In the account of our author's first journey, no serious stop is
made till we come alongside of the island of Veglia: apropos to
the passage by which, we have given to us, at some length, an
interesting extract from the report of a Venetian commissioner sent
to the island, in 1481, to inquire into its state. Of this document
we will say no more than that it is exceedingly curious, and will
well reward the pains of reading. A passing notice is given to
Segna, situated on the mainland, near Veglia, for the memory's sake
of those desperate villains the Uscocs, to whom it belonged of old.
A good deal of their history is given in the last chapter of the
second volume, which serves as a documentary appendix to the work.
Everything necessary to beget interest in the islands scattered
hereaway is told; but we pass them by, and are brought to Zara. What
of antiquities is here discoverable is rooted out for our benefit,
but not much remains. The most interesting relic in the place, to
our mind, is the inscription recording the victory of Lepanto. As
Zara is the capital of Dalmatia, occasion is taken, while speaking
of the city, to give some account of the government of the province,
and of the general condition of the people.
An incident mentioned by Sir Gardner displays, in a painful
light, the kind of feeling entertained by the Austrian government
towards these its subjects, and permitted by its officials to
find expression before the natives. We cannot take it as a case
of isolated insolence: because men in responsible situations,
especially where the social system comprises an indefinite supply
of spies, do not ostentatiously commit themselves, unless they
have a foregone conviction, that what they say is according to
the authorised tone. Men under inspection of the higher powers
do not put themselves out of their way to make a display of
bitterness, unless they think thereby to conciliate the good-will
of their superiors. This is the incident in question: On a certain
occasion, the conversation happened to turn on the subject of a
then recent disturbance in a Dalmatian town. The soldiery and the
people had quarrelled, and in the _émeute_ two of the soldiers
had been killed. On these data forth spake a Jack in office. He
knew not, nor did he care to know, how many of the peasants had
fallen, nor does he appear to have entered at all curiously into
the question of the _casus belli_. He simply recommended, as the
disturbance had taken place, and as the actual perpetrators of
the violence were not forthcoming, that the whole population of
the town should be "decimated and shot." "The butchery of any
number of Dalmatians," says our author, "was thought a fit way of
remedying the incapacity of the police." One would hardly imagine
that this counsel could have been met by the applauses of persons
holding official situations; but so, we are assured, it was in fact
received. This manifestation of feeling is a sort of thing which,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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