Through the Land of the Serb

And when he had gone there was a great silence, and I sat at the window and stared at the little white church and at the mountain that rose up just behind it. The world beyond was a vague, far-off recollection; part of a previous existence. I felt that I had passed all my life in that lonely hollow among the hills, and then wondered whether I had any right to be there at all. But I did not wish to ever forget the scene, and in spite of the old man's recommendation to sleep, I coiled up on the window-sill and began a drawing.

Time passed like a flash, and the light was rapidly dying, when I became aware of the clink of spurs and the clicking of the amber beads, and the Archimandrite followed by a servant and my pandur, bearing lamp and supper, came in a little procession down the corridor. I had not realised till then that I was to sup with the Archimandrite himself. He was distressed that I remained standing, and spoke to the pandur, who hurried away, and returned with a big and throne-like arm-chair. Meanwhile Nikola the servant spread two newspapers on the table, put the lamp in the middle and arranged the plates and dishes. Then he placed a small cane-bottomed chair and stood attention by it. My pandur drew himself up by the arm-chair, the Archimandrite motioned me to it ceremoniously, murmured a blessing, and took his seat. He tucked his large table napkin under his chin, spread the other end of it on the table and stood his plate upon it, thus making a bridge from food to mouth. Foolishly, I did not imitate him, but put mine on my knees. Now the tablecloth was a product of Western civilisation, of that make called "tapestry" in Tottenham Court Road. It was black-and-yellow, and round the border were pyramids, palm trees, camels, Arabs and damsels – a very secular tablecloth. It was greatly treasured by the old man, and the centre only was protected by newspaper. He was distressed to see that I did not know how to use a table napkin, but he was far too polite to say so. He murmured something to Nikola, and before I had realised the mistake I had made, Nikola returned with another newspaper, which he put under my plate. Then the meal began. "Nikola, serve rakija," said the Archimandrite, and Nikola filled two little glasses with slivovitz and put them before us. "This," said the Archimandrite, "is from our own plums," and he raised his glass and bowed gravely; I raised mine; he clinked with it. "God give you health," he said, and drained his glass. I drained mine, and restrained a violent desire to gasp as the spirit went down like a red-hot poker, for it was the fieriest liqueur I had ever met. "Nikola, serve the rakija," said the Archimandrite again, and we repeated the ceremony. I left some at the bottom of my glass. He pointed this out, and waited patiently. I swallowed it. "Nikola, serve the rakija," said the Archimandrite a third time. "No, thank you," said I timidly. "Three times is Servian," he said pleasantly. My glass was filled. "God give you health," said I bravely; we clinked, and the ceremony was completed.

With a burning gullet, I began dinner. There was no sign of anything else to drink. Bread, cheese, kaimak, onions and poached eggs were spread before me, and a dish of haricot beans and a lettuce before him. "You had better see what I eat," he said, with a funny little smile; "your friends in England will wish to know how an Archimandrite in Servia lives."

I had my dictionary and struggled hard to follow his conversation and to reply, but was sometimes entirely lost, for the strain after the long day was almost more than I could stand. A very great many English, he told me, had been to Studenitza. I was surprised. He counted upon his fingers, and said that since 1865, including myself, there had been eight. "Yes," he said gaily, "here we know the English very well, and your Church is not unlike our own," Feeling quite unequal to discussing theology in Servian, I did not rise to this remark. "At any rate," he said cheerfully, "we both dislike the Pope." "How old are you?" asked the Archimandrite. I told him. "And you are not married?" he said. I agreed. "That, Gospoditza," and he bowed to me, "is very good – it is the best"; and the pandur smiled a little smile under his moustache. Nikola removed our plates, and appeared with three small trout on a dish. Very excellent trout, fresh from the river, which the Archimandrite shared with me with great relish. But he seemed anxious and had little private housekeeping whispers with Nikola, and produced large keys furtively from his flowing garments. The good man was certain I had not had enough. I assured him I had had plenty; but Nikola returned presently with a small mutton ham, off which he chipped pieces which he offered me. Meanwhile my pandur had removed my knife, fork, and plate. The Archimandrite remedied this by taking his own fork, wiping it on the newspaper and presenting it to me ceremoniously. I accepted it in the spirit in which it was offered and ate as many of the little pieces of meat as I could manage, thereby pleasing my host a good deal more than myself, and the meal was concluded.

It was a dry meal. We now began to wash it down. "Nikola, serve the wine," said his master. Nikola appeared with a bottle of red wine and two small tumblers. The Archimandrite uttered pious wishes for my welfare, we clinked and drank together. I perceived very shortly that politeness did not permit him to take more while there was any left in my glass, and hoped that he was not very thirsty. He, on his part, tried to encourage me by saying that it was excellent wine and not at all strong, and the latter part of the remark fortunately was perfectly true.

When I thought we had nearly done, Nikola again went on a mysterious errand, and returned with two young monks to whom I was introduced. The two younger men were more interested in the outer world than the old one, and I had to work the dictionary hard. Then came more wine, fortunately not much, for we all four had to clink with each other and utter polite wishes, and this occupied time and made a little go a long way. Obedient to the Archimandrite, we raised and emptied our glasses simultaneously with military precision.

Each day of my life seemed stranger than the last, and I wondered how much longer this one was to be, for I had begun it at 4 a.m. When at 9.30 they arose and wished me good-night, I was more grateful to them than for anything they had yet done for me.

Towels, curtains, bed linen, all were pious offerings to the monastery. Each was embroidered with the donor's name and a motto, and the cushions were covered with beings who looked painfully like Cupids but were doubtless Cherubim. But none of these interesting facts did I discover till the next morning, when the monastery bell clanged loudly at four o'clock and woke me up. I struggled with a desire to sleep for several days, but as I had to see the church, draw it, and ride to Rashka, I got up at five and went out into the corridor. All the land was hidden in a dense white mist. The moisture clung clammily to tree and wall, and fell heavily, plap, plap, to the ground, and I shivered in a thin cotton shirt. Nikola appeared almost immediately with coffee and milk and bread, and my pandur with my coat, and, by the time I had breakfasted, the Archimandrite was waiting below to show me the church.

The old man unlocked the door, and he, I, and the pandur went in. We entered a narthex, a late addition to the church which spoils its proportions, and saw before us the original west front of the building, all of pure white marble, and the exquisite doorway – a square-headed door surmounted by a lunette with the figure of the Virgin between two angels in high relief, and framed with the most delicate mouldings upon which the fanciful monsters and arabesques of Byzantine art interlace, and the invention and execution are alike perfect. A small detached pier standing upon the back of a grotesque beast, as in the early churches of the North Italian towns, stood on either side of the door and supported the projecting upper mouldings; but they have both been sadly mutilated, for the Turks occupied the Imperial monastery (Tsarska Lavra) and stabled their horses in its church. To do them justice, however, they did not treat the building more cruelly than our own countrymen treated our own cathedrals, and much of the carving is as clean cut as when Stefan Nemanja raised it, in 1190. The Archimandrite sighed over the mutilations, but was pleased at my delighted appreciation of his church. We passed into the old building, through the little old narthex, into the body of the church. This is entirely frescoed, but the paintings are all newly restored, except those just inside the door, where great figures of weird Byzantine ascetics, the hermit saints – Onofrio, Marcus, Peter Antony, and Alexis – show grimly in the original fresco, and a rude painting of the Last Supper with fragments of some other subjects still cling to the walls. The north and south doors have also been beautiful, but they have suffered more severely than that of the west. Of the windows, one only is intact; the others have been adequately restored. The present dome, a recent and very poor attempt in plaster, is to be shortly replaced. Again the old man bewailed the destruction wrought by the Turks. "And it is your own country that has helped them," he said sadly, and shook his head.

He showed me the treasures of the church, the shrine of St. Simeone (King Stefan Nemanja) and the great silver casket, adorned with reliefs of scenes from the saints life, presented by Alexander Karageorgevich, in which to worthily preserve the sacred relics. He called the pandur to assist him, and together the young soldier and the Archimandrite unfolded with exceeding care the splendid crimson velvet covering for it, a gift from the then reigning king (Alexander Obrenovich), destined to cover the shrine on the saint's day. The Archimandrite looked at it lovingly, the pandur with awe and amazement, and then they tenderly put it away again, while I wondered over the much detested king who had presented it, and the king who had died seven hundred years ago and had wrought so well for his land that he is yet revered in it as a saint. In spite of time and the Turks, the Imperial monastery still preserves many of its old treasures, church vessels and vestments. A magnificent crimson-and-gold one, the Archimandrite told me, undoubtedly belonged to St. Sava, and it may have done so; but a gilt censer, also said to be the saint's, one of the church's precious relics which he looked on with believing eyes, betrays both by design and workmanship that it is of a later date. There was a very old reliquary, also the property of St. Sava, and there were three or four old manuscript books, and all he handled with a simple pride that was pretty to see. The last cupboard that he unlocked was perhaps the most interesting of all to me, for it contained a mass of votive offerings, most of them personal ornaments, splendid specimens of Turkish, Albanian, Bosnian, and Herzegovinian work, things barbaric and beautiful, choice examples of the finest native work, some of it undoubtedly very old. The last of the treasures was locked up again, and we left the treasury.

Then the pandur and the Archimandrite had a little discussion, and the kind old man told me that the ride to Rashka was a long one, that I had better stay until to-morrow, then I should have time to draw the church and to rest. I was his guest, and he begged I would stay. The church should be left open, and I might draw what I pleased. I accepted the more gratefully as the sky threatened rain and it was damp and cold. He instructed the pandur to bring a table and chair into the church, and then I was left to my own devices. The time flew, and when I heard the clink of spurs on the marble floor, and the pandur saluting said, "Are you hungry?" I merely said "No," and went on. When, however, he reappeared in about twenty minutes and repeated his inquiry with an anxious face, I looked at my watch, realised I had been working for four hours, and hastily followed him to the corridor, where the poor Archimandrite was pacing up and down by the table, evidently wanting his dinner badly, and much relieved by my appearance. The forms observed were much the same as on the previous evening, and he talked of the sad state of "our people" in Macedonia and Old Servia, and lamented that the quarrels of great nations should cause the suffering of little ones. "Between your country and Russia we can do nothing. You keep the Turk in Europe." A portrait of Peter the Great hung on the wall. Here, as everywhere else in Servia, I found Russia the Serbs' only hope of salvation.

I spent the afternoon drawing the monastery buildings. It was very still, and the plash of the tiny fountain and the clink of the pandur's spurs as he hovered about me were the only sounds. The air was heavy with lime blossom; now and then a long-haired, black-robed monk glided silently by, and it was all unreal and dream-like. As evening drew on I heard the clicking of the amber beads, and the Archimandrite appeared. "You are always doing something," he said; "you have no rest. They say all the English are like that"; and he instructed Nikola to bring me a glass of slivovitz and a plateful of jam.

Nor did his kindness and courtesy ever cease, and his stately black figure bowing farewell was the last I saw of him as I passed through the monastery gates in the early morning and rode out into the world again with my escort.

This time I made good progress, for the pandur was no slug. I followed him up a torrent bed, over stock and stone, in a pretty straight line to the top of the mountain ridge, where we struck the high road, and after resting the horses an hour, rode easily down into and along the valley of the I bar. The nearer we got to the frontier the more conversational the youth became. He pointed out the ruins of two churches burnt by the Turks, and then cried, "See, here they are!" as a cart full of turbaned men creaked down the road. "Turks!" he said with contempt, "all Turks!" As a turn in the road revealed a hill at the end of the valley crowned with a building, "There is the Turkish fortress," he said, "and the frontier." "That is all Turkish?" I asked, pointing ahead. "It is Old Servia" (Stara Srbija), he replied firmly. I was on the edge of the coveted land, and the cartridges in my companion's belt were meant for those who hold it. Rashka is a tiny village on the very edge. We pulled up at the inn door, and the pandur went off to report me to the authorities. They arrived almost at once, the Nachelnik and the police captain, reinforced by the doctor, who spoke a little French, and a friendly youth who spoke some German. I was dimly aware of questions in three languages, blinked at them helplessly, and said that I was going to sleep. At which they all laughed, wished me good repose, and left me. By the time I had slept off Studenitza and the ride, the pandur had reported that I drew, also that I had been in Montenegro. Consequently, when I reappeared, I had a festive time over my sketch-book with the authorities. Pictures "done by hand" were quite a new idea.

Rashka, a tiny place, was founded in 1846. It is only the fact that it is on the very edge that makes it a place at all. It feels itself very important, and its talk is of Turks, and of Macedonia and of Old Servia. That I must cross the line and be able to say that I had been in Old Servia was taken for granted. It was discussed as seriously as though it was a raid we were about to make. Having the permission of the police and having reported our proposed expedition to the Nachelnik, who saw no objection to it, the doctor and the gentleman-who-spoke-German escorted me through a sentry-guarded gate to a wooden bridge guarded at one end by a Servian and at the other by a Turkish soldier. We explained that we had come to see Someone-Effendi, and were allowed to pass. On this side the river there is nothing but a custom-house, a coffee-shop, and a cottage or two. From the bridge the track winds to Novibazar, which is but three hours distant, and, on the hills above, two fortresses guard it. I could get there and back in a day, and imparted the notion at once to my companions, who were horrified, and thought that the chances of returning were extremely remote. The Servian frontier regards the Turk as hopelessly untrustworthy. It has had, at any rate, plenty of opportunity of judging.

We waited humbly the appearance of Someone-Effendi, quite on our p's and q's. The enemy soon appeared, rather grubby, in a tarboosh and a scrubby European overcoat. My presence was explained. We were all very polite to one another. I was irresistibly reminded of the meeting of two dogs who approach each other growling from opposite sides of the road, decide not to bite, wag stiff tails and pretend to be glad to see one another, while their bristles stand up on their backs. Chairs were brought, we were asked to sit down, and the inevitable black coffee appeared. Then I was told that as I was in Turkey I must see the coffee-shop, and we adjourned thither.

The owner of it, a burly handsome fellow with a yellow moustache and eyes as blue as an Anglo-Saxon's, sprawled, picturesque in black-and-white striped costume, on the bench in the balcony. He was friendly, and we had more coffee and some sticky sweet stuff, while he smoked cigarettes in a holder the mouthpiece of which was a fine lump of amber and the stem black wood and silver filigree. "He is a Turk," said my companions. "He doesn't look like one," said I; for every Mohammedan calls himself a "Turk," and this one was like a fair Albanian. They repeated my remark to him, upon which he laughed and said that he did not speak Turkish. He wore a very handsome silver chain round his neck, and that and the cigarette-holder attracted my attention. "Those are from Skodra," I said. He beamed. "You know Skodra!" And he vowed gleefully that of all cities in the world Skodra was the finest, and appealed to me to support him. My companions were incredulous, they had never been there. The statement that I had been there twice satisfied him, and he smiled at me frankly, for now we knew that we had the same tastes. "You have seen the bazaar?" I nodded. "Oh, that is fine, very fine," he said. The bazaar would indeed have been a suitable background for him; I could imagine him cheerily filling up the gaps in his cartridge belt, and even more cheerily fighting on the Turkish side against all and any who should wish to force Western ideas into that and other happy hunting grounds.

Drinks differ in all lands, but everywhere it is correct to offer and accept too much of them; so we drank an inordinate quantity of coffee, said farewell to the Effendi, and were soon safely off the premises and in our own territory.

The captain took me a walk along the Servian frontier by the rivers side, a rich and beautiful land ablaze with a wonderful variety of wild flowers; only the two Turkish fortresses kept in mind the fact that the green land across the narrow stream was one of the sorest spots in Europe. The captain's tale of a boy who had been shot not long before by the Turks was concluded as we came in sight of the last fort, and we turned back. I think we went about three miles and took an hour over it; but the captain was very warm, and all his friends agreed that the English walked at an alarming pace.

By request, I made a drawing. It was of the frontier, the Turkish custom-house, and the fort-capped hill. It was supposed that it would annoy the Turks greatly if they knew, but they didn't. "And where," I asked, "are your forts? I have only seen Turkish ones." "Oh," was the cheerful answer, "forts are for defence – we are only going forward!"

Rashka was very hospitable. It gave me coffee; it gave me wine, beer, jam, water, eggs and bacon; it entertained me to the best of its ability. I was sorry to leave it, but time pressed. The diligence said it would start at 5 a.m., but did not do so till 6; I hung about waiting. It was a perfect morning; the mountains were blue on a pale lemon sky, and the grass was hoary with dew. "What a beautiful day!" I said to a man who was standing by the inn door. "No," he said gloomily; "to-day is Kosovo Day. That was a bad day for us." It was June 15 (O.S.). In the churches throughout the country there were solemn services in memory of the defeat in 1389, and there in front of us was Stara Srbija across the river.

The diligence proved to be a springless cart with a basket-work top, and as the horses were poor and the roads bad, we were eleven and a half hours upon that road, instead of eight, as I had been promised. It was dark when at last the crazy vehicle jogged painfully into Kraljevo.

Kraljevo ("The Town of the Kings") did not receive me amiably. I crawled into the hotel stiff and sore, was awaiting soup, and had just sent off my letter of introduction, when a severe personage in black arose from a little table at the other end of the room and made straight for me. Striking his hand heavily on the table to compel my attention, he said very loudly, "You have come from Rashka?" He spoke Servian, and did not even stop to inquire if I understood it. Having a clear conscience and an introduction to one of the leading men of the town, I returned his stare and said "Yes." "You will leave here to-morrow morning," he asserted. "No," said I firmly. We paused for a moment. "Have you a passport?" he asked. "Yes," said I. "Show it me at once." "It is a very good passport," I remarked, spreading it on the table; "it is English." I watched with some amusement his vain and elaborate pretence of deciphering it. Then he said, "When are you going?" "I don't know," said I. He chose to imagine that this meant I did not understand, so he shouted the question at me again very aggressively. As I meant him to know that it was no use chivying the English, I said, "Perhaps Monday, perhaps Tuesday, I do not know." "You will leave to-morrow early," he said. I reflected that if I did not stand to my guns the next British subject would have a bad time; so I said firmly, "I will not. I am English, and that passport is good." He looked at it again, reflected that, if it were good, things might become awkward, threw it down, and left abruptly. "Good-night," said I, but he did not respond.

Shortly afterwards the two gentlemen to whom I had been recommended came on the scene. They were so anxious to help me in every way that I did not betray the fact that I had already had a skirmish. But the landlord did. Next day I learned that my aggressor was the Nachelnik (burgomaster) himself, and that my new friends were extremely angry with him. He was introduced to me and told by whom I was recommended. He looked at me suspiciously, shook hands in a guarded manner, and spied furtively at my sketch-book, which was lying open on the table. I immediately offered it him for inspection, but it did not reassure him at all. Greatly to my surprise, however, he volunteered to take me for a drive in the afternoon. As I was quite used to being suspected, I only thought the episode funny; but my two acquaintances were so much upset about it that I was sorry they had been told.

Kraljevo still figures on most of the maps as Karanovatz, and has only recently been re-named. Zhitza, the monastery church where the kings of the Nemanja line were crowned, is once again Servias coronation-place. A melancholy monument of former greatness, it stands upon rising ground about a mile and a half from the town, and a long straight avenue, fit background for a royal procession, leads up to it. The church itself, built in 1210 by St. Sava, still stands. Here he crowned his eldest brother and announced him as Prvovenchani, the "First Crowned." Of the monastery founded some years later by the said Stefan nothing now exists but a few rocky masses of wall. The Turks wrecked the royal building, the richest monastery in Servia, and left the church in ruins.

The church is Byzantine in character, with a large cupola and two smaller ones (all three restorations), and a round apse. It is barrel-vaulted, and has two tiny chapels. The walls are still covered with old frescoes, for fortunately the monastery is too poor to afford re-decorating. It has been frescoed twice. The upper layer, which shows strong Italian influence and might indeed be by an Italian hand, dates from the sixteenth century – an interesting fact, as it shows that though under Turkish rule, the monastery must then have still been fairly rich. The lower layer, which is visible where the upper is broken away, I believe to be contemporaneous with the church, but could get no information at all about it. Half the building has been restored and roofed. The other end is entirely in ruins; its tall tower only is well preserved.