lightning in their pockets and have then indignantly revealed it. But the whole affair is wrapped in darkness and awaits the exploring of Austria's archives. The probability is that Aerenthal was at his work to demonstrate that Belgrade was a nest of vipers, so that Europe would not hearken to their protest when the time came for the House of Habsburg to smother them.[69] ... This same Austrian police-spy Nastić had procured for Nikita a certain "revolutionary statue" which that personage made over to the Imperial authorities, for use against the Serbs at the Zagreb treason trial. This atrocious deed against his brother Serbs destroyed for ever the last shreds of Nikita's reputation. THE DREAMS OF AN OLD REALIST Nevertheless he dreamed that from the mighty castle which looks down on Prizren he would rule the Southern Slavs; his eyes were ever turned towards the famous legendary land of Old Serbia. One essential was that he should be a king, and in 1910 with the consent of the Powers he assumed this title. The spider-webs of which he was so fond began to join Cetinje and Sofia, Cetinje and the mountains of Albania, while the master-weaver mitigated in his usual fashion the monotony of life in his poor capital. The Petrović have such a way with them that--if you do not happen to be one of their subjects--you are in danger of being disarmed. Thus when they were basking in the goodwill of Austria and when Nikita himself, in the spring of 1911, had been splendidly received at Vienna, so that on his return to Cetinje he was welcomed by the whole diplomatic body, save for the Russian Minister, Count Giers, and General Potapoff, the Russian military attaché, who were exhibiting their Government's disapproval, this appeared to Nikita a favourable moment for--as the Persians would say--blackening the face of the Austrian representative.