Page:The Ballads of Marko Kraljević.djvu/229

 but was still at the stage of oral tradition. Such written and printed matter as did exist was almost entirely of a religious or official nature, and was composed in the Paleo-Slav of the Church, an archaic language unintelligible to the people. The original alphabet of Cyril the Byzantine missionary of the ninth century had become quite unsuitable as a means of expressing the sounds of the spoken language, and when Kopitar urged upon Vuk the importance of publishing his collected material it became clear that the first necessity was to reform the ancient Cyrillic alphabet so as to adapt it to the needs of the living tongue. Vuk undertook the task and carried it through with triumphant success in spite of the bitterest clerical opposition, and to-day the Serbs, alone in Europe, enjoy the privilege of possessing a true phonetic alphabet. With the publication of the Grammar and of the first collection of Serbian folk-songs in 1814, Vuk may be said to have found his vocation.

Advised and assisted by Kopitar, he produced after several years of laborious work his great Serbian Dictionary, a book which was received by scholars with the liveliest satisfaction. Learned societies began to honour him and in 1820, on the invitation of Prince Milosh, he returned to Belgrade to help in the task of establishing a system of national education. But those who regarded, or professed to regard, the reform of the alphabet as an act of sacrilege, were so strong and bitter in their hostility, that Vuk was compelled to leave. He returned to Vienna and prepared another collection of folk-songs for the press. Here again difficulty beset him, and obstacles were placed in the way of publication. Vuk, accordingly, travelled to Leipzig in 1823 and had the book printed there (1823). He became the personal friend of Goethe, Jacob Grimm, Humboldt, Ranke and many other distinguished men, but their generous appreciation did not save him from the pinch of downright poverty.

"I cannot tell you," he wrote to a friend, "in what difficulties I find myself. Believe me, I was unable to buy a pound of meat, far less a pig, for Christmas. Remembering what day it was, and looking at my children, I wept like a child. Everything I can sell or pawn, I have sold or pawned, and now I know not what I am to do with my wife and children. It is winter, and I have no wood, no bread and no money."

Gradually, however, his circumstances improved and a pension was granted him. The remainder of his life was largely spent in travel in Serbia, Bosnia and Montenegro, and in the publication of the material thus collected.