Through the Land of the SerbDurham, M. E. (Mary Edith)
History
Through the Land of the Serb
Durham, M. E. (Mary Edith)
Montenegro -- Description and travel; Serbia -- Description and travel
Andrijevitza is a tiny, tiny place (2200 feet above the sea), nestled in
a valley on the banks of the Lim, which hurries down from the lands of
Plava and Gusinje, and is here joined by a little tributary. I put up at
the bakers shop, a funny little house built on a slope. It accommodated
a cow in the basement and fowls in the roof. These began to scrattle and
peck about four in the morning, you woke with the feeling that they were
raking for corn in your head, and the baker's wife, who kindly let me
share her bedroom and saved me from the general guest-room, used to
hammer on the ceiling with my umbrella by way of quieting them. Life at
Andrijevitza is somewhat rough, but I fared exceedingly well; for the
kindness, courtesy, and hospitality of everyone more than made up for
the barbaric simplicity of all domestic arrangements. Nor did it ever
occur to anyone that I was not living in the lap of luxury, for I had
every comfort that money can buy--in Andrijevitza. Compared with
Andrijevitza, Kolashin is large and wealthy. Andrijevitza is poor,
proud, honest and self-respecting--and it has a right to be proud, for
it is the very last outpost of civilisation in that direction. The
border and the Turk are but four miles away, the men of Andrijevitza are
fighting frontiersmen, and their head is that "veliki junak," Voyvode
Lakich.
Voyvode Lakich--the eagle-eyed, grey-headed warrior, the beloved of his
people, a terror to the Turks--is a type of all that is fine in Old
Montenegro. One of a long line of fighting men, his honest eyes, his
hearty laugh, and the simple dignity of his bearing command entire trust
at first sight, and the respect with which he is regarded tell that he
is a born leader of men, a Duke (dux) in the old sense of the word. His
courtly old wife called on me at once with her daughter-in-law, and
proceeded to welcome me in the orthodox style with glasses of rakija.
Poor old lady, she was really no more addicted to raw spirits than I am,
and gasped between each glass; but in spite of my efforts the proper
forms had to be observed, and we duly swallowed the three glasses
required by Christianity and the laws of hospitality. She marvelled
greatly over my journey, for she herself had never left the
neighbourhood. Her nephew, she said, was a great traveller; "he had been
to Nikshitje, Podgoritza, and Cetinje." She was the great lady of the
land and much respected, but has lived a life of toil and poverty and
danger compared with which the life of our own "working classes" is one
of pampered luxury. I do not think that there is anyone in Montenegro
whose soul is imperilled by great possessions. When I had once left
Podgoritza, and the world, behind me, my two small saddle-bags were
regarded as an inordinate amount of luggage. "You have quite enough
clothes on. What can you need these for? Leave them here, and call for
them on the way back." No one travels with more than can be tied up in a
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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