E. Goad of the British-Italian League wrote a highly indignant letter to the editor, and in the course of it he denounced me for having egregiously invented the chocolates "for the sole purpose of throwing her testimony into ridicule.... What do you, Sir, think of such methods as that?" And he concluded by declaring that I wallowed in a "truly Balkan slough of distortion and calumny." Well, on referring to Mrs. Re-Bartlett's article I find that there is no mention of chocolates, and I apologize; presumably the children were crowding round their adoredCapitanoin order to thank him for the bridges and waterworks which were being built in Dalmatia.

[58]During the Italian occupation, said Professor Salvemini, teachers, doctors and priests were deported or expelled from the country, while the Italian Government had to dissolve 30 municipal councils out of 33, so that at the head of the communes were Italian officials and not properly elected mayors. Moreover, all liberties were suppressed. No Slav newspapers, no Slav societies were permitted, and 32 out of 57 magistrates were dismissed—these methods being due not to cruelty or folly, said the Professor, but to the necessity of keeping order by forcible means in a country which was wholly hostile.

[59]November 13, 1920.

[60]November 15, 1920.

[61]This, of course, did not meet with the approval of Signor d'Annunzio. He made numerous pronouncements with regard to his inflexible desires, saying that, if necessary, he would offer up his bleeding corpse. And his resistance to the Italian Government did not confine itself to rhetoric. During his usurpation of Rieka this man had done his country grievous harm. It was not only that he held her up to the smiles of the malicious who said that she could not keep order in her own house, but he was guiding the people back to barbarism. When sailors of the royal navy deserted to his standard, he knelt before them in the streets of Rieka at a time when from Russia Lenin was inciting the Italian Communists to revolution and to the conquest of the State. He refused to deal with Giolitti, even as he had rejected the advances of Nitti. But the aged Giolitti grasped the problem with more firmness, which was what one might expect from the statesman who, after his return to power, had leaned neither on the industrial magnates of Milan nor on their Bolševik antagonists. Giolitti was resolved to put an end to the nuisance of d'Annunzio; in no constitutional State is there room for a Prime Minister and such a swashbuckler. The Nationalists of Italy were furious when they perceived that the Premier was in earnest and that force would be employed against their idol. And it had to come to that, for the utterly misguided man continued to resist—hoping doubtless for wholesale desertions in the army and navy—with the deplorable result that a good many Italians were slain by Italians. Orders were issued by the Government that all possible care should be taken of d'Annunzio's person; and eventually when Rieka was taken by the royalist troops the poet broke his oath that he would surely die; he announced that Italy was not worth dying for and it was said that he had sailed away on an aeroplane. He had accomplished none of his desires; the town had not become Italian, though he had bathed it in Italian blood. His overweening personal ambitions had been shipwrecked on the rock of ridicule, for as he made his inglorious exit he shouted at the world that he was "still alive and inexorable." But yet he may have unconsciously achieved something, for his seizure of what he loved to call the "holocaust city" provided the extreme Nationalists with a private stage where—in uniforms of their own design, in cloaks and feathers and flowing black ties and with eccentric arrangements of the hair—they could strut and caper and fling bombastic insults at the authorities in Rome, until the Government found it opportune to take them in hand. The greatest Italian poet and one of the greatest imaginative writers in Europe will now be able to devote himself—if his rather morbid Muse has suffered no injury—to his predestined task. Those—the comparatively few that read—whose acquaintance with this writer's work usually caused them to regret his methods, could not help admiring his personal activities, his genius for leadership and his vital fire during the War. But, once this was over, he relapsed; and expressing himself very clearly in action, so that he became known to the many instead of the few, he lived what he previously wrote, and now it is generally recognized that Gabriel of the Annunciation, as he calls himself, who produced a row of obscene and histrionic novels, is a mountebank, a self-deceiver and a most affected bore. When he came to Rieka he thought fit to appeal to the England of Milton. And, like him, Milton lived as he wrote. Milton, Dante and Sophocles—to mention no others of the supreme writers—were as serious and responsible in their public actions as in the pursuit of their art.

[62]Whatever be the limitations of theDomas a newspaper—it is almost exclusively occupied with the person and programme of Mr. Radić—yet that brings with it the virtue, most exceptional in Yugoslavia, of refusing to engage in polemics. This would otherwise take up a good deal of its space, as Radić has become such a bogey-man that nothing is too ridiculous for his opponents to believe. A Czech newspaper not long ago informed the world that this monstrous personage had told an interviewer that not only had Serbian soldiers in Macedonia been murdering 200 children but that they had roasted and consumed them. Furthermore Radić had said that the British Minister to Yugoslavia had called upon him and had asked his advice with some persistence, not even wishing to leave Radić time to reflect, as to whether the Prince-Regent should rule in Russia, while an English Prince should be invited to occupy the Yugoslav throne. The first of these remarks proved conclusively, said a number of Belgrade papers, that Radić was a knave and by the second he had demonstrated that he was an imbecile. And my friend Mr. Leiper of theMorning Postspeculated as to whether he was more likely to end his days in a lunatic asylum or a prison. But Radić was caring about none of these things; his birthday happened at about this time and some 30,000 of his adherents came to do him honour at his birthplace, over 500 of them on decorated horses having met him at Sisak station the previous evening. When I asked him what he had to say about the two afore-mentioned remarks he gave me an amusing account of how the interviewer had appreciated the various samples of wine which he (Radić) had just brought down from his vineyard. The conversation lasted for about four hours, and in the course of it Radić mentioned that a certain Moslem deputy from Novi Bazar, irritated by the fact that Mr. Drašković, Minister of the Interior, found no pleasure in his continued presence on a commission of inquiry in the region of Kossovo, had been throwing out very dark hints about a child which he accused the Serbs of killing in the stormy days of 1878, and then relating to the Tsar that this dastardly deed had been committed by the Turks. This was the basis of that part of the interview. As for the other absurdity, it was mentioned that some courtiers had told the Prince-Regent that he alone could establish an orderly Government in Russia, whereupon Radić observed that England and France were not likely to allow one person to reign both there and in Yugoslavia. And when I asked why he had not published this explanation in his paper, he said that he couldn't very well charge a guest with having liked his wine too much.

[63]Cf.The Quarterly Review(October 1921), in which Messrs. Pavle Popović and Jovan M. Jovanović published a very able survey of Yugoslav conditions.

[64]Cf.Nineteenth Century and After, January 1921.

[65]April 26, 1921.

[66]Unhappily it became apparent that the Italians were not disposed to have the Treaty put in force

[67]March 23, 1922.

[68]Cf. an article in a fascisti newspaper, quoted by theZagreber Tagblattof May 14, 1922.

[69]Cf. "The Rise of the Little Entente," by Dorothy Thompson. April 1, 1922.

[70]Fortnightly Review, May 1922.

[71]The magnates of Hungary and their friends do not grow weary of lamenting the sad fate of the Magyar minorities. Whatever may be happening in Transylvania, they have a very poor case against the Serbs. In the Voivodina there are, according to Hungarian statistics, about 382,000 Magyars out of 1·4 million inhabitants. These Magyars have their primary and secondary schools, their newspapers and so forth, whereas in the spring of 1922 the schools in various Serbian villages near Budapest were forcibly closed, the lady teachers being told that if they stayed they would have to undergo the physical examination which is applied to prostitutes.

Introduction—(a)The Albanian Frontier: 1.The Actors—2.The audience rush the stage—3.Serbs, Albanians and the Mischief-makers—4.The State of Albanian culture—5.A method which might have been tried in Albania—6.The attraction of Yugoslavia—7.Religious and other matters in the border region—8.A digression on two rival Albanian authorities—9.What faces the Yugoslavs—10.Dr. Trumbić's proposal—11.The position in 1921: The Tirana Government and the Mirditi—12.Serbia's good influence—13.European measures against the Yugoslavs and their friends—14.The region from which the Yugoslavs have retired—15.The prospect—(b)The Greek frontier—(c)The Bulgarian frontier—(d)The Roumanian frontier: 1.The state of the Roumanians in eastern Serbia—2.The Banat—(e)The Hungarian frontier—(f)The Austrian frontier—(g)The Italian frontier.

INTRODUCTION

Nobody could have expected in the autumn of 1918 that the frontiers of the new State would be rapidly delimitated. Ethnological, economic, historic and strategical arguments—to mention no others—would be brought forward by either side, and the Supreme Council, which had to deliver judgment on these knotty problems, would be often more preoccupied with their own interests and their relation to each other. It would also happen that a member of the Supreme Council would be simultaneously judge and pleader. The mills of justice would therefore grind very slowly, for they would be conscious that the fruit of their efforts, evolved with much foreign material clogging the machinery and with parts of the machinery jerked out of their line of track, would be received with acute criticism. When more than two years had elapsed from the time of the Armistice a considerablepart of Yugoslavia's frontiers remained undecided. We will travel along the frontier lines, starting with that between Yugoslavs and Albanians.

(a) THE ALBANIAN FRONTIER

1. THE ACTORS

Those who in old Turkish days lived in that wild border country which is dealt with on these pages would have been surprised to hear that they would be the objects of a great deal of discussion in the west of Europe. But in those days there was no Yugoslavia and no Albania and no League of Nations, and very few were the writers who took up this question. It is, undoubtedly, a question of importance, though some of these writers, remembering that the fate of the world was dependent on the fraction of an inch of Cleopatra's nose, seem almost to have imagined that it was proportionately more dependent on those several hundred kilometres of disputed frontier. It would not so much matter that they have introduced a good deal of passion into their arguments if they had not also exerted some influence on influential men—and this compels one to pay them what would otherwise be excessive attention.

Let us consider the frontier which the Ambassadors' Conference in November 1921 assigned to Yugoslavia and the Albanians. We have already mentioned some of the previous points of contact between those Balkan neighbours who for centuries have been acquiring knowledge of each other and who, therefore, as Berati Bey, the Albanian delegate in Paris, very wisely said, should have been left to manage their own frontier question. A number of Western Europeans will exclaim that this could not be accomplished without the shedding of blood; but it is rather more than probable that the interference of Western Europe—partly philanthropic and partly otherwise—will be responsible for greater loss of life. If it could not be permitted that two of the less powerful peoples should attempt to settle their own affairs, then,at any rate, the most competent of alien judges should have sat on the tribunal. A frontier in that part of Europe should primarily take the peculiarities of the people into account, and I believe that if Sir Charles Eliot and Baron Nopsca with their unrivalled knowledge of the Albanians had been consulted it is probable they would, for some years to come, have thought desirable the frontier which is preferred by General Franchet d'Espérey, by a majority of the local Albanians, and by those who hope for peace in the Balkans.

2. THE AUDIENCE RUSH THE STAGE

A battle which took place near Tuzi, not far from Podgorica, in December 1919, may assist the study of the difficult Albanian question. At the first attack about 150 Montenegrins, mostly young recruits, were killed or wounded; but in the counter-attack the Albanian losses were much greater, 167 of them being made prisoners. On all of these were found Italian rifles, ammunition, money and army rations. On the other hand, a few Montenegrins, with three officers, were also captured and were stripped and handed over, naked, to the Italians. But these declined to have them, saying that the conflict had been no concern of theirs, and the unfortunate men—with the exception of one who escaped—remained among the Albanians. The fact that Tuzi would be of no value to the Italians neither weakens nor strengthens the supposition that they were privy to the Albanian attack; but it may very well be that the natives had taken their Italian equipment by force of arms. It would, anyhow, seem that the Italians have little understanding of this people: during the War, when General Franchet d'Espérey was straightening his line, he paid some hundreds of Albanians to maintain his western flank, and they were very satisfactory. (It troubled them very little whether they were holding it against the Austrians or against other Albanians.) When Italy took over that part of the line she employed a whole Division, which—to the amusement, it is said, of Franchet d'Espérey—provided the local population with a greatdeal of booty, and in particular with mules. There was constant trouble in those regions of Albania which were occupied by the Italians,[72]and in June 1920 things had come to such a pass that the Italian garrisons, after being thrown out of the villages of Bestrovo and Selitza, were actually retiring with all the stores they could rescue to Valona. Their retreat, said Reuter, in a euphemistic message from Rome, was "attended by some loss." As Valona was their last stronghold in Albanian territory, it seemed that very few, if any, of the tribes were in favour of an Italian protectorate. And since it was calculated that during the first six months of 1920 the Italian Government was paying from 400 to 500 million lire a month for corn, and the year's deficit might be enough to lead the State to the very verge of bankruptcy, one was asking whether from an economic, apart from any other, point of view, it would not be advisable for the Italians to cut their losses in central Albania. And this they very wisely determined to do. Would that their subsequent policy in northern Albania had been as well-inspired.

It would also seem as if the affair of Tuzi shows that the Albanians have no wish for a Yugoslav protectorate, and there are a good many Serbs, such as Professor Cvijić, who view with uneasiness any extension of their sway over the Albanians. Many of the tribes are prepared, after very small provocation or none, to take up arms against anybody; and those who, in the north and north-east of the country, are in favour of a Yugoslav protectorate would undoubtedly have opposed to them a number of the natives, less because they are fired with the prospect of "Albania for the Albanians" than onaccount of their patriarchal views. We must, however, at the same time, acknowledge that those Albanians who are impelled by patriotic ideals, and who would like to see their countrymen within the 1913 frontiers, resolutely turn away from the various attractions which the Slavs undoubtedly exercise over many of them and combine in a brotherly fashion, under the guidance of a disinterested State, to work for an independent Albania—those idealists have every right to be heard. Their solution is, in fact, the one that would, as we have elsewhere said, be best for everyone concerned. The late Professor Burrows, who believed in the possibility of such an arrangement, thought that it would take generations for this people "to pass from blood feud and tribal jealousy to the good order of a unified State, unless they have tutorage in the art of self-government." There seem to be grave difficulties, both external and internal, in the way of setting up such a tutorage over the whole of the 1913 Albania; and if a majority of the northern and north-eastern tribes prefer to turn to Yugoslavia, rather than to join the frustrated patriots and the wilder brethren in turning away from it, they should not be sweepingly condemned as traitors to the national cause. The frame of mind which looks with deep suspicion on a road that links a tribe to its neighbour is not very promising for those who dream of an Albanian nation; it is a prevalent and fundamental frame of mind. "The Prince of Wied," we are told by his countryman, Dr. Max Müller, "succeeded in conquering the hearts of those Albanians who supported him and of gaining the highest respect of those who were his political opponents." No doubt they were flattered when they noticed that he had so far become an Albanian as to surround his residence at Durazzo with barbed-wire entanglements.

Among the solutions of the Albanian problem was that which Dr. Müller very seriously, not to say ponderously, put forward in 1916.[73]This gentleman, with a first-hand knowledge of the country, which he gained during the War, did not minimize the task which would face the Prince of Wied on his return. Of that wooden potentate one may say that his work in Albania did not collapsefor the reason that it was never started; a few miles from Durazzo, his capital, from which, I believe, he made only that one excursion whose end was undignified, a few miles away he excited the derision of his "subjects," and a few miles farther off they had not heard of him. Dr. Müller, after reproving us sternly for smiling at the national decoration, in several classes, with which his Highness on landing at the rickety pier was graciously pleased to gladden the meritorious natives, admits that at his second coming he will have to take various other steps. Austrians and Germans should be brought to colonize the country, and not peasants, forsooth, like those who have laboriously made good in the Banat, but merchants, manufacturers, engineers, doctors, officials and large landowners—not by any means without close inquiry, so as to admit only such as are in possession of a blameless repute and a certain amount of cash. Dr. Müller was resolved that, so far as lay with him, none but the very best Teutons should embark upon this splendid mission. He desired that, after landing, they should first of all remain at the harbour, there to undergo a course of tuition in the customs and peculiarities of the tribe among which they proposed to settle. His compatriots would be so tactful—apparently not criticizing any of the customs—that the hearts of the Albanians would incline towards them and by their beautiful example they would make these primitive, wild hearts beat not so much for local interests but very fervently for the Albanian fatherland. One cannot help a feeling of regret that circumstances have prevented us from seeing Dr. Müller's scheme put into action.

3. SERBS, ALBANIANS AND THE MISCHIEF-MAKERS

In 1913, after the Balkan War, the flags of the Powers were hoisted at Scutari, and a frontier dividing the Albanians from the Yugoslavs (Montenegrins and Serbs) was indicated by Austria and traced at the London Conference. This boundary was still awaiting its final demarcation by commissioners on the spot when the European War broke out. Then in the second year ofthe War disturbances were organized by the Austrians in Albania—their friend the miscreant ruler of Montenegro caused money to be sent for this purpose to the Austro-Hungarian Consul at Scutari—and in April and May of that year the Serbs were authorized by their Allies to protect themselves by occupying certain portions of the country. Various battles took place between those Albanians who were partisans of Austria and those who were disinclined to attack the Serbs in the rear. The Serbian Government opposed the Austrian propaganda by dispatching to that region the Montenegrin Pouniša Račić, of whom we have much to say. He was accompanied by Smajo Ferović, a Moslem sergeant of komitadjis. They explained to the Albanians that the Serbs had been offered a separate peace with numerous concessions, but that Mr. Pašić had refused to treat. When the two Albanian parties discussed the situation by shooting at each other, the Austro-Hungarian officers made tracks for Kotor, and that particular intrigue came to an end.

When the War was over, the Serbs, sweeping up from Macedonia, were requested by General Franchet d'Espérey to undertake a task which the Italians refused, and push the demoralized Austrian troops out of Albania. Some weeks after this had been accomplished, the Italians, mindful of the Treaty of London, demanded that a large part of Albania should be given up to their administration. The Serbs agreed and withdrew; they even took away their representative from Scutari, where the Allies had again installed themselves. The Treaty of London bestowed upon the Serbs a sphere of influence in northern Albania, but—save for a few misguided politicians—they were logical enough to reject the whole of the pernicious Treaty, both the clauses which robbed them in Dalmatia and those which in Albania gave them stolen goods. Over and over again did the Yugoslav delegates declare in Paris that it was their wish to see established an independent Albania with the frontiers of 1913. These, the first frontiers which the Albanians had ever possessed, were laid down by Austria with the express purpose of thwarting the Serbs and facilitating Albanian raids. It is true that several towns with large Albanian majoritieswere made over to the Serbs—very much, as it turned out, to their subsequent advantage—yet, being separated from their hinterland, this was a doubtful gift. Nevertheless, if a free and united Albania could be constituted the Serbs were ready to accept this frontier, and even Monsieur Justin Godart, the strenuous French Albanophile of whom we speak elsewhere, cannot deny that this attitude of the Yugoslavs redounds very much to their honour. But before relative tranquillity reigns among the Albanians it is, as General Franchet d'Espérey perceived in 1918, an untenable line. He, therefore, drew a temporary frontier which permitted the Serbs to advance for some miles into Albania, so that on the river Drin or on the mountain summits they might ward off attacks. These, by the way, had their origin far more in the border population's empty stomachs than in their animus against the Slavs. And nobody with knowledge of this people could regard the 1918 frontier as unnecessary. The Albanians were themselves so much inclined to acquiesce that one must ask why, in the months which followed, there was a considerable amount of border fighting. What was it that caused the Albanians in the region of Scutari to make their violent onslaughts of December 1919 and January 1920, the renewed offensive of July 1920 at the same places—after which the Albanian Government forwarded to that of Belgrade an assurance of goodwill—and the organized thrust of August 13 against Dibra, which was preceded on August 10 by a manifesto to the chancelleries of Europe falsely accusing the Serbs of having begun these operations, and which was followed by the Tirana Government promising to try to find the guilty persons? The 19th of the same month saw the Albanians delivering a further attack in the neighbourhood of Scutari, and then the Yugoslav Government decided that their army must occupy such defensive positions as would put a stop to these everlasting incidents. But a voice was whispering to the Albanians that they must not allow themselves to be so easily coerced. "You have thrown us out of all the land behind Valona," said the voice, "and out of Valona itself. You must, therefore, be the greatest warriors in the world, and we will be charmed to provide you with rifles andmachine guns and munitions and uniforms and cash. We will gladly publish to the world that your Delegation at Rome has sent us an official Note demanding that the Yugoslav troops should retire to the 1913 line, pure and simple. Of course we, like the other Allies, agreed that they should occupy the more advanced positions which General Franchet d'Espérey assigned to them—and to show you how truly sorry we are for having done so, we propose to send you all the help you need. In dealing with us you will find that you have to do with honourable men, whereas the Yugoslavs—what are they but Yugoslavs?"

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