Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/423

 416  critic. I have been too bold to write on such a theme.

Courteous reader, in rising from the table, let me express a hope that you see a very great difference between “dining” and “getting your dinner.” May you never sit down to one without an appetite,—may you never hunger without being able to dine.

tiniest member of the European community of nations, so insignificant as to be forgotten in peace-time, has just now become famous. The Montenegrins, always ready to seize hold of their weapons, and find occasion for vindicating old claims and avenging past injuries, are again at war with the Porte. Without venturing upon the troubled ground of politics, or guessing at the issue of that contest, we may pick a few facts in illustration of their character out of the note-books of Sir Gardner Wilkinson, M. Kohl, and other travellers.

They are a rough, uncouth, almost barbarous set of men; in their temper exactly harmonising with the rugged nature of their residence. The country is an extended surface of small hills and valleys, with here and there a loftier eminence jutting up. Sometimes the mountains are steep and smooth like glaciers: often the valleys are traversed by rapid torrents. So rocky is the whole place that the inhabitants have made up a queer story to account for the peculiarity. When God, they say, was traversing the newly-made world, and apportioning stones to the different parts, the bag in which the stones were kept burst as He passed over Tzernagora, and, in consequence, they all fell there.

The district, situated in the north-west portion of Turkey, and hemmed in by the Turkish provinces of Herzogovina, Bosnia and Albania, is scarcely larger than our English county of Kent, and not altogether unlike it in shape. It measures some sixty miles in length and thirty or thirty-five in breadth. It gets its name of Black Mountain—for so the Venetian word, Montenegro, and the native word, Tzernagora, both signify—from the dark pine forests which once almost covered it, and of which traces still exist. Five centuries ago, before the unwieldy structure was broken in pieces by the Mussulmans, it formed part of the Slavonic empire of Servia. But while the Turkish nation was growing up, and spreading its roots in the parts all round them, the hardy little people of the Black Mountain could never be brought under subjection. Ever since that time, they have been always at feud—generally at open war—with their angry enemies, and a most intense, unwavering hatred has been maintained between the two races. In the late Russian war this animosity overcame their partiality for the English, and led them at once to take part against the allies of the Turks.

Till very recently the chief power has been vested in the bishop. The present governor, or Vladika, however, Prince Daniel, is a layman, the change having been considered expedient, in order that, by marrying, he may have children who can form a regular dynasty, and thus avoid the squabbles of an election at each vacancy. In the year 1712, fearing to rely solely on their own strength, the people placed themselves under the protection of Russia, Peter the Great being then Czar, an alliance which was encouraged both by affinity of race and by communion of religion; for the Montenegrins are zealous Christians belonging to the Greek Church, a fact which naturally heightens the opposition of the Turks.

Though nominally governed by Vladikas, these officers have very little real power. In the senates of the chiefs, the answer to every proposal is: “Be it as thou wishest, Vladika!” and there the submissiveness ends. Each man does as is right in his own eyes. The two Vladikas who preceded the present one made great efforts, and with some success, to secure order by instituting correct systems of trial for offences. But all attempts are rendered very difficult by the strong prejudice against bringing any one to justice. If a man is wronged, it is thought that he must revenge the injury with his own hand. It is the most sacred duty of the eldest son to avenge the murder of his father. If he is too young to set about the work at once, he is instructed to regard himself as a divinely appointed minister of retribution. Unless he is an infant, in which case the mother acts as his proxy, the widowed parent holds before the boy his father’s blood-stained clothing, and makes him swear in the presence of his kinsmen and a priest, that he will seek before everything to punish the murderer. The garment, or any other relic that is procurable, is then hung up as a lasting memento of the unrequited wrong. In 1851, when M. Kohl was travelling through the country, a little fellow was brought up as a witness in a trial before an Austrian court, when the following dialogue took place:

The Judge asked, “What is your name?”

“Savva Markovich,” was the answer.

“How old are you?”

“Seven years.”

“Who is your father?”

“Marko Gregorovich: he is no longer alive.”

“When did he die?”

“He did not die.”

“How so?”

“He was murdered. We all know it. He was murdered by Spiro Jurovich, from Saroschi; and when I am a man I will shoot Jurovich.”

“Stop, stop, my little man. How can you think of such a dreadful thing? who put it into your head?”

“Oh! yes: I will kill Spiro Jurovich. I must do so. My uncle, the priest, Peter Gregorovich, has told me so. I will shoot him with the rifle that hangs in my uncle’s room. When I am a man my uncle will give me the rifle, that I may avenge my father, and punish his murderer.”

Nor is the necessity of blood-revenge confined to cases of bloodshed. Another incident was brought under the notice of the same traveller. A pretty girl had been long affianced to a young man; but the marriage was deferred owing to his poverty. Things were in this state, when another youth, wealthier than the former, came to live in the village. Before long, having succeeded in drawing off the girl’s affections, he made her his wife. For a while, the insulted youth took no