The inhabitants of Albania are totally devoid of national feeling.[189] Various causes militate against national unity. Primeval patriotism, expressed by love of tribe rather than of country, is one of them. Furthermore the peculiar shape of their country transforms it into a number of compartment-like areas beyond which tribal activity rarely extends. The setting up of an independent state in 1913 was a purely political move undertaken by Austrian statesmen to prevent Serbian expansion to the Adriatic. Within the boundaries determined by the ambassadorial conference held in London in that year strife and dissensions prevail now as intensely as during the Turkish régime. Natives of the northern sections of the country speak Serbian dialects and favor union with Serbia or Montenegro rather than independence. Malisori tribesmen fought side by side with Montenegrin troops in the fall of 1912 as their ancestors had done in the campaign of 1711 against the Turks. The Albanians of Ipek, however, gave assistance to Turkish regulars. The inhabitants of the valley of the upper Morava sent supplies to Serbian troops against which the chieftains of central Albania led their men. The purest type of Albanian found in the vicinity of Elbassan, Koritza and Valona[190] is practically submerged in a sea of Greeks. Under these circumstances, partition of the country between Greece and Serbia might not be incompatible with native aspirations. Political stability could be obtained in this case without paying attention to linguistic unity. Nevertheless Albania is not without national boundaries. The valley of the Drin and the range of the Pindus have left their mark in the development of the Albanian people, while the sea on the west provides the country with a most desirable confine. On the east and south, the limits of Albanian language and nationality become indefinite owing to the intermingling of foreign populations. In the Ipek district, along the northeast corner of the country, two centuries of Albanian invasions have failed to insure preponderance of the Albanian over the Serbian element. Nevertheless at the London ambassadorial conference in 1913 Albania was awarded the only available road between Montenegro and Serbia. The route, cut in the mountainous tangle which characterizes this region, follows the Clementi gap, a district settled by shepherds of the tribe of the same name. The Prokleita mountains allotted to Albania form here a natural boundary. The inclusion of this uplift within Serbian territory would have enabled the Serbians to maintain communication with their Montenegrin kinsmen. Albanians would have lost little in the transaction, as can well be inferred from the name of the mountain, which is Serbian for “accursed.”