The Land of the Black Mountain Part 5

"But we have had ----" It is not well to particularise--it was a thirsty day.

"There is nothing to pay," the woman reiterated.

The other party had guiltily slipped out of the room and climbed into their carriage, and our driver became impatient to maintain the lead.

With mixed feelings we followed him out, and in another second were off again at a gallop.

It was always like that in Montenegro. We have gone into an inn or cafe and drunk a liqueur (a polite name for the fiery but wholesome local spirit), when a fresh gla.s.s will be silently placed before us.

We have waved it away.

"Not ordered it," we would say.

"That man has," answers the boy, and points at a smiling Montenegrin on the other side of the room. Sometimes, and very often too, other guests follow suit, and the result is trying. We gave up visits to cafes afterwards, except when we were on pleasure bent and had an hour to spare. Hospitable, reckless, poverty-stricken Montenegrins--one can travel far before another such a race can be found.

The last two hours of the drive are uninteresting, chiefly because eight hours in a carriage is trying. Podgorica comes in sight long before it is reached, in the form of a cl.u.s.ter of trees on a gra.s.sy but dead-level plain, out of which two minarets show their graceful spires. The background is imposing, lowering Albanian mountains rise abruptly to their lofty heights from the level of the plain.

For an hour we drove along the plain, and pa.s.sed a solitary building situated on a slight eminence. It was Kruevac, one of the Prince's country palaces, or, to be more correct, Prince Mirko's palace, as "Voivoda" or Duke of the Zeta, which ancient and historical t.i.tle is his. Then for some distance we skirted the Moraca, driving in an opposite direction to Podgorica till we came to the "Vizier" bridge, over which we crossed and retraced our way to the town.

The River Moraca is a large mountain torrent, into which the Zeta flows only a short distance away from the town. It rushes over great boulders, forming here and there formidable rapids, between two deep banks, which, without any warning, break off suddenly from the flat and form precipitous sides fully two hundred feet deep. Two or three hundred yards away, no gap or break in the plain is observable.

Sometimes the river swells almost to the top of its banks, and then the effect must be terrible. There is a ford near Podgorica, which the peasants use to avoid the long detour by the bridge, but woe to the man who makes a false step. Three women, carrying loads of wood, lost their footing during our stay, and were drowned. In its waters we swam every evening, and even in midsummer, when the river is low, the strength of the current required an expert and powerful swimmer to breast it, and it was invariably very cold.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE VIZIER BRIDGE]

The bridge, built by an old Turkish Vizier many, many years ago, is most picturesque, and completely in keeping with the rocky banks and the foam-flecked, emerald-green waters rus.h.i.+ng beneath. From this bridge a man once sprang into the depths below, to show that he was not intoxicated. As a matter of fact he was, but he emerged dripping a hundred yards lower down, unhurt and at least in his right mind.

There used to be a deep indentation in a stone of the bridge parapet--during our stay in the country it has been plastered up--which credulous Montenegrins relate to be the cut of a Turkish horseman pursuing a fleeing Montenegrin. The story goes that the Turk severed the Montenegrin's head from his body, and so violent was the stroke that he cut into the stone wall as well.

Again, just before the town, two slabs, standing exactly thirty paces apart, mark a similar episode, and the headless man is said to have run that distance before falling. This legend--which, furthermore, has many eye-witnesses still living in the town who swear to the truth--is more capable of belief if one takes into consideration the flight of a decapitated fowl in any of our poultry yards.

The road entering Podgorica is very similar in appearance to that which leads into Cetinje, only the first impressions are considerably wilder and more uncivilised than that of the capital. Hundreds of Turks and Albanians are smoking their evening "tchibouque" in the streets, and scowl in no friendly manner at the stranger. Some of them, namely, the merchant cla.s.s, are, however, excellent people, travelled and educated, as we found out afterwards. The Albanian and Turk are the enterprising merchants of Montenegro, and improve on acquaintance, which is sometimes necessary.

We had a lonely, solitary feeling as we drove through the crowd of loiterers, and were glad to descend at a presentable-looking hostelry.

How often first impressions are wrong we proved to the full in this instance.

Podgorica saw more of us than any other town during our stay, for we made it afterwards our headquarters. It would be difficult to forget that mountain-bounded valley and the town with its bustling streets of picturesque humanity. And then those sunsets! The peaks towering behind bathed in crimson, and the intervening hills rising one above the other to the furthermost summits like a giant staircase, rich in a mysterious purple. As we walked back from our evening swim, over the short, springing gra.s.s, that scene at sunset never abated its charms one whit. And we were always glad on entering the town that no one wore plain, ugly European clothes but ourselves. The national costumes, so full of colour, blended harmoniously with our feelings, and have left behind them an indelible picture.

CHAPTER VI

Podgorica--Its central position--Our headquarters--Easter in Montenegro--Our experience of it--We view the town--The prison and its inmates--Christian and Mahometan friction--The modern town--The market and the armed buyers--The Black Earth--Easter customs--Montenegrin methods of doing business.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GENERAL VIEW OF PODGORICA]

If it were not for the dangerous proximity of the Albanian border, Podgorica would have been made the capital of Montenegro. It is favourably situated for a trade centre, and, owing to this fact, has naturally gathered a large population (the largest in Montenegro), approaching ten thousand. Lying on a rich and fertile plain, within easy reach of the Lake of Scutari, and connected by good roads with Cetinje and Nikic, it is within market distance, so to speak, of Kolain and Andrijevica. From these districts, and from the Albanian borders, the people flock in crowds, and the Podgorican market is by far the most important in the country. But--and it is a big "but"--in this case the Albanian frontier is only an hour's walk away, and it would never do to risk the persons of the Royal Family and the Ministers in a sudden Albanian raid, and troubles and disturbances are of everyday occurrence.

We made Podgorica our headquarters during our sojourn in the land of the Black Mountain mainly for its central position, but also for the opportunity afforded us there for studying Montenegrin life.

It would be difficult to forget our first visit to the town. It was Easter Sunday evening when we arrived at the Hotel Europa, and after seeing our luggage carried in, started out on a tour of inspection, and also to present our letter of introduction to Dr. S., the veterinary surgeon of Montenegro. We had not got more than fifty yards from the hotel when we were forced to beat a hasty and ignominious retreat. At Eastertide, which is one of the biggest feasts in the Greek Church, beggars, halt and maim, blind and tattered, pour into all the larger towns of the country. They come from Turkey, Albania, Bosnia, and Dalmatia--in fact, from everywhere within reach--and make a rich harvest, for the Montenegrin opens his heart, his hand, and his house at Easter. In our innocence we imagined this to be the normal state of affairs in Montenegro, and were greatly cast down.

But our worthy host armed himself with a big stick, and we sallied forth again under his guidance. Even then it was no joke, and the house of Dr. S. came as a haven of refuge. Anyone who has been in the East knows what an amount of persistency and endurance the Oriental beggar possesses.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE RIBNICA]

We were received as old friends and welcomed to the Easter table, which was set, as in any other Montenegrin house at this season, for anyone and everyone who has the remotest claims of acquaintances.h.i.+p.

Several men were present, to whom we were at once introduced; amongst others a canny Scotchman, the only Britisher living permanently in the country. We were a cosmopolitan gathering. There was Dr. S., a Roumanian, an Austrian ornithologist, a Scotchman, our innkeeper was a Macedonian, and two or three Montenegrins. From that evening date many of the pleasant friends.h.i.+ps which we made in Montenegro.

The next day our newly-made friends showed us Podgorica. It is divided into two distinct parts--the old, or Turkish town, and the new Montenegrin town, which dates from the conquest of 1877. The two halves are separated by the River Ribnica, which flows in a deep bed before the crumbling walls of the Turkish quarter. At one angle of the town the Ribnica enters the Moraca, Montenegro's biggest and most important river.

Most picturesque is the old Turkish quarter, still surrounded by the same bastions and walls which not so long ago defied the Montenegrin army. But the houses, as well as the walls, are fast falling to ruin; for at the order of the Prince the market has been removed to the other side, and, in comparison with the new town, there are few inhabitants left. The fortifications still bear witness to the fierce struggle which took place before them, and one bastion was breached more successfully than ever Montenegrin cannon had done, by lightning, during the bombardment. Many of the older inhabitants, as well as the walls, show traces of the former conflict, a noseless man being no great curiosity.

Not for nothing has the Montenegrin won his fame as one of the fiercest fighters in the world. He was never outdone in atrocities by his enemies. It was the rule of war (and is now, to a great extent) to either behead one's prisoner on the spot, or, if the day had been exceptionally heavy, and more heads could not be carried conveniently, noses were taken instead. Perhaps the phrase "to count noses"

originated in these lands. However, it usually ended the same, for the noseless man would, as a rule, bleed to death; but some have lived through it, and can be met with anywhere in Montenegro or Albania.

Many fierce fights took place in and about Podgorica, and the ghastly picture of victorious Montenegrins at the conclusion of an affray, sitting in groups, each with a small or large heap of heads and noses before him, "counting the bag," has many eye-witnesses still living.

In the Turkish town lies the prison, soon to be the only one in Montenegro. A new wing is rapidly nearing completion to accommodate the female prisoners, who are at present incarcerated in Cetinje. We visited the director that Easter Monday morning, and were received unofficially in his quarters. We always had great fun with that man--a pompous individual filled to overflowing with the importance of his position, and, not unlike men similarly afflicted, most aggressively stupid.

As a great favour, and after our united persuasion, he allowed us at last to look from a window overlooking the courtyard of the prison. As in Cetinje, the prisoners walk without let or hindrance in the s.p.a.cious walled-in courts before their cell doors. Being Easter no man was chained, a privilege they owe to the Prince, who always releases the prisoners from their fetters during the great festivals; one wretched individual, however, we noticed more heavily manacled than even a murderer of the worst kind. He was, we were informed, a dangerous madman, though, poor devil, he looked harmless enough, slouching round and round the yard. The primitive custom of confining dangerous lunatics (for the harmless are allowed their full liberty outside) in the common prison is soon to be done away with. A large lunatic asylum is rapidly nearing completion near Danilovgrad--another memorial of Prince Nicolas' improvements.

The prisoners were sleek and fat--those imprisoned for long terms or for life bearing witness of the good treatment which they receive at the hands of the authorities. One youngish man in particular attracted our attention, a merry laughing fellow whose girth had reached alarming proportions. He was imprisoned for life, and his crime, which sat so lightly upon him, had been a particularly atrocious and dastardly murder for plunder--a crime practically unknown in Montenegro.

Imprisonment is more real here than in Cetinje. There is none of that delightful promenading up and down before the prison walls, hours pleasantly whiled away with a friendly visitor from afar over a pint of wine. The only glimpse of the outside world that these prisoners obtain is when a few of them fetch water daily from a well outside the walls.

As we gazed upon the strange scene from the window above, of prisoners and warders amicably chatting together, others squatting in groups over a harmless game, a horrible voice disturbed the serenity of the picture. Then at a closely barred window a face appeared, with matted hair and long unkempt beard. It was the face of a madman; with terrible curses he filled the air, and we looked inquiringly at our cicerone.

"That man is a political offender," came the answer. "For fifteen years he has waited his trial, and now he has become hopelessly insane. Many years ago he endeavoured to stir up a revolution against the Prince, and fled to Vienna, where he carried on his treasonable propaganda. But he was enticed back, and thrown into solitary confinement such as those who are traitors to their Prince receive.

For an hour every day these prisoners are allowed to walk in the yard, but this man from the first refused to avail himself of the privilege, and now he has become what you see."

"Will he never regain his freedom?" we asked.

A shrug of the shoulders was all that our guide vouchsafed, and with that awful voice ringing in our ears we were glad to turn away.

Two mosques still exist, and are in use, for the Turkish population is fairly large, though owing to recent events rapidly diminis.h.i.+ng, but the Prince does everything in his power to cultivate a friendly feeling with the Mahometans. His country is the asylum for the persecuted Turk as well as the fugitive from justice, and, if his crime is political, he will be warmly welcomed.

But, Woman again has upset the best of intentions, and within a year four elopements of Turkish girls from their homes with Montenegrins have taken place in Podgorica. These girls have been baptised and married to their Christian lovers. A worse insult to the Mahometan faith does not exist. But of this more anon.

The modern town is painfully plain and uninteresting. Montenegrins have no knowledge or love of architecture. Each house is built solidly of stone, square and undecorated. Even the palaces of the Royal Family are of puritanical simplicity externally.

There are the law courts, post and telegraph offices, and police-station all in one, a school, and a market-place, with a very ugly memorial to the fallen Montenegrins in the last war. Otherwise, the town is laid out with broad streets, all planted with trees, exactly like a South African towns.h.i.+p.

Building plots are free, the only obligation to the owner being that he must run up the outside walls of the house at once. The roof and internal work can be completed at leisure. A large part of the town consists of mere sh.e.l.ls of houses, the owners waiting for the means of completion.

Some little distance from the town, across the Moraca, is the Prince's palace of Kruevac, which he occasionally visits. It stands quite alone on a slight eminence.

The view round Podgorica is one of the most fascinating features of the place. It is one of those perfect views which never tire, and always present some new beauty, and the armed rough men in their brightly coloured and novel costumes are in complete unison with the picture. These national costumes seem so absolutely fitting to Montenegro that the otherwise plain and uninteresting buildings of the town are turned merely into a background for the ever-moving stream of colour. The Turkish bazaars with their gaudy wares hung out into the street, the red-jacketed Montenegrin, the Turk in pure white, the Scutarines in their distinct and original costume, and the Albanians who flock in hundreds to the market in coa.r.s.e white serge, heavily bordered with black braiding, rifles over their shoulders and a bandolier round their waists, make a never-ending picture. We never wearied of wandering about the streets on market days. Then the town is filled to overflowing with a multi-coloured crowd, and every man from a distance brings his rifle.