capital, with the object, it is commonly understood, of impressing visitors—and perhaps also the inhabitants themselves—with the ‘benefits’ of Austrian rule—as though palaces, parks, pavements, and prostitutes were sufficient compensation to the Serbs for the racial unity and freedom which have been denied them, first by one nation, then by another.“ “But,” some one broke in, “up to the time of the present war, didn’t the Serbs have Serbia?” “The present kingdom of Serbia proper was inhabited by Serbs,” returned the other, “but the Serbia we know is only a small part of what was, long ago, the Serbian Empire. Since the fall of the empire, in the fourteenth century, it has been the great ambition of the Serbs to become again a unified nation. Bosnia was a part of the old empire, but was conquered by the Turks, and later taken over by the Austrians. The story I am about to tell shows, however, what an enduring race consciousness the Bosnian Serbs have maintained. “Our district manager for Bosnia lived in the town of which I have been speaking, and when I first went there he took me to a small but particularly clean and attractive hotel, run by an Austrian Serb. As is usual in small hotels in Europe, the proprietor’s family took part in the work of running the place; and as I used to stay there frequently, sometimes for two or three weeks at a stretch, I soon came to know them all well. As the years passed I became really attached to them, and there were many signs to show that they were fond of me. Michael, the father, exercised general supervision—though he was not above carrying a trunk upstairs; Stana, the mother, kept the accounts and superintended the cooking, which was excellent; the two daughters worked in the kitchen and sometimes helped wait on table. Even the boy, Gavrilo, the youngest member of the family, helped after school with light work, though he studied hard and was not very strong. I often sat with them at their own family table at one end of the dining-room; I called them all by their given names, and addressed them with the ‘thee’ and ‘thou’ of familiarity. “When I first knew Gavrilo he was twelve or thirteen years old. His father, though of pure Serb blood, had acquired, with years and experience in business, a certain resignation to the existing order of things. He had seen several wars and revolutions, and as he grew older had begun to think that peace under Austrian domination was better than continual conflict, whatever the cause. “The boy Gavrilo was, however, more like Stana, his mother. Stana could grow old, but the flame in her, the poetry, the mysticism, and above all the Serbian racial feeling, never diminished. Gavrilo learned the Serbian folk stories and songs at her knee; also he learned from her Serbian history, which, under Austria, was not taught in the schools; for the Austrians have long desired to crush out Serbian racial feeling.