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
their plans, and have in fact provided them with the materials for a
fairly accurate biography of myself, should one ever be required. Its
excessive dulness went a long way towards soothing their agitated
nerves. Pressure of business forced the pale blue youth to stamp my
passport and let me go while his appetite for details was yet
unsatisfied, and I hastened to buy a ticket for Shabatz. This was
impossible. I could only book across the river to Semlin. By this time I
was really interested in frontier existence, and began to regard the
trip as a sporting event. Feeling righteous and bold as a lion, being
armed with a stamped passport and a ticket, I walked down the platform
only to be stopped short by sentries. The pale blue youth from the
office came flying up. Having hurried up through his business, he
intended learning a little more about me while yet there was time. As he
spoke nothing but his native tongue and was fluent and excited, we did
not get on very well; but I imparted my proposed plan of seeing Servia
to him, and he stood on the step of the carriage till the train started.
Hardly were we off when another officer turned up. He took the passport
and wrote my name in a little book, but had unfortunately no time to ask
more than three or four questions.
At Semlin we were quite busy. First we went through the customs, and
then we had to go and find our passports. The stout and smiling police
official selected mine, and without venturing to pronounce my name
cried, "The English one." More conversation, this time in German. I told
him that I had made nine journeys with that passport without its ever
being looked at, and now it had been stamped twice in an hour. This
pleased him, and he pointed out that it showed how superior the
Hungarian police are to those of other nations. Then I re-booked, and
learned that I had to change trains! My fellow-passengers dazed me with
Magyar. They none of them agreed as to where I must change, but were all
convinced that I had been wrongly informed by the railway guard, and
when I arrived at last on the banks of the Save and saw the ferry-boat,
I felt as if I were returning to a well-known and civilised land. Even
Servian is better than Magyar.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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