should be discontinued, thus reducing "this little country to such a state of despair," said Mr. Ronald M'Neill in the House of Commons in November 1919, "and to strip it so naked before the world that it will be compelled, having no other course to take, to accept union with Serbia, as the only way out of hopeless misery and bankruptcy." It is possible that Mr. M'Neill is referring to some subsidy other than that given to Nikita, but I have my doubts. In the same speech he alluded to American Relief work in Montenegro, saying that 70 per cent. of it was consumed by Serbian troops and the rest sold to profiteers. He confused the American Red Cross, which maintained four hospitals and distributed vast quantities of clothing and food among the inhabitants of Montenegro, and those American supplies which the Yugoslav Government purchased, mainly for the troops. But Mr. M'Neill, M.P., is very angry with the Serbs for spreading, as he says, reports discreditable to the King of Montenegro--if he knew a little more I think that he would say a good deal less--and Nikita must have deprecated the remark that no facilities at all had been given by the Great Powers to enable him and his Ministers to return to Montenegro. If every Serbian soldier were to be withdrawn the country would, with a tremendous majority, have been adverse to the ex-King and his family. This was recognized by Danilo when his father suggested that he should go out in the autumn of 1918. On December 5 he replied from Cap Martin saying that the appendicitis from which he had suffered since the War prevented him even from going into the garden. Mr. M'Neill and a few similar enthusiasts are not weary of repeating that the Serbs and the Montenegrins are quite distinct peoples. This, no doubt, is Mr. M'Neill's opinion, and if he wishes to retain it he is welcome to do so. But I should like to refer his audiences in the House of Commons and elsewhere to the Patriarch Brkić of Peć, who wrote in the eighteenth century concerning some of the Turkish provinces. No one would pretend that Brkić was profoundly versed in philology or in ethnography, and I believe he studied the Slav languages not any more than does Mr. M'Neill. He was a Montenegrin whose education had been that of an ordinary pupil in a monastery. He spoke the Southern dialect, and in his eyes all those who had another accent were not veritable Serbs. Even in our time there are many Montenegrins whom it is quite difficult to convince that they are not the only true Serbs. THE BURDEN OF AUSTRIA'S SOUTHERN SLAV TROOPS Meanwhile Austria's Yugoslav soldiers and sailors had been continuing their patriotic work. On February 2, 1918, a telegram was sent to the Army High Command at Baden (near Vienna). [This message is No. 974. It concerns itself with the Austrian navy, in whose ranks Sarkotić perceives agitation. The rest of the message consists chiefly of the drastic remedies which the writer would apply.]