THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS THE FUTURE of THE SOUTHERN SLAVS BY A. H. E. TAYLOR NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1917 {All rights reserved) PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN D PREFACE In the summer of 1915 it was suggested to me that an article contributed by me to the British Review on the Benascence of Serbia might be expanded into a volume on the subject. When eventually I acted on this suggestion, instead of expanding the article in question I thought it better altogether to enlarge the scope of what I had written into a volume on the future of the Southern Slavs rather than to confine myself to the more limited design and to the past. Some paragraphs of Chapter I, and a portion of Chapter III section II, appeared in the British Review for April 1915, and the greater part of the second section of Chapter VI dealing with the Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty of 1912 appeared in the same Keview for September 1915 ; the latter article in its original form was also reprinted by request in Mr. Crawford Price's book Light on the Balkan Darkness. With these shght exceptions the matter of this volume is entirely new. It has frequently been said in connection with proposed reconstructions of the map of Europe that you should not divide the bear's skin until you have killed the bear, and in some quarters all such proposals are consequently deprecated. In spite of the finality with which some people regard a proverb as being invested there are very good reasons why, so far as South-Eastern Europe is concerned, the supposed application of this particular proverb should be disregarded. It is, for instance, advisable if you are out hunting to know what sort of animal you are after ; if it is a bear that you are hunting it is not wise to arm yourself with a shot-gun. In this case, moreover, 8 PREFACE part of the bear's skin has been promised already by those in authority, so that the question has been opened up. More especially is such discussion not only advisable but even necessary in regard to the Balkans. Hitherto the attitude of the general public towards Balkan problems has been one of indifference tempered with annoyance at certain small nations whose affairs are continually threatening to set other people by the ears, while the attitude of our Foreign Office, if not actuated always by indifference, though indifference has largely been present, has constantly been based upon a misapprehension of the problems at issue. Our Balkan policy, if it deserves the name at all, has been carried on from hand to mouth and has usually at any given moment sought the line of least resistance regardless of the ultimate results. Even if popular opinion is to have less say on the subject of the terms of peace than is sometimes claimed for it, and if those terms are to be framed by those whose conduct of the Eastern Question has been so remiss, yet it is probable that the public will have much more influence than it has possessed in similar circumstances in the past. All classes of the community have suffered grievous losses in the war, and it is natural that they should demand that the settlement should be thorough and as permanent as possible. Unfortunately the mass even of educated people is but ill-informed of the real issues in the Balkans ; the problem has not been studied in the past, and consequently, so far as the general public is concerned, there is no clear idea of the aims to be pursued in the future settlement. Particularly is this true of the Southern Slav question whose solution for many is contained in the phrase " compensations for Serbia ". To the general indifference there has been one exception which is furnished by Bulgaria. Bulgaria has been regarded as almost the sole important factor in the Balkans, her well-advertised claims are known, and the ceaseless reiteration of them has in many people wrought the conviction that they must be well founded. While this result has been largely due to PREFACE 9 the skilful Bulgarian propaganda, it has also its origin in the circumstances under which Bulgaria gained her independence with the upshot that she, the Balkan Prussia, has taken a place in the hearts of some English- men which is really quite unique, and which furnishes a not inapt commentary on the concluding phrase, at any rate, of Bishop Creighton's remark when told that some- thing would go straight to the heart of the English people: "A very nasty place to go to, the last resting- place I should like to be found in — a sloppy sort of place, I take it ". My object, then, has been to attempt to set forth the main features of the Southern Slav problem as they exist to-day, and the solution at which we should aim. Of necessity, in discussing territorial questions I have assumed such a complete victory for the Allies as will result in the dismemberment of Austria. However unlikely such a victory may seem in view of the past mishandling of our resources, the want of grip and energy of our rulers, and the bungling ineptitude which seemed intended to prove the truth of the saying that a democracy can neither keep peace nor make war, it is the only possible basis for such a study as this. If the Central Powers win outright the peace will be dictated by them on their own terms, while, if the victory of either side be less complete, as the extent of such victory cannot be foreseen, so no discussion is possible of the resultant terms of peace, which will vary with the nature of the victory. The hypothesis adopted enables us at any rate to examine what is the ideal settle- ment which should be aimed at in proportion to the success which may attend our arms and our consequent ability to enforce our views. Since the close of the Napoleonic wars there has been no such opportunity for a national readjust- ment of European relations, and if the opportunity be lost now it may never recur, and in any case can only recur at the same hideous cost. A partial settlement will leave a chronic state of unrest in the Balkans, and this fact must be realized ^by the British public if its influence is to be 10 PREFACE used aright. No war weariness should induce us to relax our striving for an out-and-out victory, coute-que-coute, and not the least of the benefits to be attained will be found in the settlement of the Southern Slav question for, as I have endeavoured to indicate, it is in a real sense our affair also. The difficulty of writing such a book under present condi- tions has been greater than will be realized by those who have not essayed a similar task. Some topics have perforce been avoided altogether, others barely indicated, and this quite irrespective of their importance. I wish to offer my thanks to those to whom I am in various ways indebted. The publication of this book has been delayed for various reasons, and while the foreign matter has been brought up to date, the references to the English Government are to the administrations of Mr. Asquith. The circumstance*? attending the formation of Mr. Lloyd George's administration, the arguments ad- duced for the change, and, I think, the results already attained, afford an amply sufficient justification for the strictures on its immediate predecessors which may be found in these pages. I have used the Serbo-Croat names of the Dalmatian towns and islands, as the use of Italian names has proved a fertile cause of misapprehension as to the real nationality of their inhabitants. Moreover, this usage is in accordance with the growing practice of making use of the correct native names of places save where long familiarity and custom have resulted in a genuine English form which it would be pedantic to disregard. Serbo-Croat names have been spelt in accordance with the " Croatian orthography ". The Orthodox Serbs use the Cyrillic alphabet which is phonetic, the Croats use the Latin alphabet modified in order to render the sounds of the language and to represent the more numerous letters of the CyrilHc. Thus c (which in pronunciation is either k or s) is rejected and made use of as an arbitrary symbol, while the sound of other letters is modified by various diacritic marks. It is a pity that the PREFACE 11 Croatin orthography is not more extensively used, as its adoption would avoid a great deal of unnecessary confusion. The name of General Zivkovic, for example, I have seen spelt in at least six different ways (Jivkovitch, Givkovich, Zhivkovics, etc.), and similar cases sometimes leave one in doubt as to who or what is intended. The Croatian script is not an artificial "system" of transliteration, but the script in use for the common language by that part of the race which employs the Latin alphabet. Moreover, like the modern Cyrillic alphabet, it is the result of a scientific reform, the work of Serbo-Croat philologists of the early nineteenth century. There is consequently no need to supersede it by any " system " or attempt to render words phonetically, the latter in any case impossible, as the English letter-signs vary in value. I append a Table of the necessary letters. c = ts in sound j = y d = ch Ij = liquid gl c = tch nj = liquid gn B=sh r has a vowel sound, e.g., Srb. z = French j Lj is sometimes written (presumably in order that one Cyrillic symbol may be represented by one Latin symbol) 1; nj, n; and dj or gj, d: dz corresponds to a single Cyrillic character. The following list of Serbo-Croat place-names with their equivalents may be of use : — Bar, Antivari Lopud, Mezzo Brae, Brazza Losinj, Lussin Cres, Cherso Mljet or Mlet, Meleda Dubrovnik, Bagusa Rijeka or Rieka, Fiume Gruz, Gravosa Sibenik, Sebenico Hvar, Lesina Sipan, Giuppana Korcula, Curzola Spljet or Splet or Split, Spalato Kotor, Cattaro Susac, Cazza Kranjska, Carniola Trogir, Trau Krk, Veglia Vis, Lissa Lastovo, Lagosta Zadar, Zara Ljubljana, Laibach Zagreb, Agram CONTENTS PAGB PREFACE . 7 CHAPTER I A PLEA FOR SERBIA . . . . .15 CHAPTER II A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY— I. THE RISE OF SERBIA : HISTORY OP SERBIA TILL THE DEATH OP STEPHEN DuSaN . . .28 II. THE SUBMERGENCE OF SERBIA : PROM THE DEATH OF DUSAN TILL 1804 — THE HUNGARIAN SERBS . 51 III. THE RESURGENCE OP SERBIA : 1804-1908 . . 64 CHAPTER III THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA— I. EFFECTS OP THE AUSTRIAN OCCUPATION OP BOSNIA — AUSTRIA AND THE SOUTHERN SLAVS . . 80 II. THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA : 1908-1914 . . 94 CHAPTER IV THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC— I. GENERAL OUTLINE OF THE PROBLEM . . . 105 II. GEOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL CLAIMS OP ITALY TO DALMATIA — CHARACTER OF THE VENETIAN RULE ...... 120 III. THE ETHNOGRAPHY OP DALMATIA IN THE PAST AND PRESENT ...... 128 IV. ITALIAN STRATEGIC CLAIMS . . . .136 V. WHAT ITALY CAN RIGHTLY CLAIM . . .150 VI. THE DALMATIAN AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE ENTENTE AND ITALY ...... 161 14 CONTENTS CHAPTER V PAOB PROPOSED FRONTIERS . . . . -169 CHAPTER VI MACEDONIA: THE SERBO-BULGARIAN TREATY OF 1912— I. HISTORY AND ETHNOGBAPHY OF MACEDONIA . . 200 II. THE TREATY OF 1912 ..... 209 CHAPTER VII THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA . . .221 CHAPTER VIII THE FUTURE SOUTHERN SLAV STATE— I. AREA AND POPULATION ..... 249 II. FUTURE RELATIONSHIP TO EACH OTHER OF THE DIFFERENT PROVINCES .... 255 CHAPTER IX SOME PROBLEMS OF THE NEW STATE . . 269 CHAPTER X THE EUROPEAN IMPORTANCE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS . . . . . .304 INDEX . . . , . . . .321 MAP ...... Facing page 320 The Future of the Southern Slavs CHAPTER I A PLEA FOR SERBIA It might seem at first sight unnecessary to commence a volume dealing with our Balkan ally and the Southern Slavs with a plea for Serbia, whose enormous sacrifices in the common cause and indomitable valour entitle her to the fullest possible measure of gratitude from her allies. Unfortunately, however, such a plea is by no means superfluous, but forms a very necessary prelude to the study of the pressing problems that attend the future of the Southern Slavs, in view of the influences which are still working in England to their prejudice, and, looking upon them as mere pawns in the game, do not hesitate to urge that they should be sacrificed to the desires of their enemies, though it is true that the qualities of the Serb race, its progress, especially in military matters, and its prospects for the future, have won a recognition that in the past has been wanting, recognition even better founded in the history of Serbia during the last few years than is yet generally known. It is twenty years ago since the author first offered a plea for Serbia,^ and in those days and for long afterwards that plea stood almost alone, for a few quotations will show that anti-Serb feeling has its roots in days long before the assassination of Alexander and * A Plea for Serbia, " the Piedmont of the Balkans ". Westmimter Review, July 1897. This article is disfigured by the anti-Russian prejudice common at the time which, with fuller knowledge, I abjured soon after. 16 16 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Draga. In that article I wrote, "Of all the recently emancipated communities in the Balkans the most interest- ing, both from its past history and its probable future, is probably Serbia. It is undoubtedly that which, to all appearance, and if it plays its cards well, has the most brilliant future before it ; for it will benefit not only by the break-up of the Turkish Empire in Europe, but also by the disappearance, in its present form, of another State — the Austrian". In that same year appeared Travels and Politics in the Near East, by that able and impartial authority Mr. WiUiam Miller, and it is interesting to note how widely different was his opinion. He gave it as his idea that the "dream of a great Serb Empire" was "un- practical ". ^ Speaking of the Prince of Montenegro's play. The Empress of the Balkans, he remarked : " Into this drama the Prince has put those grand ideas which every Serb imbibes with his motheji's milk and cherishes dearly, however unpractical he may admit them to be in his calmer moments. The restoration of the old Servian Empire, which rose with DuSan and fell, I believe, for ever, on the fatal field of Kosovo five centuries ago, is one of the Prince's daydreams ".- Of the occupation of Bosnia by Austria he said: "The monarchy possesses resources, alike in men and money, which no independent Balkan State, no fantastic Servian Empire, could produce ". 3 " The notion of a great Servian Empire, of which Bosnia and the Hercegovina would form a part, or parts, is one of those fantastic daydreams which are repugnant alike to the teachings of Balkan history and the dictates of common sense ".4 The use of the word "Empire" introduces a certain ambiguity into these judgments, but the general sense of the context and of v/hat is generally meant by a Serb "empire" seems to include in his condemnation not only the idea of an empire, but of a greater Serbia confined to the Serb race, yet time has shown that these daydreams are, on the supposition of a victory for the Allies, on the eve of fulfilment. ' Op. cit. p. 33. ' Ibid. p. 47. ^ Jbid. p. 119. ■♦ Ibid. p. 128. A PLEA FOR SERBIA 17 Mr. Miller, however, wrote with gravity and a real sympathy, and his conclusions were reluctant ; far other- wise was it with the generality of writers. " Milan's miserable nation of pig-drivers" was the expression of a weekly illustrated paper which affected, and affects, an interest in foreign politics. The same paper accused the Serbs in 1885 of having as little stomach for the fighting as they had in 1876 — the accusation of cowardice against this warlike and brave people has been a common one. On this latter point a leading Conservative paper in the mid nineties remarked that, having " little prestige to lose ", there existed in Serbia an " absence of the stimulus of pride in past prowess ". The same paper advocated about the same time the partition of Serbia between Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria. When the reform scheme for Macedonia was promulgated about eleven years ago, Old Serbia ^ was expressly excluded from its scope, the Serbs there being left to the mercy of Albanians. Mr. Brailsford, in his book Macedonia, remarked : " Servia is not exactly a credit to civilization, and one cannot say that her political extinction would be a serious loss to Europe ",* a strange dictum from a Liberal and an adherent, in some cases a vehement adherent, of the principle of nationality. During the annexation crisis of 1908-9 the Saturday Bevieio described the Serbs as " this rascal nation " ; while at the time when, during the Balkan War, the question of a Serb outlet to the Adriatic was under discussion, Mr. Nevinson, another Liberal and nationalist, wrote con- temptuously in the Daily Chronicle that doubtless a railway could be built to Porto Medua good enough to carry pigs. Mr, de Windt renewed the charge of cowardice: "As General B remarked, ' Every Servian is a soldier and ' The term " Old Serbia " (Stara Srbija) is used throughout in its historic sense as denoting the territory roughly corresponding to the former Turkish vilayet of Kosovo with the Sanjak of Novipazar. Sinca the Balkan War, it is sometimes applied to the kingdom as existing from 1878 to 1912, the recent gains being designated " New Serbia ". This practice is needlessly confusing. ' Macedonia, p. 319. 2 18 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS every soldier a chauvinist*, and this is probably true — until war is declared. Then, as events have proved (at any rate during the past thirty years), the warlike ardour of the Servian perceptibly diminishes in proportion to the gradual approach of his foe " ! ^ Two days before war was declared the Manchester Guardian remarked : " If it were physically possible for Serbia to be towed out to sea and sunk there, the air of Europe would at once seem cleaner", a statement which provoked the comment that evidently that paper's version of Mr. Lloyd George's famous apostrophe, put in the mouth of Russia, would have been, " You dare to lay hands on that little fellow ! Then I will take him out to sea and drown him ". To recall these dicta would be a task both thankless and harmful were it not that in many quarters the old prejudice remains and finds frequent expression, not always direct, with results that may prove extremely harmful to Serbia when the day of settlement arrives, as it has already done more to poison the relations between England and Serbia than the general public, which can judge only by official expressions of opinion, has any idea of. The lack of sympathy with which Serbia has been treated throughout the war by our Government, and by a large section of our publicists, is brought out in the history of the negotiations which were carried on in the summer of 1915 with Bulgaria, and in the articles which appeared at the time in the daily and periodical Press. The recital of the course of these negotiations will show the scant regard in which the interests of Serbia were held and the altogether exaggerated tenderness paid to the exacting demands, themselves not put forward bona fide, of her eastern neighbour. No doubt the part which diplomacy had to play was extremely difficult and its motives were innocuous, but neither the difficulty of the case nor the purity of motive offers adequate excuse for the manner in which our ally was treated and her interests made subservient to the behests of Bulgaria. Although the story is an old one, a brief recapitulation will serve to " Through Savage Europe, pp. 194, 195. Popular Edition. A PLEA FOR SERBIA 19 indicate the errors of our past dealings with Serbia, and the nature of the course which we should avoid steering in the future. I mention only such affairs as were known at the time. From the commencement of the war Bulgaria adopted an attitude of dubious neutrality which indicated clearly the ultimate trend of Bulgarian policy, and when in November 1914 it seemed likely that the Austrian invasion would prove successful the mask was thrown off and so- called " bands " cut the vital artery of the Salonica railway at the very moment when the much-needed munitions were being forwarded to the army, and for some days Serbia in consequence stood in deadly peril. There followed in January 191.5 the conclusion of a loan with Germany, or rather the payment by Germany of an instalment of a loan concluded before the commencement of the war. It was explained that the matter had no political significance and entailed no political obligations. It was obvious that Germany had no money to lend to neutrals without a quid pro quo, and above all that she was unhkely to export any gold in view of the efforts being made at home to gather the metal into the coffers of the Reichsbank ; yet the explanation was accepted. In the spring of 1915 took place the negotiations with Turkey with reference to the strip of territory on the right bank of the Marica through which runs the railway from Bulgaria to Dedeaga6. In the negotiations with Turkey in 1913 Bulgaria had stood out for the whole of the Hne but had been forced to give way, a result which constituted a legitimate grievance. The final upshot of the negotiations of last year was that Turkey conceded the necessary area, some thousand square miles in extent. Again the explanation was given out from Sofia that the matter was purely commercial and of no political importance, and that it did not bind her future action in any way. Nothing could be more unlikely than that such a cession of territory should have been made without political obligation ; the cession obviously was 20 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the outcome of a pledge for the future, otherwise all motive on the part of Turkey would be lacking. It would be difficult in any case to exceed the cynicism of the Bulgarian explanation even if the latter were taken at its face value. Possibly this very cynicism lent it credence, as being prima facie characteristic, at any rate Bulgaria's friends asked us to accept it as being correct, and appa- rently believed in it themselves. Finally came the mobilization of the Bulgarian Army on September 19, which followed the offer on September 1 of great con- cessions by Serbia. This mobilization could have only one meaning. There was a wide advertisement of a forth- coming Austro-German attack on Serbia, and an ominous significance attached to the fact that the final offer of concessions had been followed by silence on the part of King Ferdinand's government on that point while the possibility of a war with Serbia was more and more openly canvassed. A last exhibition of duplicity was given when Professor Stephanov came to England and gave what he called a message from M. Kadoslavov to the English people,^ breathing nothing but goodwill and expressions of devotion. This, we were assured by her friends, represented the real sentiment of Bulgaria, and all would yet be well. Their eyes were shut to the evidence of double dealing, and they continued to urge upon the country the policy of sacrificing our friends to our foes. Beyond this the extreme Bulgarophils in England proceeded at every turn to dot the i's and cross the t's of our diplomacy in their own sense and in a manner that was most injurious to our interests. The result was a general impression of feebleness on our part. We seemed to be going cap in hand to Bulgaria, as though success or failure in the war were dependent upon the line which she might choose to adopt, we were told continually that Bulgaria held the key to the Balkan position and that she must be made the pivot of our Balkan policy. Our natural ' Vide interview in the Morning Post, September 28, 1916. A PLEA FOR SERBIA 21 friends became more and more bewildered and uneasy, and less and less inclined to throw in their lot with a side which seemed to care less for the interests of its friends than of its enemies, till at length we reaped the results which usually attend the conduct that sacrifices friends in order to placate enemies. In England a vigorous Press campaign was waged, and it was even seriously suggested that Russia should "coerce" Serbia, while the other Powers should threaten Greece with blockade, with a view to landing troops in Salonica to occupy Macedonia/or Bulgaria ! The whole treatment of our ally savoured of inequality. National rights which in Dalmatia had been disregarded to the detriment of the Southern Slavs became a sine qud non when it was alleged that they favoured Bulgaria ; the strategic claims which elsewhere had weighed down the balance against Serbia became a feather-weight when urged on her behalf, and while the Entente set itself to realize Bulgarian unity it would not, and in view of its previous engagements to Italy could not, guarantee the unity of the Serbo-Croats. The concessions agreed to by Serbia went to the utmost limit of what it was reasonable to ask, and beyond: she abandoned the Salonica railway, placed another customs barrier between herself and the ^gean, surrendered Bitolj (Monastir), the terminus of another line to Salonica, while the reservation of Ochrida maintained contact with Greece in a purely formal manner, for a line to Salonica thence would perforce pass through Bitolj, though in the future a very roundabout way might be made through Korica and Castoria. With the exception of Ochrida and Prilip it was a return to 1912, in spite of all that had passed since then — the treacherous attack of her former ally, the blood shed in the second Balkan war, and the attitude of her foe during the present war. She gave far more than had seemed at all likely. I well remember the answer of a Serb publicist to a query of mine with reference to a possible surrender of the Monastir region : " Yes — after another Kosovo". Even so Bulgaria was not satisfied — nor were her friends in England. 22 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS The unwillingness to face facts, the blind adherence to the Bulgarian legend, were maintained to the very end. It was not unnatural that Sir Edwin Pears, with his close and honourable connection with the very rebirth of the Bulgarian people should be willing, so late as October 8, apparently to accept assurances given to him from Bulgaria that no ministry could last a week, which proposed war with Russia or opposition to England, and that nothing would ever induce the Bulgarians to fight on the side of Turkey, and to plead that Bulgaria should be given another chance,^ but others had not the same excuse. Even after the Russian ultimatum the Daily Netvs on October 6 remarked, " We should like to think that the offer of the Entente Powers was still valid." Speaking two days later, Mr. C. R. Buxton said that he was not convinced that Bulgaria was going to war, and that he failed to find certain evidence, although to any one not wilfully self-blinded then at least the matter was clear to probation. Mr. H. M. Wallis, in a letter to The Times written on October 5, thought that the Bulgarian nation stood ''in a light calling for our deep commiseration and forbearance". He added that in a popular song which he had received from Sofia, it was " the Greek and the Serb who are held up to execra- tion. And with some reason". Two days before the news arrived of the Bulgarian attack, on October 9, the Nation still thought that there was a possibility that the German of&cers in Bulgaria were only on their way to Turkey, or existed only in the heated imagination of a hostile Balkan witness. It urged even greater concessions ; " the offer might very easily be improved. It is worth while making a good offer, a high bid not merely for active support, but for a benevolent neutrality ".^ Yet, as has been seen, the offer was already as high as could be expected — Bulgaria's legitimate ' Letter to the Nation of October 9. • It is only fair to state that the Nation gave an admirable example of impartiality by admitting to its columns lengthy letters whose con- tents would certainly not have received editorial endorsement, and this at a time when it was not easy to obtain a hearing for Serbia's case elsewhere. A PLEA FOR SERBIA 23 claims had been more than met. Even the outbreak of war was followed by a final appeal from Messrs. C. R. and N. Buxton, which caused renewed hesitations in neutral Balkan quarters. The net result was to create the impres- sion, as indeed it showed the reality, of excessive weakness on the part of our Foreign Office, and an inability to grasp the essential facts of the situation. The warnings which we had received from Serbia fell on deaf ears and met with no response. As early as April our Foreign Office was informed that Bulgaria had come to an understanding with the Central Powers, but nothing was done to avert the danger that thus presented itself. On July 7 the Minister of Serbia in London suggested the the sending of British troops to Serbia, but the military authorities replied that we had no troops to send, being then engaged in a further extension of the disastrous Dardanelles expedition, which could only be carried on at all so long as Serbia remained unsubdued. It was in truth one of the most crucial points of the war, and the neglect of Serb advice and interest has entailed vast responsibilities and diiSculties on the Allies. Following on the Bulgarian mobilization of September 19 Sir Edward Grey " was pressed " on September 27 for his opinion on the Serb proposal to strike at Bulgaria while that Power was in the midst of mobilization — a contingency which forms the nightmare of every general staff — and gave a reply which could only be construed as a refusal. It was Serbia's last chance, hazardous indeed, but the only course which in the absence of allied aid ^ promised any prospect of success, but it was denied to her and she was left alone to bear the double attack made upon her when her ad- versaries had completed all their preparations methodically and without let or hindrance. To the very end our Government had yielded itself to the Bulgar obsession which has marked our dealings with « On September 24 an offer was made to Greece to send troops to Salonica in order to aid her in the fulfilment of her treaty obligations. They began to land on October 5. 24 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the Balkans ever since 1878, an obsession which nothing that Bulgaria could do or leave undone v^as able to shake. Everything was looked upon from the standpoint of Bulgaria, her claims were always just, her opponents always in the wrong, nor was any penalty ever to be exacted from her however often she might bite the hand that had fed her. For thirty years she has been the spoilt child of Europe immune from the criticism and the exigencies which are the lot of other States. The excuse made for our diplomacy in the spring and summer of 1915 that its aim was to restore the Balkan League, means in effect that our Foreign Office had set itself to a task which was foredoomed to failure and which it was unable to recognize as based upon an utter ignorance of realities ; it was the hegemony of the Balkans which Bulgaria desired and not an accord based on mutual rights. M. Rizov has stated ^ that a governing motive was to prevent Serbo-Croat union and the formation of a Southern Slav State which would be more powerful than Bulgaria. People and ruler were at one, the Bulgarians have always docilely followed the lead of King Ferdinand, and in the absence of any serious movement of dissent must be held to have endorsed his policy. "When the last two Obrenovic sovereigns of Serbia pursued an anti-national policy Serbia was in a continual ferment, as all the world was made aware, and when finally no other way of escape from ruin offered itself the issue was the tragedy of 1903. No such exhibitions of opposition to the policy of King Ferdinand have ever manifested themselves among the Bulgarians, and the attempt to dissociate the people from their ruler fails. It is difficult to sum up this political desertion in any other terms but as the betrayal of Serbia, and whatever may be the outcome a terrible responsibility lies upon our Government for all the misery that has ensued to that unhappy country, the devastation of her towns and ' Vide report of an interview given by M. Kizov, Minister in Berlin, to a German paper, in Westminster Gazette of November 17. A PLEA FOR SERBIA 25 villages, the losses of her Army, the hideous sufferings of her people, the death of thousands of women and children, the exile of her aged and heroic King. For the blood of these martyred women and children whose bodies littered the via dolorosa to the Adriatic our Govern- ment stands largely answerable at the bar of history and to the Serb race. Even the (promise of aid given by our Foreign Minister in the House of Commons on September 28 was subsequently explained away as being a promise to Greece to help her to keep her treaty obligations ! In more senses than one we owe an immense debt to the valiant and sorely tried Serbs, and a plea on their behalf is not out of place as a prelude to the study of Serbia's future. That country has suffered much from the nature of the news diligently disseminated throughout Europe by Austro- Hungarian agencies. No tale was too disgraceful nor too unlikely for use as a means of prejudicing western European opinion. Rumours of plots that had no existence, of un- speakable infamies concocted by the ingenious brains of the Ballplatz, of unrest and disorder, were spread abroad in the justified anticipation that if enough mud were thrown some would be sure to stick. The result has been that perhaps no people in the world has been more misrepresented and misunderstood than the Serbs. Its strong spirit of national feeling became mere turbulence, its justifiable hopes lawless ambitions against the consecrated status quo, its impatience of misrule a sign of its anarchical proclivities. No English journalist was resident in Serbia, and all news came through tainted sources. One example will suffice here. When King Alexander was killed all the world was told that his body had been hacked about and thrown out of the window into the garden beneath, where it was left to lie all night, yet I have been informed that there is no word of truth in these details. My informant was the son of one of King Alexander's Prime Ministers, and his own authority was the personal testimony given to him by the king's physician. " It was all an Austrian lie " was the sense if not the actual words of my informant's summing up. Not long ago a 26 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS cultured gentleman of my acquaintance remarked that it would be well if the Balkans were put under the sea for twenty-four hours, and that he regarded the Serbs as little better than their own swine. The prejudice showed itself even in details — not until three or four years ago would writers acknowledge that after all perhaps the Serbs knew their own language best and that DuSan did not mean " the strangler". EngHsh ignorance of the Serbs was profound.^ On the occasion of an address by Father Nicholas Velimir- ovic a lady came up to him after he had concluded and asked hjm, in the writer's presence, in what language he would have spoken if he had spoken in his native tongue ! He replied with politeness and gravity that he would have spoken in Serb, which was a Slav language with a general affinity to Russian for example. The question interested others, for almost immediately a gentleman approached to say that he and his friends had been interested in his ability to speak English and would like to know what was his native tongue ; had the Serbs a " language of their own " ? A second polite explanation was followed not long after by the approach of a third enquirer who had evidently a little dangerous knowledge of the ethnological perplexities of the Danubian regions. He asked whether the native language of the Serbs were not Cech ! Prejudice and ignorance form a powerful combination, and it is evident that, to a great extent, neither has been dispelled even yet. Unless, however, we are to make, or allow our rulers to make, great and lamentable mistakes at ' So well-known a publicist and eminent colonial governor as Sir Harry Johnston has suggested the cession of the Hercegovina to Serbia as the solution of the Southern Slav question I Such an idea from such a source gives the measure of the profound ignorance of the very elements of the Southern Slav problem which exists in the most " well- informed " quarters. " Eeasonable compensation to Serbia and Monte- negro would take the form of the cession to Serbia of Herzegovina, to Montenegro of Cattaro, and to Serbia and Montenegro of the right to deal as they pleased with all Albania with the exception of the circum- scription of Valona and Epirus". — Germavy, Africa, and the Terms of Peace. Nineteenth Century Beview, April 1915, p. 765. Serbia and the Hercegovina are not coterminous 1 A PLEA FOR SERBIA 27 the end of the war it is essential not only that prejudice should be dissipated but ignorance dispelled. It is likely enough, and in view of the sorry record of our diplomatists reasonable enough, that the general body of public opinion will demand a much larger voice in the settling of the terms of peace than has been the case in the past, and if that public opinion is not itself to be misled and misleading it is necessary that the English people should possess not only a working knowledge of the historical past of the Serbs, but a clear appreciation of the nature and extent of the problems with which they are faced in the present. A boggled and patched-up peace in the Near East, born of shear weariness and distaste will be the sure precursor of fresh wars, and will even afford our present enemies opportunities of which none know better how to avail themselves. CHAPTER II A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY I The Rise of Serbia A SHORT sketch of the history of the Serbs will serve the purpose, which is all that is attempted here, of setting out recent events and their outcome in something of their historical setting, the aim being rather to illustrate the forces at work than to give a full account of events which in so short a compass would be impossible, and if attempted useless. "We are accustomed to speak of the Balkan peoples as young nations, and the phrase is, of course, abundantly justified if we regard the present scale of their culture and the stage which they have attained in political growth. It has to be remembered at the same time that in another sense they are by no means young nations. They had reached and passed their early zenith before Prussia had come into existence, and in the Middle Ages they were the legitimate heirs of, and sharers in, the culture of Byzantium. It has been their tragedy that just when they seemed on the point of entering on the course of development which marked the fifteenth century — and this applies in a very real degree to the Serbs — they came under the curse of the Turkish blight. It was not so much that the current of their development was changed, or even forced to take a subordinate position, but that all they were, or possessed, in the way of political develop- ment, cultural achievement, architectural and artistic i28 A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 29 aspiration, was stamped flat under the Turkish hoof, and simply ceased to exist. For four hundred years only their heroic ballads served to keep alive among the Serbs the memory of past greatness, and to lift, in even the slightest degree, the life of the people above the level of an arduous struggle for mere physical existence. When in the nine- teenth century these people attained again to a national independence it is not surprising, not only that they re- tained many of the marks of long generations of servitude, but that they took up the threads of national life where they had been snapped short by the Turkish conquest. It is this that without doubt largely accounts for the "historical" bias which has marked their renewed con- sciousness. If we could imagine English history a blank from the reign of Richard II to our own days, how much more real and present a character would seem Edward III, and with what different eyes should we look upon the battles of Cregy and Poictiers, the question of Calais and Guienne. It is not altogether their fault if they are apt to exasperate the twentieth century with detailed claims derived from the fourteenth. All this has to be remem- bered if we would understand and sympathize with, in the proper sense of the word, their present aspirations and outlook. The original home of the Southern Slavs, which term is usually confined in practice to the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, but in this connection includes the primitive Slav element in the Bulgarian people, is supposed to have been to the north of the Carpathians between the Vistula and the Dnieper. They entered the Balkan Peninsula towards the end of the sixth century, and in 620 are said to have been invited to migrate into his dominions by the Emperor Heraclius, though a steady infiltration had been going over a long time. The general appellation of these tribes was Slovene, and it was not till the ninth century that specific designations for their main divisions emerge. The term Slovene is used also in the same general sense as its English derivative Slav, e.g. in such expressions as 30 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Slovenski Jug — Slavonic South — Macedo-Slovenes, and so forth. It is apparently an accident of history that the term has become also the specific appellation of one of the three branches of the Southern Slavs, possibly because that small branch retained the original general name while its more numerous neighbours acquired particular desig- nations of their own. The terms Croat and Serb emerge in the ninth century, but it is significant of the funda- mental identity of these two kindreds that to the early Byzantine historians the terms are interchangeable. ^ The origin of these names is unknown, but it is interesting to note that the name Serb is applied to themselves by the nearly extinct Slavs of northern Saxony and the adjacent part of Brandenburg who are usually known to us as Sorbs or Wends. When the Serbs and Croats eventually differ- entiated themselves the former are found to be occupying roughly the kingdom of Serbia, as existing from 1878 to 1912, Old Serbia (the country round Prizren, Pristina, etc.), the late sanjak of Novipazar, Montenegro, southern Dalmatia, the Hercegovina, Bosnia and Srem or Syrmia, the Timok being their immemorial boundary on the east while in Dalmatia the Cetina divided them from the Croats who occupied northern Dalmatia, Croatia, and Slavonia, the Triune Kingdom as it came later to be called. In addition to these regions the early Slav invaders overran the greater part of the Balkan Peninsula. The modern Bulgaria and Macedonia were occupied by them, while the population of Albania and northern Greece has a large Slav element in its composition which in the former case is specifically Serb.^ The easterly and southern invaders seem to have been largely lacking in the sense of a specific national consciousness, as has been the case to the present day in the case of the Macedonians,3 possibly ' Git. Nevill Forbes. The Southern Slavs, p. 16. ' " Perhaps the majority of place-names of central and northern Albania are Slavonic ". H. M. Brailsford, Macedonia, p. 231. Pro- fessor Eliot Smith holds that the Albanians are part of the original Slav population. British Association Meeting, 1915. 3 See also Chapter VI. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 31 because the original population of these regions was more numerous than in the north-west, and so the invaders became more mixed in blood. In 679 the Bulgarians under Isperich conquered Lower Moesia, inhabited by these Slav invaders, and founded their first Balkan Bulgarian Kingdom. The new-comers were of Tartar origin, and though they were to a certain extent absorbed by the conquered, the nation has always been marked by many of the characteristics of its non- Slav ancestors. Though the new immigrants learned the Slav tongue — to this day Serb and Bulgar can understand one another, "when they choose", as Sir Charles Eliot says — their manners and polity remained sharply dis- tinguished from those of their Serb neighbours. They owned the sway of an autocratic Khan who lived in Oriental seclusion, and throughout its history the people has been marked by the passivity with which it has submitted to its rulers. The absence of any really serious revolt against Turkish domination cannot be ascribed entirely to the geographical features and position of the country, less difficult than Serbia or Greece, less remote than Roumania. The acquiescence in the absolute rule of the powerful Stambulov, and latterly with disastrous results in that of King Ferdinand, seems to be of a piece with what is known of their ancient history. In early days indeed this trait in their character allowed of a rapid development of the power of the Bulgarians, lending itself to the designs of their Khans and Tsars, and in consequence they were centuries before the Serbs in the consolidation of a serious political power. With the advent of the Bulgarians the era of considerable invasions of the Balkan Peninsula came to an end till the coming of the Turks. At this period, then, we find the north-western area in the hands of the Serbs, with the Bulgars to the east of them. In Albania the original stock had been pushed back into the utmost recesses of the country — the Mirdites are said never to have come under the effective sway of any foreign Power — while in the rest of the 32 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS land there was a considerable infiltration of Serb blood. Macedonia had been largely occupied by a Slav stock which must have been akin to the Serbs, but here their blood was largely diluted with elements derived from the provincial population of the later Empire. To this day the still dwindling element of that stock — much more numerous in the Middle Ages — perched on the mountain- tops of the Pindus and its offshoots overlooking the land that once was theirs preserves alike in its language and its name — Aromuni — the boast of descent from the lords of the ancient world, though these Vlachs (Kutzo-Vlachs, lame Vlachs) as they are generally known, can have had but comparatively little genuine Roman blood. Still, Romanized Thracians as they were, they have pre- served to us the "provincial" of the Empire. The metropolitan province of Constantinople was Greek, though, as has been seen, in its native land Greek blood was now largely intermingled with Slav. In organization the Serbs were poles asunder from the Bulgarians. They owned to no fixed central authority, but were a congeries of tribes acknowledging the rule of their tribal chiefs known as zupans but knowing nothing, save at rare intervals, of a national ruler. Indeed, to the end of the Middle Ages not only were Croats and Serbs separate, but the Serbs of Bosnia under their Bans occupied a position of precarious and delicately balanced independence between the rival claims to suzerainty of the Kings of Hungary and the Kings and Tsars of Serbia. From time to time one zupan more powerful than his contemporaries would succeed in uniting a large part of the nation under his sway as Grand Zupan. The fissiparous tendencies of Serb political life have been the bane of the nation, a truth that at long last has been bitten deep into the consciousness of the Southern Slavs. It has, however, to be remembered that this very impatience of restraint and fierce love of independence has been of untold value to the people in times of adversity, keeping alive through centuries of oppression the hope of eventual A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 33 national restoration and a burning desire to achieve it. Time and again they rose against the Turks till the very name of Serb stank in Turkish nostrils, and they never sank as others into a sluggish and oriental acquiescence in their servile political lot. The character of their country also, mountainous and split up into a number of comparatively small valleys, and mountain-surrounded basins — the poljes of Balkan geography — as it forbad any easy road to national unity so it fostered a sturdy love of independence and a vigorous local life. Of the early centuries of Serb history but little is known, and in a brief sketch such as this that little need not detain us long. It is not till 830 that we find definite mention of the name of a Grand Zupan in Voislav, while shortly after in the rule of one Eadoslav occurred the most momentous event of early Serb history, and one of the most momentous in the whole history of the race, the conversion of the people to Christianity according to the Orthodox Eastern rite by the Southern Slav apostles, SS. Cyril and Methodius, who in the reign of Boris of Bulgaria converted the people of that country also. The Croats received their religion from western Roman sources, and for centuries the difference in religion has been perhaps the most weighty of the causes which have kept the two branches of the race apart. One of the causes of this difference is to be found not only in the more westerly position of the Croats, and the greater accessibility of their land to Western influences, but in the fact that, roughly speaking, the dividing line between Croat and Serb had been the old dividing line of the Eastern and Western Empires as it became that of Eastern and Western Christianity, From S. Cyril is derived the name of the " Orthodox " alphabet in use among the Serbs which has undergone various modifications since its introduction, perhaps in the form of what is known as the Glagolica alphabet ; the Croats on the contrary use the Latin alphabet with various diacritic marks in order to represent the sounds of the language, the Cyrillic alphabet being 3 34 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS phonetic. The reign of the Grand ^upan Vlastimir was marked by a three-year attack by the Bulgarians under Presjam, the predecessor of Boris, which was beaten back. This is perhaps the earliest occasion on which the two peoples came into conflict since their institutions had crystallized into something like a definite polity, and marks the beginning of the secular struggle between them. The almost constant state of warfare between Serbs and Bulgars may be likened in its insistence, if not in its scale, to the agelong conflict between France and "the Empire", and both alike have been renewed in our own days with an intensity of feeling which has certainly not lessened with the passage of the centuries. This is sometimes forgotten by those who, ignorant apparently that the mutual animosity has its roots deep down in the history and his- torical consciousness of Serb and Bulgar, not only preach, as well they may, a gospel of peace to them, but allow their desires to outrun the realities of the situation, and either take their hopes for facts or grow impatient if those hopes are deceived. That nothing in the Balkan Peninsula is so desirable as the laying aside of the feud which has worked such incalculable mischief is as true as that the same applies to Frenchman and German, or Englishman and German, in the west, and the two feuds are likely to have their end about the same time. At any rate it is not for western Europe to take up a superior attitude of pained surprise or lofty disdain towards the blindness to their real interests of the two peoples who might well respond with Quis tulerit Gracchos ? This hatred between the two kindred peoples is a fact which is as saddening in the thought for the future as in the record of the past, but it is a fact to ignore which is simply a mark of incom- petence. The two nations are antipathetic, which may be due to the fact that after all the Bulgars are at least as Mongol, or at any rate non-Slav, as Slav. Boris renewed the attack against the sons of Vlastimir but was unsuccessful, and Muntimir, the eldest of them, succeeded his father as Grand Zupan, an office which was tending to become hereditary. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 35 What Boris had been unable to accomplish was effected by his son the great Tsar Simeon, founder of the first Bulgarian Empire. Under him the territory ruled by the Bulgarians touched the three seas which are the goal of Ferdinand in our own time, and included the eastern part of Serbia with Ni§ and Belgrade. In 917 Simeon made Paul Brankovic Grand Zupan after Peter his pre- decessor had been decoyed into the Bulgarian camp and treacherously murdered. Frequent Serb revolts were put down with ruthless severity and the country ravaged to desolation. After the death of Simeon Serbia became independent under Ceslav, who succeeded in driving out the Bulgars, but after his death Serb history becomes again almost a blank illumined by the emergence of one or two names. We hear of a John Vladimir who was defeated by Samuel the successor of SiSman, who had founded the "western Bulgarian Empire", and sub- sequently murdered by John Vladislav the last of the early Bulgar tsars. As nearly always, the fortunes of the two nations were inversely connected, and the fall of the Bulgars and their subjection to the Eastern Empire for a century and a half saw the dawn of a better day for the Serbs, and in 1040 Stephen Voislav ruled as an independent sovereign over Zahumlija, Zeta, and Ra§ka, while Michael his son was even recognized as king by Gregory VII, though he was wise enough to maintain his peace with the Emperor. Both Serb and Bulgar rulers engaged in an occasional flirtation with the Papacy when they required aid against Constantinople. It was with the accession of the Nemanja dynasty in the middle of the twelfth century that the heroic epoch of Serb history began. It must be remembered that the kingdom of Serbia as it existed from 1878 to 1912 is by no means the cradle of the original Serb State, and cannot be spoken of in any historical sense as Serbia "proper" as is sometimes loosely done. The designation " Serbia " has been a political term for that portion of the Serb lands which has been independent, and Danubian 36 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Serbia in no sense corresponds to East and West Prussia as "Prussia proper". At this time the Serb tribes had coalesced in certain fairly constant State formations both in the Primorija or coast region along the Adriatic, and Zagorija or transmontane region of the interior. Bosnia, as the name implies, had its centre in the basin of the river Bosna. To the south lay Zahumlija, or the land of Hum or Primorija, corresponding roughly to the modern Hercegovina. Zeta, another subdivision of the territory, was the representative of the present Crnagora, or Monte- negro. The main Serb State w^as Raska, which compre- hended the late sanjak of Novipazar, Old Serbia to the §ar mountains, and western Serbia (as we know it) as its permanent elements, the eastern part of Serbia was at times in dispute with the Bulgars, as ^Belgrade and the Macva were with the Hungarians, for in those days as in our own time the configuration of the latter region made it hard to defend. Vidin in Bulgaria was also a subject of dispute. Stephen Nemanja, whose accession to power is variously dated as 1143 or 1160, succeeded after conflict with his brothers in uniting Zahumlija, Zeta, and RaSka under his sway as Grand Zupan, and henceforth to RaSka in its varying extent may be applied the name of Serbia. He was born at Dioclea in Zeta in which town, now ruined, some have seen the origin of the name of Diocletian. For a time he succeeded in uniting Bosnia also to his dominions. His attempts, however, to throw off the suzerainty of Con- stantinople ended in failure, and he was obliged to make a humiliating submission to the Emperor Manuel Comnenus. After the death of Manuel in 1180 Nemanja was able to gather strength, and he added Ni§ to his territories, and five years later he assumed the title of king though he was never crowned. In 1195 he abdicated the throne in favour of his son, became a monk under the name of Simeon and retired to the famous monastery of Hilindar which he had founded on Mount Athos, where he died four years later. From his time the sovereigns of Serbia A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 37 almost without exception bore the name of Stephen, probably from its signification — a crown. The titles of these sovereigns are variously given : I have followed the simplest nomenclature, giving the other designa- tions by which they are sometimes known in brackets. Nemanja's son Stephen II (sometimes called Stephen Urog) had to contest his right with one of his brothers stirred up by Andrew II of Hungary, jealous of the rising power of Serbia, but the quarrel after some fighting was allayed by the king's youngest brother who had taken orders and is known in Serb history as S. Sava. The latter indeed might almost in some respects be considered the veritable founder of the new State, composing quarrels, organizing the Church, and pressing on the work of civili- zation. ^ Stephen II at one time coquetted with the Pope and was even crowned by a Papal legate ; but this act, though undertaken for political reasons, aroused the Ortho- dox resentment of his subjects. He was acknowledged by Baldwin the first Latin Emperor of Constantinople as independent King of Serbia, Dalmatia, and Bosnia. S. Sava, who became Archbishop of U^ice, crowned his brother again and henceforth the latter was known as PrvovenSani, "the first crowned". The organization of the State was completed by the recognition accorded by the Patriarch of Constantinople to the Serb Church as an autonomous body in 1219. War with Hungary followed the acquisition of Bosnia with results favourable to the Serbs. The reigns of Stephen III (Eodoslav) and his brother Vladislav were contemporaneous with the growth of the second Bulgarian Empire under John Asen II. The former of these sovereigns obtained Syrmia, a province which throughout the Middle Ages had a close connection with Serbia and stood somewhat apart from the kingdom of Croatia- Slavonia, from Hungary and Vidin from Bulgaria, but the latter acquisition was lost by his brother. ' " If the father endowed the Serbian State with a body, the son gave it a soul". Father Nicholas Velimirovid, Religion and Nationality in Serbia, p. 7. 38 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS The country made notable progress during the reign of a third brother, Stephen IV the Great (Stephen Uro§ I), who ascended the throne of Serbia in 1242. He married Helena, a niece of Baldwin of Constantinople, of whom her husband's subjects were lavish in praise for the manner in which she seconded the king's efforts for the advance- ment of his people. A curious memorial of her is to be found in the ruined church of Gradac, in the former sanjak of Novipazar, which in a strange land bears the impress of the French Gothic of her own people. The reign was one of peace on the whole, though Serbia had to undergo a terrible invasion of the Mongols, who were not defeated till they had ravaged the country to the shores of the Adriatic. Among other measures taken for the develop- ment of the country was the opening up of the mining industry, for which experts were sought, it is interesting to note, from Germany. His son Dragutin was married to a daughter of Bela IV of Hungary, and the close of the old king's reign was marked by one of the domestic trage- dies which form so great a blot on the medieval history of Serbia. Assisted by the Hungarians, his son rebelled, and Stephen the Great was forced to abdicate in 1276. Stephen Dragutin did not long enjoy the fruits of his unfilial conduct, for, stung by remorse, he abdicated in favour of his younger brother, reserving for himself the Ma6va and Syrmia, which for many years he ruled, with success. Under Stephen VI Milutin (Uro§ II Milutin), Serbia entered upon a vigorous policy which aimed at aggrandize- ment at the expense of the Eastern Empire, which since the decline of the Bulgarian realm, under the successors of John Asen II, had been in possession of Macedonia. Milutin's first campaign was completely successful, and the Serb armies penetrated to Seres, to the Aegean, and the lakes of Ochrida and Prespa. Not all these conquests were retained, however, but northern and a part of central Mace- donia remained in his hands. Equally successful against the Bulgarians, he took Vidin in 1291, and on a renewal A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 39 of the struggle against the Greeks made himself master of Durazzo and northern Albania, gains which were partly offset by the loss of the Macva to Hungary on the death of his brother, the Hungarian king claiming that province equally with Syrmia as a fief of his crown. A new foe was encountered by the Serbs for the first time in the reign of Milutin. The rapid advance of the Turks in Asia Minor might well give pause to the Balkan sovereigns who were wasting their manhood in perpetual warfare among them- selves. Possibly it was an appreciation of this danger that caused Milutin during the latter half of his reign to pursue a policy of peace and alliance with Constantinople. This alliance was sealed by the marriage of Milutin, a widower, with Simonis, daughter of Andronicus II. In 1303 the Serbs, in alliance with the Greeks, crossed into Asia Minor and took part in the victory of Angora, in which the Turks were defeated. Twelve years later Serbia again came to the help of Constantinople, in dire straits owing to an inva- sion of Thrace itself by the Turks. Again the Serbs were successful, and the Turks were swept into the Sea of Mar- mora. Progress was marked in the development of civili- zation in the kingdom, and Milutin has been called the " roi batisseur " of his dynasty. The monastery of Hilindar was rebuilt on a larger scale by him, and religious or charit- able foundations, the results of his munificence, were found in cities so widely dispersed as Salonica, Skoplje, Seres, Constantinople, and even Jerusalem, while the church of Ban] ska, near Mitrovica, also owned him as founder. In his reign the archiepiscopal see of Serbia was removed from Uzice to Pec, in Old Serbia, which since 1913 has been included in Montenegro. His later domestic relations were unhappy, for his wife Simonis intrigued against the suc- cession of his eldest son in favour of her own child. The former was exiled to Constantinople, and his stepmother is said to have given orders for him to be blinded ; but the executioner only pretended to do his horrid work, and after seven years the prince returned to his country with eye- sight unimpaired, and in 1321 ascended the throne as 40 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Stephen VII, Decanski (Uro§ III). Milutin was buried at Sofia. ^ The new monarch's surname was derived from the most magnificent monument of medieval Serb art in existence, the Monastery of Decani, near to Pec, and, Hke that town, now included in Montenegro. Built of red and white marble by an architect from Kotor (Cattaro), one of the Serb seaports, it has impressed itself with a species of superstitious veneration upon the minds of even the wild Albanians in its vicinity, and retains to this day the con- temporary frescoes of early Serb monarchs. During the retreat of the Serb army in 1915 the Albanians are said to have made an attempt to destroy that which they have respected through the centuries, so contaminating are the methods of war as practised by the apostles of kultur.^ Stephen De6anski's short reign was marked by almost continuous warfare. The king of Hungary attacked the Wallachs, who were allies of Stephen, and the latter crossed the Danube and inflicted a crushing defeat upon his enemies. In 1325 he lost Zahumlija to Kutromanic, Ban of Bosnia, in a war which had been caused by a revolt of the Serb king's half-brother. At the end of his reign he had to face a combination of Bulgaria and the Eastern Empire. His action was prompt and brilliantly successful. Inter- posing himself between the forces of the two allies he crushed the former State in the battle of Velbuzd, not far from Kustendil, in which the Bulgarian Tsar, who had repudiated his wife, Stephen's sister, was killed. Stephen placed his sister on the Bulgarian throne as regent, and henceforth, almost till the final destruction of Bulgaria by the Turks, that State remained the vassal of her western neighbour. The Greek forces retreated without awaiting ' The " Church of the Holy King " in which he was buried has lately been renamed by the Bulgars, who glory in the desecration of Milutin's remains. ' The report apparently has done an injustice to the Albanians. That which the wild caterans respected was left to the Austro-Bulgars to spoil. The treasures of Decani have been carried away and a sordid dispute haa been carried on by the robbers as to their respective shares. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 41 an attack. Yet again domestic differences marked the close of a Serb king's reign. Unmindful of all that he had suffered, De6anski took a Greek princess for his second wife, with the usual result that she intrigued against her stepson Stephen — the role of royal women in Balkan politics has indeed been miserable. Stephen took up arms against his father and dethroned him. Shortly after, in 1331, the old king was strangled, it is said against the new king's wish and at the instigation of the nobles. With the reign of the new king Stephen VIII, DuSan, medieval Serbia reached its zenith. For years the surname of this monarch was derived by English historians from a Serb word, duSiti, to strangle, and was translated as " the strangler ", or " throttler". It is now agreed that the Serbs were right in deriving it from dusa, " the soul ", and that it means the soul or darling, i.e. of the people. A Serb has informed me that the former derivation was absolutely impossible on grammatical grounds. He resumed the war against the Byzantines, and his earlier campaigns were completely successful, Andronicus III himself being forced to suffer a siege in Salonica, and to agree to terms of peace. As a result of the treaty of 1340 DuSan was left in posses- sion of Albania, with the exception of Durazzo, Epirus, Acarnania, Thessaly, and Macedonia to Seres, except for the town of Salonica, while Bulgaria was a vassal State, so that he was master of the greater part of the Balkan Peninsula. Soon after he intervened in the civil war waged between the Empress Anne and John Cantacuzene, taking at first the side of the latter, but reversing his action when Cantacuzene called in the aid of the Turks. Here we can perceive the prescience of Du§an, and perhaps the first germs of the project on which he was occupied at the time of his death. So great was his power and so extensive his dominions that the title of king no longer sufficed for him, and he assumed the title of Emperor or Tsar. A cor- responding increase of dignity was conferred upon the Archbishop of Pec, who was elevated to the title of patri- arch, and so commenced the long and glorious history of 42 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the Patriarchs of Pe6, who were in sadder circumstances to uphold the standard of Serb nationalism when all temporal authorities had been forced to bow the neck to the Turkish yoke. The Patriarch of Constantinople protested, and it was not till some thirty years after that he consented to recognize the new dignity of the Serb metropolitan. One of the jfirst acts of the new Patriarch was to crown his sovereign in company with the Archbishop of Ochrida, the occupant of which ancient and historic see was titular metropolitan of Bulgaria and Justiniana Prima. At Skoplje on Easter Day, 1346, Stephen DuSan was crowned and proclaimed "Emperor of the Serbs and Romans". The title was in itself a challenge to Byzantium, and seems a clear indication that the Tsar had by this time definitely decided on his grand design, though it was another nine years before he put it into execution. Henceforth the Tsar assumed imperial state and titles, while he founded an order of chivalry, the Order of S. Stephen. Nor was DuSan a conqueror only; he resembled the great sovereigns of history in being a lawgiver also. He caused a code to be drawn up based upon a recension of Byzantine law to which some two hundred articles were added, said to have been largely derived from the laws of the Adriatic seaport Budva, and in 1349 was promulgated his famous Zahonik, or law code. So far as I know this code has never been translated into English, and the most complete analysis of some of its main provisions is to be found in Prince Lazarovi6-Hrebel- janovic's book The Servian People. What is there set forth is sufficient to arouse the interest of any one who has passed through the Oxford History School and possesses a working knowledge of medieval English law and the social conditions on which early law throws so illumi- nating a light. It is to be hoped that, when peace restores our scholars to their accustomed studies, one of them, his interest aroused in our Balkan ally, will give himself to the work of bringing out an annotated edition of this code, even though the actual translation should be the A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 43 work of another hand. It shows us a state of society and a law procedure which can fitly be compared with their countertypes in the West, while to the interest of the resemblances is added the force of contrast provided by those elements which were due either to native Serb conditions or to the influence of Byzantine elements. The Tsar was also a patron of learning, and built many schools and churches. The following year saw the conclusion of a fresh peace, this time between Du§an and Cantacuzene who had made himself master of the Greek Empire and with Turkish aid had won back some of DuSan's most easterly conquests. What the latter, however, lost in the east he more than recovered in the west. Louis the Great of Hungary, jealous of the Tsar's power, invaded the latter's dominions only to experience the fortune that had attended the Hungarian adventure against Stephen Decanski. Defeated by DuSan he was compelled to give up Belgrade, while Bosnia, together with Zahumlija (the Hercegovina), which latter province had belonged to Bosnia since 1325, passed under DuSan's hand. Kotor, Budva, Bar (Antivari), on the Adriatic were likewise part of the Serb realm, that particular portion of the Adriatic being known as the Serb Sea, while friendly relations were entertained with the independent Serb republic of Dubrovnik (Eagusa). Thus was formed at length the medieval Great Serbia, the union of the Serb stock in one realm. Even before this year — ten years earlier if the date be correct — DuSan had claimed the lordship of Bosnia. Sir Arthur Evans has told how in the Franciscan monastery of Fonjica in Bosnia he saw " The Book of Arms of the Nobility of Bosnia or Illyria, and Serbia, together set forth by Stanislaus Rub5ic, priest, to the glory of Stephen Nemanja, Tsar of the Serbs and Bosnians. In the year 1340 " ; the book, however, being a late medieval copy of the original. The present aspirations of the Southern Slavs are here prefigured, for among the quarterings of the various Serb provinces surrounding the white double 44 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS eagle are to be found the three bearded kings of Dalmatia, the hounds of Slavonia, and the red and silver chequer of Croatia. In 1355 DuSan took up in earnest his great design. The Greek Empire was growing feebler and feebler. Apart from a short stretch of the coast of Asia Minor all that re- mained to the successors of the Roman Emperors was the metropolitan province of Constantinople and Thrace ; the Turks were passing from conquest to conquest, and already the Serbs had met them in battle in Europe ; evidently Constantinople was doomed to pass into alien hands, and Du§an determined that those hands should be his own. He formed the magnificent project, altogether justified by circumstances, of seizing Constantinople and refounding the Eastern Empire under himself. Had the scheme succeeded, and had Dusan lived out his life to a normal span, the whole current of European history might have been changed. As it was the strength of the imperial city enabled it to hold out for another hundred years, and if it had been held by a young and vigorous race, reawakening to life the dry bones of the Empire, re- juvenating its population and institutions with fresh impulses and a new awakening, it might well have been that the Turks would have thundered at its gates in vain, and south-eastern Europe have been spared five hundred years of misery, bloodshed, and decay. Not less than 80,000 men were gathered beneath the Tsar's standard, he had sympathizers in the city, and there was no adequate military force to oppose him. Adrianople and Thrace fell into his hands, and he had approached within forty miles of the capital when he was suddenly taken ill and died in December 1355, the circumstances raising the suspicion that he had been poisoned by the Greeks. He was not yet fifty years of age. His forces immediately turned back, and bore the body of the great Tsar to be buried in the monastery which he had founded in Prizren the Tsarigrad. In that tomb was laid also the future of Serbia. In estimating the civilization of the medieval Serbs we A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 45 are faced not merely with scanty documentary evidence but with the almost "complete obliteration of those enduring monuments which in happier lands speak so eloquently across the ages. Yet sufficient remains to indicate that they were not the savages or mere copyists that they have been represented to be. Their civilization has two sources; the more immediate was Byzantium with its great traditions and continuous life from Roman times, on the other hand, especially through Dubrovnik, that lamp of the eastern Adriatic, Serbia lay open to the influences of Italy and the West : the historic role of Serbia imposed upon her by her geographical position is to be at once the keeper of the gate between East and West and interpreter of the one to the other — a role which it is to be hoped she will shortly resume. But little description has appeared of the relics of Serb architecture, even from those who have seen them. It is necessary to go back to Denton's Servia and the Servians, published so far back as 1862, for anything like a reasoned account of some of its features.^ Throughout, Serb architecture seems to have exhibited a melange of western and eastern forms, which in some respects becomes more marked towards the close of the period. Some of the most beautiful churches, though by no means large judged by western standards, date from the last years of Serb independence and are the work of "Tsar" Lazar, his wife, and son. Such is the extremely beautiful little church at Kru§evac, and the fine fortified monastery of Manassija, ' A short account is given in Servia by the Servians, edited by A. Stead. This section of the book, however, suffers from bad trans- lation, the translator having apparently but little acquaintance with architectural terms. The term "Roman" for example is applied not only to Romanesque art, but, as the context shows, to Gothic. "Tambour" is untranslated, though its literal rendering, a "drum," is also correct technically. The climax is reached when, by a slip, the fourteenth-century churches are stated to be marked by the occurrence of a "polygamous tambour," a feature surely more suited to Mohammedan than Christian art I Still, read with care, the section is interesting and instructive. 46 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS whose towered enceinte still remains. It has been said that Serbia was on the point of developing a new style "First Pointed Byzantine," that is to say a style which combines many of the features of "First Pointed Gothic " with those of Byzantine architecture. From the latter this later Serb architecture is dis- tinguished by several features. Byzantine churches though they show a transept in elevation, do not generally show one in plan (in York Cathedral the great transept projects beyond the line of the aisles and therefore shows in plan, the smaller eastern transept shows in elevation, but as it is practically flush with the aisle walls does not show in plan) ; the Serb churches, however, which we are considering, possess slightly projecting transepts the projection taking the form of polygonal transverse apses. The place of a dome is taken by a low octagonal tower not unlike those to be found in some " Early English " churches as at Uffington, and these towers were covered by a pyramidal cap originally, though in some cases these have been mistakenly "restored" with bulbous domes of Eussian type. Eose windows are a very prominent feature, and the likeness to Gothic is sometimes enhanced by the occurrence of "lancet" windows grouped in pairs, with a circle in the head but not under a containing arch. It is much to be hoped that in the future Serb architects, instead of copying the present academic art of the west, will set themselves to follow up the trend of their own traditions : to possess a national style of architecture which has not been "worked out" is indeed a boon, the greatness of which they do not seem hitherto to have appreciated as they ought. Owing to their history, moreover, it has never been superseded by any other tradition, only a few important buildings having been erected in recent times. Of the social conditions which prevailed in medieval Serbia we can get information from Tsar DuSan's Zakonik.^ ' I rely in the following paragraphs on the analysis given in Prince Lazarovid-Hrebeljanovic's book already cited, vol. i, chap. vi. Some of bis comments and comparisons are by no means free from partiality, A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 47 At the head of the great officers of State stood the Chancellor (Logothet) and by his side were found a High Steward (Veliki Celnik) and Treasurer (RizniCkni Oelnik). For administrative purposes the country was divided into districts under administrators with the title of Knez. The Crown possessed large estates whose revenues, as was the case with the "ancient demesne" of England, were applicable alike to the personal expenses of the ruler and to the needs of State, while other receipts were derived from the hearth tax, from the mines, from judicial fines, customs dues, and the fixed contribution paid by Dubrovnik (Ragusa) in lieu of individual trade licences. Local administration was exercised through the Zupa and the village (selo) each of which possessed its local assembly, the centre of the former being the grad, whose attributes and origin seem to be closely analogous to the Saxon burh. The nobles (vlastela) were divided into two grades, great and small, both of which had places in the Sabor, or national council, to the exclusion of the commoners, though originally these latter had possessed rights of representation. The landed property of the nobles fell under two classifica- tions, ba§tina and pronja. The former of these was freehold, it could be disposed of after the consent had been obtained of the family, or zadruga, and confirmation by the Crown. The holder was bound to give military service and to pay the hearth tax. The second form of noble tenure was the pronja {irpovoia). This was not a freehold but a life tenure, it could not be disposed of by sale or gift, and on the death of the holder it returned to Crown. Article 57 declared the pronja to be forfeit in the event of oppression of the tenants. The pronja represented an usufruct granted as stipend to State officials and dignitaries. Below the nobles came the commoner (sebar). The first order of these, called Slobodnji Ljudi, or independent people, possessed baStina, or freehold property, and was liable but I see no reason to doubt the correctness of the translations given by him or statements made as of fact. The allusions to medieval Engheh conditions are my own. 48 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS to military service. His position in other respects seems to have been in general not dissimilar in its social relationships to that of the English freeholder or tenant in socage, account being had of the fact that in Serbia the feudal system had but little hold in its organized western form. The second order of sebri was composed of the merops or kmets. This latter class composed the great mass of the population. Their property might consist either of bastina, which however was encumbered with servitudes towards a noble's demesne, or of land rented from such a demesne. The baStina could be aliened (Article 174) provided that there should be a work-hand to perform labour (robot) due to the lord's demesne. The duties are defined in Article 68 which forbad any exaction beyond the robot prescribed by law, and in the event of such exaction the kmet could cite the lord before the royal court, an improvement on the rights of the villein in the English court customary. Each merop house had to give the labour of one man for two days in the week, each tenant was further bound to give one day's work (all the tenants working together) at haymaking, and another in the vineyard ; the hearth tax and military service were also due, as well as labour on public works, fortresses, and the like, the latter taking the place of the contributions in the form of taxes levied for a similar purpose on the nobles. Lodging and hospitality had also to be given to certain State officials on circuit. The position of the merop was so far superior to that of the English villein in that he was capable of possessing freehold property (ba§tina) which the villein could not ; on the other hand he owed labour service for his freehold, so that he was in respect of the latter some- what in the position of the class in England which held their land in what has sometimes been called villein socage, the smallest class of manorial freeholders. In other respects, and if none of his land were freehold, he occupied very much the same place in rural and social economy as the villein. Article 22 enacted : " Merops who have A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 49 abandoned their land to go and settle on Church lands shall return to their original domain", and Article 201 : "If a merop abandons his tenure, the overlord of his [sic ?the] domain, upon finding him, can have him punished, and exact a bond for good behaviour, but he cannot seize any of that merop's property". The appli- cation would seem to be to a merop not owning baStina of his own, but holding of the lord. The lowest class of all was formed by the otroks. These were strictly ascripti glehae but could not be transferred apart from the estate. Civil cases between otroks were decided before their lord, for criminal offences they were answerable to the royal courts. They may be compared to the lowest class of EngHsh villeins, the bordars and cottars of early documents. Legal slavery there was none. Article 21 enacted: "Whoever sells a Christian shall lose his hand and have his nose slit ". The administration of justice was in the hands of the royal courts, the country being divided into circuits (Article 179), while local justice was administered in the " grads " (head seat of a 2;upa) by the court of the grad presided over by the Tjephalia (Greek kephalia), the captain or governor of the grad, in the villages by village courts composed of judges locally elected styled " good men " (dobri Ijudi) presided over by the village elder : the suitors were the judges. In addition there were the ecclesiastical and commercial courts. Article 171 expressly enacted the subjection of the Sovereign to the laws ; " In case My Imperial Majesty should give to any person a ' writing ' . . . which is contrary to the law . . . the judge shall pay no heed to that writing, and shall judge regularly and according to law and shall see to it that his judgment is executed". Articles 184 and 185 forbad imprisonment without a writ of judgment or order of a judge — an anti- cipation by three hundred years of our Habeas Corpus. The pristavs, or sheriffs, were forbidden to act save in accordance with legal provisions. Article 152 ordained that both in civil and criminal cases a man could be 4 50 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS judged only by his peers " as in the time of my grand- father, the holy King Milutin ". The two blots on the code were the inequality of punishment for the same offence and the draconian severity of some of these punishments. Personal injury inflicted by a great vlastelin upon a lesser vlastelin was punished with a fine of one hundred perpers (one perper was equal to half a Venetian ducat or Serb zlatnik whose value was about nine shillings), in the contrary case the punishment was a fine of one hundred perpers and corporal punishment, but this differentiation did not extend to crimes against public order or the State. Article 145 ordered that villages where was found a robber or a thief should be dispersed, the robber hanged, the thief blinded. Parricides were burnt at the stake. Some examples exhibit both defects. Manslaughter committed by a noble against a sebar was punished by a fine of one thousand perpers, in the contrary event by a fine of three hundred perpers and loss of a hand. If a nobleman violated a gentlewoman both his hands were to be chopped off and his nose slit, for a like offence the sebar was hanged, but if, in the latter case, the sebar's offence was against one of his own order the punishment was loss of both hands and the nose to be slit, as in the case of a noble offending against his own order. Such draconian severity does not, however, ever seem to have been exercised in cases where the offence was obviously disproportionate; the cruelty, if such it be called, was reserved for crimes which rightly excited detestation and was not exercised in wantonness. Merchants were protected and a brisk commerce was done with Dubrovnik (Eagusa). The produce of the mines enabled the sovereigns to hire mercenaries, heavy cavalry, from France, Italy, Switzerland, and Germany. On the whole the picture presented is by no means unattractive. The Zakonik itself, in view of its date, deserves a very high place in legal records, and indicates a high degree of social and legal organization — Tsar Du§an A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 51 was no semi-barbarous monarch ruling his dominions with oriental caprice and despotism. The general position of the mass of the people was certainly superior to that occupied by the similar classes in central and western Europe with the exception, perhaps, of our own. There was no feudal oppression, nor feudal justice, or rather in- justice, such as ground down the countryside where feudal- ism reigned supreme in its full development, as it never did in England, and the French peasant of the eighteenth century would probably have very willingly changed places with his Serb brother of the fourteenth. Speaking generally DuSan's code was superior to the contemporary systems prevailing in western Europe even in the more advanced States, and surprising though this may seem at first sight it is not so much to be wondered at when we remember that he had at his immediate disposal the code of Justinian and those legal principles which have so profoundly influenced modern western legal systems. Doubt- less administration of this code would vary at different times. In a state of almost constant warfare the organs of govern- ment would frequently be functioning very badly, as they did in our country under the weak Lancastrian adminis- tration which led to the demand for "more abundant governance," yet it remains that the great Tsar endued his country with a good legal system in advance of those generally prevailing. II The Fall of Serbia The Serb Empire as distinct from the Kingdom of Serbia had been the work of DuSan and fell with his death. He had had no time in which to assimilate its new acquisitions or to set up therein a tradition of organized government under Serb auspices. Even in the Serb provinces the old fissiparous tendencies manifested themselves anew. The problem of all medieval States of any size was the difficulty 52 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS of maintaining the central authority in their outlying provinces, the governors of which continually strove to establish for themselves an independent position ; the Roman Empire alone with its close central authority and organized hierarchical services had achieved a solution the merits of which alone enabled its eastern member to endure till the fifteenth century. Added to this in Serbia the nature of the country itself, divided into separate river basins with difficult intercommunication, as it had facilitated in the early migrations the setting up of small clan States, so now made for the dissolution of the Empire into its com- ponent elements. Immediately the strong hand of Dugan was removed from the governors these began to agitate their independence. His successor was the young Tsar Uro§ (Urog V), a youth of nineteen and devoid of the vigour and decision of character which had marked out his father even at that age. Thessaly became independent, the Albanians regained their usual condition of inde- pendence or anarchy, Bulgaria ceased to be the vassal of the Tsar, Belgrade was lost to the Hungarians, and Bosnia under Stephen Tvrtko fell away from the Empire, which became now not even a pan- Serb Kingdom. Within the Kingdom itself the same process proceeded apace, and is intimately connected with the name of Vukasin Mrnjavcevic. It is a proof that the Serbs themselves were keenly conscious of the cause of their ruin that their popular legends hold up to detestation the names of the great rebels, and indeed impute to them crimes of which they were innocent, guilty as was their general conduct. Vukasin, who was governor of Macedonia, pro- claimed his independence of the Tsar and even assumed the title of King of Serbia in 1366. According to legend he attacked UroS and contrived his death some time in 1367 ; as a matter of fact, however, the Tsar survived his rebellious vassal.^ In the meantime the Turks had occupied Adrianople, in 1360, and made it the capital of ' Lavisse and Rambaud, Histoire Generate, Tome iii, chap xviii, p. 915. This chapter is by the late Stojan Novakovic and A. Maiet. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 53 their Empire, and began, under Murad I, to press upon the small Serb States which had been formed beyond the Struma. In 1371 King VukaSin, at the head of a combined army of Slavs, Greeks, Hungarians, and Wallachs marched against Adrianople, and suffered on the banks of the Marica a disastrous defeat at a spot thereafter known as Srb Sindin — " The Serb Rout ", Vuka§in himself is said to have been drowned in the river, or, as other accounts have it, was murdered after the battle for the sake of the gold ornaments he wore. In what remained to Tsar Uro§ the Baltic of the Zeta (Montenegro), and the Altomanovic of the land soon to be the Hercegovina had broken away before the death of the Tsar two months after the battle of Adrianople in December 1371. Uro§ had left no direct heirs and his dominions were disputed among the Serb princes. Of these Lazar Hrebeljanovic, a connection of the Royal House whose name has become the very symbol of the tragedy of Serbia, was recognized as the ruler of Serbia north of the Sar mountains, with the exception of the territories mentioned above. Although he is always called in the legends Tsar Lazar, and is commonly considered the last of the Tsars, he never assumed the title, which indeed would hardly have consorted with his actual power, but entitled himself merely Knez or Prince. Another relative of the Nemanjas Tvrtko of Bosnia entertained designs on the higher dignity, and in 1376 proclaimed himself King of Serbia and Bosnia, but no warfare ensued between the two princes. Macedonia had fallen under the suzerainty of the Turks which was acknowledged by its ruler, the son of Vuka§in, the far-famed Marko Kraljevic (Marko the King's son) the great hero of a cycle of ballads which deal with his marvellous exploits and those of his magic horse Sarac. His seat was at Prilip, where he was to sleep till the hour of national resurrection was to strike, and when, in the first Balkan War of 1912, the Serbs avenged Kosovo, many of the soldiers ascribed their success to the presence, which they 54 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS affirmed, of Marko on Sarac who led them to the assault. In sober history he was a vassal of the Turk, and it is a mystery of popular legend how and why his figure assumed in the imagination of the whole of the Southern Slav race the place which it occupies. Lazar's strength was diminished by the necessity of beating back the attacks of the Hungarians, and in 1386 the Turks captured NiS and forced the prince to pay tribute and provide mercenaries for the Turkish armies. Three years later occurred the great disaster which has burnt itself into the memory and historical consciousness of the Serb race ever since. Lazar had fixed the capital of Serbia, which at various times had been located at RaSka (Novipazar), PriStina, Prizren, and Skoplje, at KruSevac not far from the junction of the two main streams of the Morava, where he built the beautiful church which still exists, and the "White Tower", now in ruins, from which he set out on his last fateful campaign. An alliance was formed between Serbia, the Zeta, and Bosnia for a great attempt to drive back the tide of Turkish invasion. The two armies met on June 15, 1389, on the field of Kosovo (the "Field of Blackbirds"), and then was settled for five hundred years the fate of the Balkan Peninsula. The battle was long and stubbornly contested and the result was only decided, according to the legend, by the treachery of Vuk Brankovic,^ a Serb noble who was in command of one wing of the Christian host and, while the issue was still in suspense, rode off the field at the head of 12,000 men in accordance with a previous agreement with Murad, who had promised him the throne of Serbia. ^ The Serbs, ' The legends have dealt hardly with hig name. There seems to be no proof in fact of his alleged treachery, and his family became the leaders of the Serbs in their subsequent resistance. ' " The story is often repeated in Bosnia that at the time of the Austro- Hungarian occupation in 1878 an old Serb Moslem Bey named Brankovid was taunted by a Hungarian officer of Hussars who said, ' It was one of your name who ran away at Kosovo, and gave the country to the Turks'. 'Yes, yes, we know that, alas 1 ' said the Bey, 'but remember, Major, the men under him were a contingent of Hungarian mercenaries ' ". Prince Lazarovic-Hrebeljanovic, The Servian People, vol. i, p. 290 note. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 55 overwhelmed by weight of numbers, gave way : the Turkish victory was complete. Both sovereigns lost their lives, for Murad, riding over the scene of the battle whon all was over, was killed by a Serb knight, Milo§ Obilic or Kobili6. The catastrophe impressed itself deeply on the minds of the Southern Slavs and has become the centre of the " Kosovo cycle '•' of Serb popular poetry and legend. In these poems, where fact is mingled with fiction, all the incidents preceding and attending the * battle are dealt with ; the departure of Lazar the " Golden Crown of Serbia " from the White Tower of KruSevac ; his attend- ance by his father-in-law Jug Bogdan and his brothers-in- law the nine Jugovic ; the choice offered him by the Virgin of a heavenly or an earthly crown and his acceptance of the former ; the taunt levelled by Brankovic against the courage of Milog ; the proof offered to the latter who stole to the Turkish camp before the battle and slew the Sultan — this is the popular version — the fall of Lazar in the thick of the press (for the ballads will not admit that he was taken prisoner and executed) ; the news of the death of her hus- band and brothers brought to the Tsarica Milica at KruSevac by two ravens ; and the curse of the Serbs on the head of Vuk Brankovic who on the field of battle had betrayed the all-glorious Tsar. Ever since, June 15th has been a day of mourning, while the red and black cap of the Montenegrins is said to typify the blood that was shed at Kosovo and mourning for the event. These legends served to keep alive the national consciousness of the defeated, and at Kumanovo it was to shouts of " Kosovo, Kosovo ! " that the Serb infantry charged the Turkish line when the long- delayed day of vengeance was come and they were to enter again the great Dusan's capital. "With the battle of Kosovo ended the existence of Serbia as a sovereign State, but for some years it maintained its internal autonomy under Turkish suzerainty. Bajazet, the successor of Murad, was in no condition to push matters to extremes, and Stephen Lazarevic was permitted by ;the conqueror to retain his father's dominions as " Despot " on 56 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS payment of an annual tribute and the furnishing of a Serb contingent to the Ottoman forces ; his sister, also, married the Sultan — a fact which gave the latter's successors a claim to the throne. The new ruler set himself to the organiza- tion of his State, procured Belgrade from the Hungarians and made it his capital, a change significant of the altered posi- tion of the country. Like his father, and indeed all the Nemanjici, he was a benefactor of the Church, and founded the great monastery of Manassija. After proving himself a loyal tributary to the Sultans — and it must be said in extenuation that he may well have considered that resist- ance would bring him worse evils in its train, while the Hungarians who had attacked Uro§ V and Lazar on several occasions and had done nothing previously to give assistance against the Turks could not complain if now they had to fight without Serb aid — the Despot died in 1427. The remainder of this period of Serb history need not detain us long in so cursory a survey. As he had no heirs Stephen Lazarevic nominated as his successor George Brankovic, son of that Vuk who had betrayed, according to legend, his country at Kosovo. His title was disputed by Murad II the great-grandson of Tsar Lazar, but he succeeded in maintaining it against Turkish intervention. The reign of the new ruler was one long-continued struggle with the Turks, waged now with, now without, the aid of the Hungarians under the famous John Hunyad, for it was inevitable that Serbia, less fortunate in some ways in its geographical position than the Roumanian principalities, should be bowed down completely under the Turkish yoke. The Turks were now pressing on into Hungary, and Serbia, which holds the gate of the East and therefore of the West, lay directly in their path, and suffered the fate of every State which holds an important strategical position with inadequate forces, just as at the present time she has been subjected to the reverse pressure of the German Drang nach Osten — only when there is a strong Southern Slav Kingdom will there be a tolerable guarantee of peace in the Balkans, and all efforts by whatever motive induced, to weaken the A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 57 Serbo-Croats will be direct causes of further struggles. After a long life replete with even more than the usual vicissitudes of Balkan sovereigns, George Brankovi6 died in 1457 at a great age. To him is due the great castle of Smederevo (Semendria) with its defiant cross worked into the structure of its walls now in ruins, and still further damaged, according to report, by the Austro-German bom- bardment. His death was followed by fresh dissensions, and in 1459 the Turks, their hands freed by the capture of Constantinople, put a definite end to all semblance of independence, and what remained of Serbia became the Turkish pashalik of Belgrade. The fate of the sister Serb State was not long delayed. Stephen Tvrtko I of Bosnia, as has been seen, had pro- claimed himself king in 1376, and a year later had occupied the land of Hum, Zahumlija or Primorija later the Herce- govina, a province whose medieval history, though popu- larly it is now generally looked upon as a part of Bosnia, had been generally linked with that of Serbia, and whose inhabitants differ in some traits of character from the Bosnians. Bosnia, however, was distracted by religious strife between the Catholic sovereigns on the one side and the majority of the population on the other. The latter were largely Orthodox, and perhaps still more largely Bogomil. The Bogomils, of the origin of whose name more than one account is given — the meaning is perhaps " dear to God " — had embraced a form of Manichseism, and were in fact the forerunners of the Albigenses, though to term them the forefathers of the Reformation is to strain analogy and to ignore decisive differences. Their religion seems to have been free from those darker elements of devil-worship which accompanied pure Manichseism, and which, it has been suggested,^ formed the real gravamen against the Knights Templars and led to their suppression throughout Europe, while the Hospitallers were left unmolested. Their religion was of a simple Puritan cast, but it brought ' By Mr. Hilaire Belloc in a magazine article written some seven years ago, whose title I forget. 58 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS down upon them the thunders of Rome whose obedient servants the Bosnian kings were. Add to these internal discords, oppressions, and risings, the struggle with the Hungarians on the one side and the Turks on the other, and it is easy to see how depressing is the tale of the last years of Bosnian freedom without even the relief — and the inspiration — of a heroic tragedy such as Kosovo. The integrity of the new kingdom was not long maintained, for the separate traditions of Priraorija found expression in 1448 when Stephen Vuk5ic became Duke of Primorija.^ For his title he adopted the German "Herzog" Serbized into Hercega, hence his realm became known as the Hercegovina " the Duchy ", the name which it has always since borne. In 1463 Bosnia fell before the Turks, who were actually welcomed by the Bogomils as liberators from Catholic oppression. A few years later, about 1482, the Hercegovina fell likewise. In these provinces the nobility largely apostatized to Islam in order to retain their posses- sions led also, as were many of the peasantry, by their Bogomilism to see in Mohammedanism a religion with elements akin to their own, so that ultimately we may see in the religious oppression of the Roman Curia one of the causes of that strange anomaly a large European Moslem element in the north-western Balkans. Such names as those of the Kulenovic and Kapitanovic among the present Bosnian Begs who are, many of them, the descendants of the old nobility take us back to the earliest days of Bosnian history. One State alone maintained through the centuries in its rugged mountains the standard of Serb independence, the ever-unconquered Crnagora, or Montenegro, whose inhabi- tants, recruited by those Serb nobles who had not been killed by the Turks, for they disdained apostasy, have never come under Turkish rule. ' This is suggested as the proper title by Sir Arthur Evans. The Dukes were popularly known as the Dukes of S. Sava, a piecing together of their first title with another " Keeper of the Sepulchre of S. Sava." Vide Evans, Through Bosnia and the Herzegovina, p. xlvii note. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 59 With the final conquest of the Balkan Peninsula by the Turks Serb history divides itself into two main streams, that of the Serbs who remained in their old homes, and that of those of the nation who migrated into southern Hungary. The record of the former is one of almost unceasing struggle against the conquerors linked from time to time with the story of the efforts made by the House of Habsburg to drive back the tide of Ottoman invasion. The Turkish Serbs were not altogether without an element of national unity, for the Turks, not so much from policy as from their theocratic conception of the State, allowed the Orthodox Church a great deal of autonomy not only in religious but in secular affairs also, the ecclesiastical functionaries acting as the go-between through whom the Sultan acted. The settlement of the Spahis as a territorial aristocracy was attended by great exactions of a financial order, while the inequality of Christian and Moslem before the law denied a remedy in these as in other matters. Yet the most grievous exaction of all was the " devchurme ", or blood tax. Every seven years the children of the conquered were examined, and the strongest and brightest were carried off to Constantinople to be trained in the Moslem faith and ultimately to be enrolled in the corps of Janissaries who spread the terror of the Turkish name wherever they went. Thus the nation was deprived of the promise of its soundest elements, while the Ottoman State, like some monstrous vampire, throve on the blood which it sucked from its victims and turned the vital forces of the conquered to their own destruction. To one, however, of those who had been thus seized the Serbs owed a great debt. One of the greatest of all the Grand Viziers was Mehemet Sokolovic, the minister of Suleyman the Magnificent, who in childhood had been seized under the devchurme. The fall of the Serb kingdom had entailed the fall of the Serb patriarchate of Pe6 and the Church was included in the Archiepiscopal See of Ochrida which had been in Greek hands since the fall of the second Bulgarian Empire. For some years all 60 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the efforts of the Serbs for their reHgious autonomy were unavaihng, but in 1557 Mehemet Sokolovic, after an interview with his brother the monk Macarius restored the patriarchate of Pec with an extensive jurisdiction over the Serb lands, a few central Macedonian sees alone being reserved to the See of Ochrida as suffragans, as that chair could not be destroyed and from its historical associations had been respected by DuSan himself. Macarius was made patriarch and became the recognized head of the Turkish Serbs, affording them a certain measure of protection and supplying a focus of national unity. This restored patri- archate which formed part of the great scheme of re- organization carried out by Sokolovic, who divided the Empire into beglerbegliks and sanjaks, endured till 1767 when, together with the See of Ochrida, it was sacrificed to the jealousy of the Greeks and the fears of the Turks. Sokolovic was by no means the only high official — apart from those recruited from the Phanar — of non-Turkish birth. Six other Grand Viziers were the product of the blood tax, and so numerous were the Serbs in the Imperial service that it is stated ^ that till the eighteenth century a large proportion of the administrative documents in Constantinople were drawn up in Serb. " It has been rightly said that if during the period of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the Servian people had been willing to abjure their Christian faith, the Ottoman State would be to-day a Servian Empire of Mohammedan faith ". That may be an exaggeration: the Serbs, however, re- mained in the great mass true to their religion in spits of all temptation, while the national spirit was kept alive by the recital of the heroic ballads of their past glories, the memory of which treasured in popular song land story contributed largely to the keen historical consciousness of the race, and imbued it with the vital and enduring conviction that a people with such a past could look forward with ultimate confidence to a future. Not all State forms perished, for while the bulk of the ' Lazarovic-Hrebeljanovid. Op. cit. vol i, p. 322. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 61 nation remained in its old homes thousands fled before the Turks, and establishing themselves in southern Hungary linked their fortunes with those of the House of Habsburcr which not long after acquired the crown of S. Stephen. Here, for two centuries, they enjoyed a certain measure of self-government under their Despots of the family of Brankovic, the object of the Emperors being to utilize them as a defence against the Turks. All that is here necessary is to indicate briefly the relations between the Habsburgs and their Serb subjects. The latter took part in all the wars waged between the Imperalists and the Turks in the sixteenth century, and when, in 1529, Suleyman besieged Vienna it was the action of the Serbs under their leader Paul Bakic which made it possible for the Austrians to raise the siege. The Hungarian Istvanfi says : "It was the Serb Bakich who saved Vienna".^ After more than a century of desultory warfare Serb forces shared in the campaign of the Duke of Lorraine, 1685 to 1687, and also in that of 1689, their Despot at the time being George Brankovic III. A great deal of the Austrian success in this last campaign was due to the whole-hearted support of the Serbs both of Hungary and Serbia, and General Piccolomini acting under the Margrave of Baden, the commander-in- chief, was able to carry his arms into the heart of Old Serbia. KruSevac and other towns of historic memory fell into his hands, and the national hopes of the Serbs ran high. The spirit thus manifested, however, alarmed the Emperor Leopold at the possible growth of an independent Serb State. Acting under his orders the Margrave of Baden invited the Despot to confer with him on matters concerning the campaign. On his arrival at the camp, October 26, 1689, Brankovic was seized and imprisoned at Eger, in Bohemia, where he remained until his death in 1711. "When questioned by Russia as to the cause of the Despot's incarceration the Austrian Government returned the cynical reply, "Nihil mali fecit, sed sic ratio status ' Page 163 of his History of Hungary, Cit, Lazarovid-Hrebeljanovic, ut aujpra, vol. ii, p. 562. 62 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS exposcit ", an answer which was typical of the perfidy which has throughout actuated the House of Habsburg in its dealings with the Serbs. The next year occurred the great migration which has left its mark on Old Serbia to the present day. On the death of Piccolomini the Austrian campaign collapsed, and the Emperor sent a rescript to the Serb Patriarch of Pec, Arsen III, inviting him to head an immigration into Austrian territory. He promised com- plete liberty of conscience, and full rights of self-govern- ment. The Patriarch accepted the offer and fled into Hungary at the head of some 37,000 families. In reference to this migration a subsequent Austrian Minister, Baron Bartenstein, reported to Joseph II after a commission of inquiry : " It was not a case of offering refuge to fugitives — allowing them to go on to waste lands — but one of inducing persons to leave established and well-provided homes where they had been undisturbed in the exercise of their religious faith, and to pass at the peril of their lives and estate from Turkish domination to ours ".^ The Serbs, therefore, had well-defined covenanted rights, one of the articles of agreement being that they might elect a Vojvode (duke) as their head, while the Patriarch was established at Karlovci (Karlowitz). The title of Patriarch, after being discontinued, was revived in 1848 and still continues. The first Vojvode was John Monasterlija. The aim of the Emperor was of course to keep in his power both the civil and religious heads of the Serb people. The Ottoman Government, however, filled the vacancy in the See of Pec, and, as stated above, the line of the Patriarchs of Pec con- tinued till 1767. Under Monasterlija the Serbs took part in Prince Eugene's campaign of 1697, and so well did they acquit themselves that, after the battle of Zenta, the famous general described them as " ses meilleurs eclaireurs, sa cavalerie la plus legere, les defenseurs les plus stirs des places conquises ". The Treaty of Karlowitz which ended ' Baron Bartenstein, Report on the Illyrian Nation. Cit. Lazarovic- Hrebeljanovic, ut supra, vol. ii, p. 595. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 63 this war restored Transylvania and southern Hungary to the Habsburgs. They served also in Eugene's victorious campaigns of 1716 and 1718, resulting in the acquisition of Belgrade and the district of the lower Morava which were held till 1739. After the death of Monasterlija the Vojvode- ship was not continued, and he was succeeded as head of the Hungarian Serbs by the Metropolitan of Karlovci, the name " Serb Vojvodina " alone remaining as a token of the past. One by one the privileges of the Serbs were taken from them as the Turkish menace grew less insistent and the Habsburgs had less need of their services in war, and so intolerable did they find their position that in the years 1751 to 1753 an emigration said to have composed 100,000 individvals left Hungary for Russia where they settled on the Dnieper. The Government of Maria Theresa in alarm established an Illyrian Aulic Council to supervise Serb affairs. The new Council came into frequent collision with the Hungarian Court Chancellery, the Hungarians being bitterly jealous of the privileged position of the Serbs whose greatest and most implacable foes they remain to this day. On the other hand the Viennese Hof- skriegsrath, for military reasons, was in general favour- able to the Serbs, so that the different points of view of Budapest and the Vienna "Greater Austria" party were already in evidence a century and a half ago. In 1777 the Illyrian Aulic Council was abolished, following on fresh disputes, and a Declaratorium Illy- ricum was published dealing with religious and educational matters. Thirteen years later Leopold II reestablished an Illyrian Aulic Chancellery only to abolish it again on Magyar instance in 1792. Thus the Serbs suffered under the seesaw of the more statesmanhke views of Vienna and the inflated chauvinism of Hungary, Austria's dme damnee. The same course of playing fast and loose with the Habsburg Serbs (and Croats) according to the necessities of the moment was continued throughout the nineteenth century till to-day neither Vienna nor 64 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Budapest possesses hardly a friend among the Southern Slavs. ^ III The Resurgence of Serbia During the eighteenth century more than one Austro- Russian project had been mooted for the partition of the Balkans, but with the advent of the great Revolutionary wars all such designs were of necessity laid aside, and the preoccupations of the Great Powers proved the oppor- tunity of the Serbs. Yet when the revolt came it took the form of a " loyal " revolt of Serbs who wished to enforce the Sultan's will. At this time Serbia lay under the heel of the Janissaries and their leaders, the Dahi, whose truculence and exactions were such that Haji Mustapha the Pasha of Belgrade, a mild and benevolent ruler whose name is still revered in Serbia,^ prevailed upon the reform- ing Sultan Selim III to order their removal from the country. They were not long afterwards permitted to return, whereupon they took vengeance upon Mustapha, whom they put to death, and resorted to their old practices, murdering the most prominent Serbs who were likely to prove dangerous to their authority. The result was the ' A full account of the Southern Slavs in Austria during the nine- teenth century is given in The Southern Slav Question and the Habsburg Monarchy by E. W. Seton-Watson. At the time of writing this work — the recognized authority on the subject — Dr. Seton-Watson was, as he has acknowledged, somewhat prejudiced against the Serbs of the Kingdom, whom he regarded rather from the " black-yellow " point of view as an adherent of the " Greater Austria" idea. This does not in any way affect his treatment of his main subject, and indeed only appears in one or two references to the Kingdom of Serbia. His services to the cause of Southern Slav union are known to all. See also H. W. Steed, The Hapsburg Monarchy. ' A descendant of his was Turkish Delegate at the Conference of London at the end of 1912 when the first attempt was made to make peace between the Balkan Allies and Turkey, and a graceful allusion to his ancestor was made by the first Serb Delegate. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 65 great rising of 1804 which at first was a movement to restore the legitimate authority of the Sultan and to punish the Janissaries who had set themselves to oppose his will. The leader of the revolt was the great hero of modern Serbia, George Petrovic, known from his swarthy com- plexion as Kara George (Black George — Kara is Turkish : in Serb Crni Gjorgje) the grandfather of the present King Peter Karagjorgjevic.i A man of great force of character, daring in fight, ruthless against traitors to the cause, and of fierce temperament, he had at first refused the post of leader, alleging his violent character. The people with surer insight insisted, realizing that a successful revolt against Turkish power was not likely to be effected save by a man of determination and violence. To the last in his personal habits he preserved the simplicity of the peasant stock from which he was sprung. The first campaign was successful, the Sultan even ordering the Pasha of Bosnia to aid the Serbs, with the result that the Janissaries were defeated and the four Dahi beheaded. The scope of the rising was now extended and the Serbs aimed at internal autonomy under the Sultan's suzerainty. Thus brouf^ht into direct conflict with the Ottoman State the Serbs continued their career of success, and by 1807 had made themselves masters of the territory subsequently comprised in the principality of Serbia as it existed till 1878. A Senate of twelve members was appointed to assist the Supreme Chief, schools were opened, and the work of internal reorganization set in hand, while the Assembly, or Skupgtina, represented the germ of Parliamentary insti- tutions. The next five years were marked by internal dissensions due to the jealousy of the vojvodes at the power of Kara George, and by participation in the war of Kussia against Turkey. The Peace of Bucharest, hovv^ever, concluded by Russia under the influence of the French ' So spelt in the Croatian orthography. Karageorgevid is more familiar, but is really indefensible as being partly in Croatian ortho- graphy and partly English. Kara George is too famiUar to be altered without risk of pedantry. 5 66 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS menace, left Serbia to the mercy of the Turks though Article 8 stipulated for their internal autonomy. The country was invaded from all sides, and in 1813 Kara George suddenly lost heart and fled into Austria, and the country fell under Turkish rule. The sudden loss of nerve on the part of Kara George must always remain one of the psychological puzzles of history, so unexpected was it, and so utterly out of harmony with the whole character of the man as evinced in his whole career. Most of the vojvodes followed Kara George into Austrian territory, but one among the most influential remained — Milos Obrenovic. Like his former chief of peasant stock, though well-to-do in a modest way, he had taken a promi- nent part in the insurrection, and the flight of his companions left him the most influential man in Serbia. Whether from deep policy, or from more interested motives, he bowed to the storm, made his peace with the new Pasha, and even helped to suppress an incipient rising. On Palm Sunday 1815, however, he raised anew the standard of revolt under the oak-tree of Takovo, and so immediate were the suc- cesses of the Serbs, coupled with the diplomatic aid of Russia whose hands were now free, that in October the Turks came to terms and granted the people their internal autonomy, with a Council representing the twelve districts of the principality, and a SkupStina which was to raise the amount of the tribute. A Turkish pasha continued to occupy Belgrade. Two years later Kara George returned, to the discomfiture of Milo§ who thought there was no room for two kings in Brentford. The two men had never been on friendly terms, being indeed in some ways of too similar a character. There followed a crime which must always deeply sully the character of Milo§ and was the pre- cursor of numberless woes to come. Milo§ betrayed the arrival of Kara George to the Pasha and was bidden to procure hi3 murder. Kara George was then murdered in his sleep and his head forwarded to the Pasha. Thus perished by a foul assassination the hero of modern Serbia, her first leader in the national revolt, the man who had shown the way to the A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 67 resurrection of the nation. This was the origin of the feud between the Obrenovic and the Karagjorgjcvic families, which ended only with the murder of Alexander in 1903 and the extinction of the Obrenovici. The same year MiloS was proclaimed Prince, though the title was not formally recognized by the Porte till 1830, when a final settlement was arrived at between the prin- cipality and its suzerain. Two years later six districts which had formed part of the Serbia of Kara George, 1807- 1813, but which had not taken part in the last rising, were definitely added to the little State which then attained the boundaries which it possessed till 1878. A Turkish garrison was still maintained in the fortress of Belgrade which, by a strained interpretation, was made to include the town as well as the citadel. No full account of the events of the last century can be given in this brief outline of Serb history, and it is only possible to illustrate the main tendencies of its politics, external and internal. One immediate result of the inde- pendence of Serbia was the change of methods rather than aims which was the necessary consequence in Austrian policy. The main idea of the Habsburgs had been to make use of the Serbs as an advance guard against the Turks, to humour them when their services were required, but vigorously to suppress any movement which might lead to the restoration of an independent Serb State, and to push southwards over, yet by means of, the Serb race. The successful risings of the Serbs, however, entirely altered the terms of the problem, for the centre of the political and national aspirations of the Serbs was now transferred to its old home beyond the Danube. As long as the Serb movement had its source in the Hungarian Serbs it could be controlled by the Habsburgs, and was in fact confounded in the southern advance of the dynasty, but the establishment of the Principality meant the rise of the very political formation which Habsburg policy had con- sistently opposed, seeing the danger to itself involved in the establishment of an independent centre of Serb nationality. 68 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Between the Habsburgs and the young State there could be no real friendship, though it was not at once that the fact was grasped by all Serb politicians. Hitherto the hopes of the Serbs had been centred in the Imperial House, in which alone they could see either a refuge from the past or a hope for the future, and trusting as they did, in spite of repeated disillusionment, to the Imperial pro- fessions — for it is curious how that faithless and perfidious House has for so long been able to inspire a passionate loyalty in the breasts of the servants towards whom it has never for its own part evinced the slightest loyalty or shown the least gratitude : its falsity has been beyond measure — they were unable at first in their simplicity to see that under the altered circumstances Austria was in the nature of things their most formidable foe. The Austrian Drang nach Osten which is not a tendency that dates from 1866, though the events of that year accentuated it, could from now on only be accomplished at the expense of the Serbs and in opposition to them. Serbia lay in Austria's way and must be assimilated or crushed ; the policy of the eighteenth century must be followed, but its methods and formal pro- fessions must be cast in a new mould. At once, therefore, the court of the little State became a hotbed of intrigue in which England, France, and Austria aUied themselves against the influence of Eussia. It is noteworthy that the latter was looked upon as desiring to wield an omnipotent influence over the destinies of the principality, while England and France professed their desire — as against alleged Russian pretensions hien entendu, not against Turkey — for its real independence, a profession in which Austria for motives of policy acquiesced. The absurd dread of Pan- Slavism it will be observed, is also not a thing that dates either from the Crimean War or from 1876. Milos himself worked in concert with the British representative. Colonel Hodges, against Russian influence.^ These intrigues of high policy ' "Vi basti sapere che per ordine del Principe lavoro col colonello Hodges per sottrare questo paese alia dispotica influenza russa per A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 69 aggravated the internal troubles incidental to the manner in which the new State had been formed. As will have been seen the Serbs were the first of the Balkan peoples to establish their practical independence, leading the way in this regard for the better known Greek war of inde- pendence. Moreover, unlike the Greeks, who owed their independence to the intervention of the Great Powers, and the Bulgarians who, without striking a blow in their own cause, emerged fully equipped from the will of the Russian Tsar, as Athene from the head of Zeus, they had gained their freedom by their own unaided efforts and indomitable perseverance. Thus they never experienced the fostering care which has made their eastern neighbours the spoilt darlings of Europe. From this cause sprang further consequences. All their national institutions have been evolved on their own soil and by their own efforts, their administration in all its branches has been "home made " as has been their administrative and military class. They never had the services of foreign organizers and administrators placed at their disposal to set their feet in the way of progress and to obviate the dangers attending their first steps in national life. This must always be remembered when the progress of Serbia is compared with that of the other Balkan States. Mistakes were bound to be made, and progress under such condi- tions has necessarily been slow. On the other hand there have been compensating advantages of no mean order. The national spirit and self-reliance have been greatly fostered, no bureaucracy of alien habits of thought has been foisted on the people, the dynasty is national and of the spirit of the race, and the whole life of the nation is instinct with native vitality and national con- sciousness drawing its strength from its own inner resources. Others have paid dearly for a more rapid progress having its roots in alien elements. metterlo, come la Grecia, sotto la protezione delle grandi Potenzo europee ". Extract from a letter of Dr. B. S. Cuniberti, the physician of MiIo§. F. Cuniberti, La Serbia e la dinastia degli Obrenovitch, p. 109. 70 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS The government of Milos was a despotism made more harsh to his subjects by the manner in which he secured to himself valuable commercial monopolies, the latter grievance weighing with them even more than the former, for the people were not ripe for a parliamentary rSgime. Russia espoused the cause of the malcontents and in 1838, following an abortive Constitution of nominally "advanced" character in 1835, Milos was forced to grant a Constitution, the chief feature of which was a State Council of seven- teen members, irremovable, to whom the four Ministers (appointed by the Prince) had to make their reports. It was in fact the substitution of an oligarchy of "Revolution families " for a personal despotism, and proved even less to the taste of the democratic Serbs than the former rSgime; an autocrat may rule over a people fundamentally democratic (not in the political sense of the word), or even socialistic, in feeling and sentiment as can be seen in the example of Russia, but not so an oligarchy without any historic and traditional basis of aristocratic service in the past but drawn from the ranks of the people. As was to be expected friction increased and in 1839 Milo§ was forced to abdicate by his oligarchic opponents to whom in turn the peasants were in opposition. The Prince's eldest son Milan succeeded but died a month later, being followed by Michael his younger brother. Two men, Petronjevic and Vucic, who had been regents for his brother, were imposed on him by the Porte as Councillors. Dissatisfaction in the country increased and demands were made for the removal of the Councillors and a change of the seat of Government to KruSevac. The regents fell, and Prince Michael gained a free hand, the people preferring to fill one ditch with money rather than seventeen. Michael rushed headlong into the course of Western progress accompanied by the taxation which such progress entails in Eastern lands. The people objected to a good deal of the progress, and even more strongly to the taxation. Petronjevic and Vu5ic returned from exile, and in 1842 Michael followed his father into exile. As his A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 71 successor the country chose Alexander Karafrjorgjevic son of the great hberator. The new prince, though personally popular and a good administrator, lacked the dynamic force of Kara George, and concentrated his attention on the interior development of his country, a highly necessary work as in itself the only real foundation for a " spirited foreign policy ", and various public works were undertaken. In 1848, while not abandoning its neutrality, Serbia lent its unofficial aid to the Serbs and Croats of the Habsburc Monarchy then fighting under the great Ban Jela5ic against the tyrannical Magyars, who had skilfully hoodwinked European opinion, as they have largely done to this day, into thinking that they were struggling for liberty and a constitutional regime. The Crimean War added to the Prince's difficulties as Russia not unnaturally expected his aid. The pressure of Austria and the Western Powers was, however, too strong, and he remained neutral. The mass of the people was angered at what was considered his dependence upon Austria, for their instinct did not deceive them as to who was the most dangerous enemy of Serbia ; the oligarchs exploited this resentment and in December 1858 Alexander was forced to go the way of Milo§ and Michael. The former was immediately recalled, to the dismay of the oligarchs, and reigned till his death in September 1860. The second reign of his son Michael was marked by enormous progress both in the internal economic and political development of Serbia and in its international position. The State Council was reformed and made amenable to the law courts, while the SkupStina was regularly summoned every third year. The army was also reorganized and a French officer installed as Minister of War. All this time the Turks had remained in the frontier fortresses, but in 1862 they gave the Prince an opportunity of which he quickly availed himself. Following upon an insignificant encounter in Belgrade between the Serbs and the Turks the Pasha bombarded the city from the fortress. The government immediately made representations to the 72 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Powers demanding the evacuation of the fortresses. These representations met with little response, and Prince Michael was attacked by the English Press, which was obsessed by "the superstitions of an antiquated diplomacy", as Mr. Balfour once described the Turcophil policy of the past fifty years. The affair dragged on, but in 1867, in the then condition of Europe, the Porte thought it advisable to give way, saving its face by the formula that the fortresses should be confided to the care of the Prince. In the domain of foreign policy the reign was one of great activity based upon the idea of a Balkan bloc. With Montenegro an agreement was reached in 1866 that if the frontiers of the two States should ever become coter- minous the smaller would enter into a formal union with the larger. In Macedonia Serb propaganda was pushed forward and many schools were established which endured till they were dissolved by the Turks after the Russo- Turkish War. Close relationships were entertained with Eoumania and in 1867 an alliance was concluded with Greece and an agreement arrived at with the Bulgarian Committee in Bucharest. At this time the Bulgarians hardly entertained separate nationalist aspirations, and it was agreed that, when a Bulgarian State should be formed, it should be united with Serbia, full equality being given to both languages. It was in the same train of ideas that the Serb government lent its vigorous aid at Constantinople to the project of a Bulgarian Exarchate ; in fact the Bulgars were regarded rather as a local division of the Southern Slavs proper whose future was bound up in that of the Serbs. The object of all this activity was intervention in Bosnia and Macedonia and an anticipation of the war of 1912. Never before or since has Serbia occupied so com- manding a diplomatic position in the Balkans. All these plans, however, were cut short by the murder of the Prince. A conspiracy was set on foot, as has been alleged, in the interests of the Karagjorgjevic, though there is reason to doubt it, and on June 10, 1868, the Prince was assassinated in the park of TopSider near Belgrade, the bitter fruit of A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 73 the murder of Kara George by his father. It was a bad day for Serbia. The political ends of the plot miscarried, and in default of direct heirs his cousin Milan, the grandson of MiloS's younger brother Ephrem, was proclaimed Prince under a regency, the new ruler being only fourteen years old. A new Constitution was drawn up on more modern lines than the existing one and promulgated in 1869. The executive power was placed in the hands of the ruler, while a Skup§tina which was to meet every year was given the legislative power but without the faculty of initiation. One-third of its members were nominated by the Prince, and as in our " unlearned Parliament " of 1404 no official or lawyer was eligible for election — a provision of some utility not unworthy of being copied, perhaps in a modi- fied form, by other more historical legislative assemblies. Prince Milan proved to be as worthless a ruler as he was despicable in private life. Showy in his gifts, of ' undoubted ability, considerable oratorical power, and hand- some presence, he was utterly lacking in moral stability and steadfastness of character, and sacrificed the interests of his country to his private pleasures and caprices. His reign like that of his son was one long scandal. In 1876, the year following the Bosnian rising of 1875, Serbia with Montenegro declared war against the Turks, but Milan's armies met with no success and only the intervention of the Powers saved the country. The following year, after the fall of Plevna, Serbia joined in the Russo-Turkish War and gained considerable successes, but the Treaty of San Stefano proved a great disappointment to the nation. Russia favoured only Bulgarian aims and stipulated for a great Bulgaria which should include not only all Macedonia but districts such as Vranja which were incontestably Serb, while the territorial gains of Serbia were to be few ; in fact the Treaty of Berlin, which superseded that of San Stefano, was more favourable to Serb aspirations in some respects in spite of the occupation of Bosnia and the Hercegovina by Austria, provinces which the San Stefano treaty left 74 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS to Turkey though by the secret convention of Eeichstadt Russia had agreed to an Austrian occupation. Thereafter Milan threw himself into the arms of Austria and became practically an Austrian satrap, to the great indignation of the Serbs and the Radical party, which was supported by the great majority of the people. The proclamation of Serbia as a kingdom in 1882 failed to mend matters, while a further shock to King Milan's position resulted from the unsuccessful war against Bulgaria in 1885 which followed the Eastern Roumelian revolution and the union of that province with the principality of Bulgaria. The scandals of Milan's married life brought him into general contempt while his opposition to the Radicals resulted in a conflict with his people which finally made his position untenable, so that in 1889, after granting a more liberal Constitution, he abdicated in favour of his son Alexander, a minor, who succeeded to a State which in 1878 had been extended by the acquisition of the districts of Pirot, Ni§, and Vranja. Milan and his Queen Natalie both agreed to live outside Serbia in the interests of their son and dynasty. The Hgime of the Regents brought no alleviation in the internal situation for M. Ristic, the head of the regency, was bitterly opposed to the Radicals and their leader M. Pa§i6, the " Grand Old Man " of Serbia. The denouement was startling, for on April 13, 1893, the young king, not quite seventeen years of age, arrested the regents at a dinner in the palace and proclaimed himself of age. No good results followed this coup d'etat for King Alexander was not a strong man as was hoped, but merely self-willed and obstinate, and his reign brought Serbia to the lowest depths of her fortunes and made her a byword in Europe. Finding himself unable to control the situation, at midnight, January 22, 1894, he installed a Cabinet under M. Simic, recently Minister at Vienna, and prepared the way for the return of King Milan ; at midnight on April 2 of the same year M. Simic was replaced by M. Nikolajevic ; and at mid- night on May 21 he abolished by royal ukase the Constitu- tion of 1888, replacing it by that of 18G9, after which he A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 75 recalled the Cabinet which had prudently resigned in view of the penalties involved. The return of King Milan did not effect any improvement, for it was hardly likely that Milan, who had failed to conduct his own government, should be able to conduct that of his son. In view of the growing peril to the dynasty Milan and Natalie became reconciled, but nothing could stay the downward course of events. Alexander claimed to instal in power neutral cabinets of his own choice in order to allay the strife of political parties, and give stability to the administration. The old worship of Parliamentarianism has largely decayed of late years ; it is no longer generally thought that the unique and complete cure for human ills is the transplanta- tion of the existing form of the English Constitution ; we have seen a good deal of its inefficiency, and talk of political liberty is not so alluring now that we have machine-made politics and politicians. The boon of the franchise in the absence of proportional representation means frequently a Hobson's choice between Tweedledum and Tweedledee — Arcades ambo. There is a great deal to be said, especially in countries less developed politically, for a "non-Parliamentary" executive with a strong monarchical basis, which shall be above political partizan- ship, and the tyranny of the party caucus, of political "bosses" great and small, of the machine which crushes out individuals who do not conform in everything to the party ticket, preferring to exercise an independent judg- ment, as Mr. Harold Cox and Lord Hugh Cecil were elbowed out of our own House of Commons. If a leader of a party in power is wellnigh absolute the leader of an Opposition is often only allowed to lead so long as he follows his followers, so that an Opposition has resembled a sportive puppy chasing its own tail. We have moved far from the ideas of Bagehot and his admiration of the House of Commons which to-day sounds so " remote ". "Where, moreover, there are several parties and they are divided upon personal questions rather than by differences of political programme the idea of a non-Parliamentary 76 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS executive acquires the greater force. All systems are liable to abuse, and if the action of King Constantine be objected to it may well be asked what was the result of the undiluted Parliamentarianism of King George of Greece. The complaint is justly made that King Con- stantine has reduced Greece to the condition in which it found itself before the advent of M. Venizelos. Nor can it be said that a non-Parliamentary executive is in- consistent with the sovereignty of Parliament ; ^ the United States executive is non-Parliamentary, and so in practice is the Swiss. In the case of King Alexander, however, no attempt was made to play the part of a patriot king. "With him neutrality was a catchword to cloke his obstinate and foolish refusal to accept M. Pasid and the Radicals ; so far was he from seeking to forward the national will that he placed himself continuously in opposition, alike in foreign and domestic politics, to the clearly expressed wishes of his people ; so far was he from giving stability to the administration that his capricious changes of ministry resulted in an ever- increasing instability ; he was.no single-eyed administrator raised above party and pushing forward a work of national regeneration in accordance with the national will despite self-seeking politicians, on the contrary he was always himself deep in political intrigue. At home the country was in a state of chronic dis- content, political persecution was rampant, and the ' Vide Professor A. V. Dicey, Law of the Constitution, p. 413, Appendix, Note III, for a discussion of the subject. In what I have said above there is no advocacy implied of a " crown-policy", nor is there implied a necessary antagonism between Crown and people, or Parliament, any more than there is a necessary antagonism between the Executive and Congress in the United States. A wise king would choose the man who commanded the greatest confidence, and if King Alexander had been truly patriotic he would have put M. Pasic in power and kept him there. As we have reason to know neither a Parlia- mentary executive nor Parliament itself necessarily reflects the convictions of a nation. [Point has been given to these considerations by the nature of Mr. Lloyd George's government. See Dicey, p. 417, for a forecast of the possible advent of Presidential government.] A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 77 elections were " made " shamelessly. The finances were in disorder, no public works were undertaken, the Oriental line remaining Serbia's solitary railway, the army was neglected, eaten up with politics, without rifles or artillery, and only some first tentative steps in the direction of agricultural development could be placed to the credit of the government. Abroad the Bulgarians were having their own way in Macedonia, Serbia was utterly without prestige, and if she succeeded in 1897 in obtaining a Serb appoint- ment to the See of Skoplje, and in 1900 in securing recognition of a Serb millet (politico-religious community) in Turkey, that was chiefly due to the Porte's desire to play off one nationality against another. The course of shame continued, and in 1900 the king married Madame Draga Masin, the widow of a Serb engineer and his former mistress, the event being followed by a final quarrel with King Milan, who died not long afterwards. In 1901 King Alexander, feeling the ground slipping from under him, granted a new and liberal Constitution with two Chambers — the latter feature an innovation. Still he pursued his headlong course. On April 7, 1903, he suspended the Constitution, repealed by royal ukase several laws, abolished the Council of State, abrogated the freedom of the Press and the ballot, and dismissed the judges who belonged to the Radical party, then after a lapse of twenty-four hours declared the Constitution as modified to be again in force. At this time it was reported that he intended to settle the succession to the throne upon his wife's brother, a Lieutenant Lunjevica. The crisis hastened to its con- clusion. It was evident that the country could not continue under a regime of misgovernment by midnight coup d'etat, and on June 10, 1903, the King and Queen were assassi- nated as a result of a military conspiracy. The crime was a horrible one, but without undue extenuation it may be said that it is difficult to escape the conclusion that either King Alexander or the nation had to perish. He might have been sent into exile ; but a Serb pretender in Austria . The matter has been well summed up by a 78 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS recent French historian : " L'histoire, qui a le devoir de fletrir les assassins, reserve cependant ses condamnations supremes pour les princes qui avaient reduit le pays a un tel degre d'indigence morale qu'il n'apercevait de salut que dans le crime "/ and I fear we must add correctly perceived. The Grand Skupgtina (the special body four times as numerous as the ordinary Skupgtina v^^hich deals with con- stitutional changes) immediately elected as king Prince Peter Karagjorgjevic, son of the former Prince Alexander Karagjorgjevic, and grandson of the Liberator. The new sovereign had served with distinction as a young man in the Franco-German war, and subsequently, in 1875, in the Hercegovinian rising. He was the widower of a daughter of Prince Nicholas of Montenegro, and had been living in retirement in Geneva.^ His first years of rule were difficult, the regicides were in power, and the Obrenovic still had a small following though it bad no leader, the next heir of that family being Princess Mirko of Montenegro nSe Natalie Konstantinovi6. Regarded with dislike abroad owing to the manner of his accession to the throne he had many difficulties to face at home. He remained true to his purpose to reign in constitutional manner and to follow a policy of general appeasement, while he has relied chiefly on M. Pa§i6, the veteran leader of the Radical party, universally regarded as his country's foremost statesman and always called in of late years in times of difficulty for the con- fidence he inspires. The relations of the kingdom with Austria became increasingly difficult as the country gathered strength, and the tariff war of 1905-1906 was turned to account by the opening of new markets, and a beginning was made in the direction of economic independence, for ' E. Denis, La Grand Serbie, p. 122. ' The scandalous story given by Mr. De Windt of his childish and undignified behaviour on receiving the news of his succession is negatived by the fact that he was living in Geneva not in Paris, ordered his crown in 1904 not in 1903, and that it was made of metal from a Turkish cannon captured by Kara George and not of gold. A SKETCH OF SERB HISTORY 79 hitherto the country had depended almost entirely upon the Austrian market, and Austria applied the screw mercilessly for political ends. In 1908 Austria annexed Bosnia, the Serbs awoke to a vivid sense of realities, and from that dark hour dates the renascence of Serbia. CHAPTER III THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA Before considering the effects of the annexation of Bosnia in 1908 it is necessary to go back a little. The Triune Kincrdom, as it is termed, of Croatia, Slavonia, and Dal- matia had originally owned a separate national sovereignty within varying territorial limits, but in 1102 on the extinc- tion of the native dynasty the king of Hungary, Koloman, was elected as the successor of the last of the old line. The nature of the union was personal, the bond between the two States being the common sovereign, but as was natural the legal constitutional position has formed a per- manent source of friction between Croatia and Hungary. '^ In the nineteenth century the fortunes of the Croats became more and more involved in those of their Serb neighbours, and the feeling of Southern Slav sohdarity was the gradual result. It was Napoleon, whose real abiding work is so often lost in the contemplation of the means which he adopted to gain his ends, who gave the first great fillip to this sense of solidarity in his short-lived kingdom of lUyria. The greater part of Dalmatia had gradually been acquired by the Venetian Eepublic in the course of the Middle Ages. Northern Dalmatia was wrested from the grasp of Hungary-Croatia and its possession finally made good against the Turks, though, as will be seen later, the ' For the history of Croatia see R. W. Seton-Watson's The Southern Slav Question cmd the Habsburg Monarchy. 80 THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 81 process was very slow. The southernmost portion of the province, Kotor (Cattaro), Budva, Bar (Antivari), was obtained as the result of the fall of the Serb Empire to which it had belonged, being indeed no part of the original Triune Kingdom, which stopped short at the Cetina or Narenta. The region from Sabioncello to Castelnuovo formed the independent republic of Dubrovnik (Ragusa) throughout the medieval period, and this republic as a matter of fact outlived Venice, falling before Napoleon in 1808, eleven years after the fall of Venice in 1797. Among the territorial arrangements which Napoleon was able to make as the result of his victory at Wagram in 1809 was the establishment of the kingdom of lUyria, which comprised a great part of Croatia, Kranjska (Carniola), Carinthia, GradiSka, Gorica, Istria, and Dalmatia. This union in one political formation of the Slovene and Croat branches of the Southern Slavs had a powerfully stimu- lating effect on the national consciousness of the race, which survived the reincorporation of the kingdom with the Austrian dominions in 1815. So great indeed was the impetus given that the very use of the words Illyria and lUyrian were subsequently forbidden by the Austrian Government. The ideal of Southern Slav unity was greatly aided by, indeed was largely the product of, the literary renaissance which marked the close of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth. Its origin, it is important to notice, is to be sought in Dalmatia, the most highly cultured of the Serbo-Croat lands, with its memories of the literary activity of the Eagusan school of writers of the sixteenth century, and in some ways the centre from the literary and political point of view, from which has radiated the idea of Southern Slav solidarity. In Dalmatia Kacic published a metrical history of the Jugo Slavs in 1756, but the practical work was the product of two Serbs, Obradovi6 and Karadzic and the Croat Gaj. Obradovid (1739-1811), who was sprung from southern Hungary, was self-taught, and travelled largely for the purpose of educating himself for the fulfilment of bis task 6 82 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS of educating his people. His works were chiefly those of a thinker and moralist whose aim was to raise the intel- lectual standard of his race and to teach it its essential unity. He wrote in the popular spoken language. Not less important was the work of Vuk Karadzic (1787-1864), which, from the practical point of view, made possible the realization of the hopes of Obradovi6. He found the language of his countrymen (he was born in Serbia) in a state of chaos. The spoken dialect was looked down upon as a vehicle of literary composition for which was employed a largely artificial medium of Serbo-Eussian texture. He set to work to grapple with hi?! gigantic task of raising the spoken idiom to its rightful place. He published the national poems and ballads as examples of the language to be used, and himself employed the spoken tongue in his own work. It was necessary to standardize the language, and for this purpose he compiled a dictionary and a grammar. Finally he made a recension of the Cyrillic alphabet and standardized the spelling on a phonetic principle. In spite of great opposition he achieved his objects, and left the Serbs with a language identical in writing and speaking, apart from the use of " dialect " forms, which are to be found in all languages, based on a logical and reformed alphabet and spelling. The Serbs were thus spared the unhappy results which follow where the men of literature use a language which is not " under- standed of the people". The results of his work had a repercussion in Croatia. Here Ljudevit Gaj carried out a similar reform in the Croatian spelling and language, and adopted what may be styled the reformed Serb literary language as the standard idiom of the Croats also. As a result, the provincial literature which he found was re- placed by a Serbo-Croat literature, and on its literary side the way was now clear for a real Serbo-Croat unity. The eddies of the movement spread even further, and influenced the new Slovene school of writers so that they also became conscious of their fundamental identity with their Serbo- Croat brethren. THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 83 Throughout the nineteenth century the quarrel between the Magyars and the subject nationahties of Hungary continued. In 1848 the Magyars rose against the dynasty in what they called a struggle for freedom. Western Europe was blinded by the eloquence of Kossuth and the ability with which the Hungarian case was pleaded, but that case was fundamentally unsound. If the Magyars desired freedom from Vienna they were no less passionately determined upon a policy of racial oppression at home. Hitherto the Hungarian State, though aristocratic in con- stitution, had been, if the phrase be permissible, only mildly oppressive, and the fact that Latin was the official State language made for linguistic equality among all Hungarians, i.e. citizens of the polyglot Hungarian State, who included besides the Magyars, a minority in the kingdom, the Slovaks of the north-west, the Ruthenes (Red or Little Russians) of the north-east, the Roumanians of the east, and the Serbs and Croats of southern Hungary and Croatia- Slavonia (Dalmatia is an Austrian not Hungarian crown- land) . The aim of the Magyars was to make all Hungarians Magyar, and they began to use the two expressions as synonymous terms. All means of repression, political, social, linguistic, and educational, were pressed into service with the result that "the nationalities" were bitterly estranged. When the revolution of 1848, therefore, broke out, the nationalities took up arms against the Magyars and for the House of Habsburg. The great Ban Jela6i6, the saviour of the Habsburgs, led his Croats against them, and the Serbs took up arms, convened a national assembly at Karlovci, the seat of the Serb Metropolitan, and demanded the restoration of the Patriarchate and the appointment of a Vojvode in accordance with their old rights. Colonel Supljikac was named to the latter office and accepted by Vienna, which also restored the Patri- archate. The net result of all this was nil. Colonel Supljikac dying in a few months was not replaced, and although a Serb Vojvodina was delimitated, it was purposely made unworkable by the inclusion of large alien, Magyar 84 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS and German, elements. The House of Habsburg, faithless as ever to its friends, abandoned both Serbs and Croats, and in 1867 crowned its perfidy by the Ausgleich with Hungary, which left the Serbs entirely at the mercy of the Magyar, and Croatia in a very unsatisfactory position. The empty title of Grand Vojvode of the Serb Vojvodina was all that remained to remind the Southern Slavs of their betrayed loyalty. After, then, a period of general oppres- sion from 1849 to 1867, the dual system was introduced, the position being that the Germans should do as they liked in the Austrian crown-lands and the Magyars in the Hungarian, This was the reward of the Croats for their loyalty in 1848. The friction between the nationalities and their masters continued, and the resources of modern civilization and banking organization enabled a more efficient pressure to be maintained by the Magyars. In 1878 Austria-Hungary was empowered by the Treaty of Berlin to " occupy and administer " Bosnia and the Hercegovina, whose luckless inhabitants found that they had merely exchanged one master for another. The right of occupation had originally been assented to by Russia in the Reichstadt convention, secretly arrived at by the two Powers before the Russo-Turkish war as the price of Austrian neutrality, though it found no mention in the Treaty of San Stefano, which left the provinces to Turkey. Austria was torn by conflicting motives in the affair. On the one hand she desired to continue what had long been her settled pohcy of Balkan expansion with its aim the possession, at least, of Saloncia — the Drang nach Osten. The exclusion from Germany, and from Italy also, left the Balkans as the only possible field of aggrandizement, and the Emperor, on grounds of personal pride, desired some compensation for his losses in the west. Germany had also a double motive in pushing Austria eastward. The intrusion of Austria into the Balkans would tend to make her forget her lost position in Germany, and it would also serve German ends vis-a-vis Russia, for such a pohcy would inevitably produce an acute rivalry, or rather exacerbate THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 85 the existing rivalry, between the two Powers, leaving Germany in the happy position of duohus Utigantihus tertius gaudens. She would be in a position to play off one against the other, and by threatening closer relations with either to hold them both in leash. Above all it would tend to make Austria absolutely dependent upon Germany, which for her part had no intention in those days of adventmring her newly acquired position for the sake of advancing Austrian Balkan interests at the cost of war with Russia : under Bismarck Germany made her own advice of Pericles to the Athenians — ra virapKovra aioZiiv, preserve what you have. Above all, neither Austria nor Hungary desired the formation of a strong Serb kingdom, which they looked upon as a menace to their Southern Slav possessions. On the other hand, the Magyars desired no accession in the Monarchy to the number of Slavs, which they considered to be already dangerously large. At first it had been the latter motive that weighed most heavily with Andrassy,^ but Bismarck endeavoured during the crisis to push him forward, working on the fear of a greater Serbia.^ Andrassy himself, at the Congress, apparently desired rather the appearance of having been forced by circumstances to take the fateful step,3 and eventually England, then busily engaged in building up ' " In reference to the occupation of Bosnia by Austria, Andrassy had recalled the well-known remark of Prince Ligne, who, when some one said to him that his wife was unfaithful to him, replied, ' Comment, quand on n'y est pas oblige ' ? " Memoirs of Prince Hohenlohe, ii, 157 (English edition). Conversation with Von Biilow, imder date Berlin, November 3, 1875. * "Bismarck hopes that Andrdssy, finding no other choice left to him, will invade Bosnia and keep it. Andrassy is unwilling to do this, but would prefer it to allowing the establishment of a Kingdom in Serbia". Ibid, ii, 182. Under date Varzin September 29, 1876. ' " She (Austria) did not at all wish that Montenegro should be allowed to receive Antivari, and that the Serbs, with Bosnia and Montenegro, should proclaim an empire under Nikita. But the latter would be the case if Austria did not take measures. Austria wishes, however, to be forced to invade these countries ". Ibid, ii, 212. Blowitz to Hohenlohe. Under date Berlin, June 19, 1878. 86 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the barriers which are now costing us untold blood and treasure, formally moved the invitation to Austria in the Congress. There is no doubt, however, that by that time Austria had very definitely made up her mind, however much for diplomatic appearances she might feign reluctance. Indeed, unless she were to abandon her Balkan policy, there was no other way, for the union of Bosnia with Serbia would have placed a difficult obstacle in the path of any advance in the future. The Serbs lay in the road of her ambitions, and she was determined to strike at them whenever and wherever she could. The reactions of the occupation on the internal and external politics of the Monarchy were profound. Up to quite recent years the Southern Slav question was really composed of two questions, distinct enough though closely related — the Serb question, which was mainly external to Austrian politics, and the Croat which was purely internal. As has been seen the two kindreds are divided by differences of religion, and they have also been divided in their his- torical destinies, the history of the Serbs having been mainly Balkan in its interactions and united to that of the coun- tries of the Balkan and the lower Danube, while that of the Croats has been chiefly involved in the politics of the middle Danube. The Magyars had missed no opportunity of in- flaming these differences which all through the nineteenth century rendered abortive all the efforts of the Croats against the Magyars, for the Croats," to the secret joy of the Magyars and their agents provocateurs, adopted an intransigeant attitude towards the Serbs, who number about a third of the inhabitants of Croatia- Slavonia and are numerous in southern Hungary, with the result that the latter leaned upon the ministry at Budapest which in turn used them to thwart the Croats. Serbo-Croat energy was thus turned to its own destruction. The great Bishop Strossmayer of Djakovo, a Croat in spite of his name, but a just-minded and a great-hearted Southern Slav patriot, preached in season and out of season the gospel of Southern Slav reconciliation and solidarity, yet apparently without THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 87 effect in his own day, for he did not live to see the realiza- tion of all his strivings. " He being dead yet speaketh ", and perhaps even in these days of blood he may "see the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied ". Until the occupation of Bosnia, then, it was possible theoretically, that is apart from Austrian ambitions, to envisage two separate solutions of these problems. There might have been south of the Danube a greater Serbia, purely Serb in character, consisting of the Serbia of to-day together with Bosnia and the Hercegovina and, if Austria had been wishful to make her a friend, of the territory of Dubrovnik. That was a possible settlement of the external Serb problem. The Croat problem would have remained as an internal Austrian question. At this time, so far apart politically were the two divisions of the race that such separate solutions would have seemed natural and desirable to themselves. By the occupation of Bosnia Austria had gone too far or not far enough. She had not united within herself all the Serbo-Croat stock, and there still remained the kingdom of Serbia (as well as the Serb portions of Turkey) to be an independent centre of Serb nationalism. The act in- flamed the anger of the kingdom against her mighty neighbour which had occupied two purely Serb provinces which she had regarded as her own reversion, and the population of which would have in a great majority wel- comed Serb rule since the traditions even of the Moslem Serbs of the provinces were purely Serb and told of the glories of the ancient Serb Empire. Henceforth for patriotic Serbs there could be no longer any doubt that if the Turks were the Erbfeind the Austrians were the Erzfeind. Unless Austria could engage the dynasty in its favour there was no possibility of cordial relations between the two States, and though the Habsburgs suc- ceeded in attaching Milan and Alexander to their chariot- wheels it was at the cost of increased bitterness in the nation which, after keeping the kingdom in a turmoil for a generation ended in the dreadful purge of 1903. So, on 88 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the other hand, Austria had gone too far for a purely Serb solution of the Serb problem, for she had cut the Serb stock in two, and even the purely Serb problem required the incorporation of Bosnia and Hercegovina in the kingdom. Austria had gone as far as she was able at the time, and pending a further advance her aim was to keep the kingdom as weak as possible. Aided by the organs of the Jewish Press both within and without the Monarchy, for the Jews have for occult reasons been constantly opposed to Serb expansion, she filled Europe with tales of Serb disorders, of Serb corruption and barbarism, and thus strove to prepare the way for acquiescence in a further move forward on her part. In Hungary the Jews were extremely powerful and their attitude may be regarded as an expression of Magyar chauvinism, but the Jews of Salonica and the Levant generally worked hard either for Turkey or Austria. Jewish high finance took a hand in the game, hoping perhaps for opportunities of exploita- tion in Serbia similar to those which it received in Bosnia. Equally great was the influence of the occupation on the internal politics of the Monarchy owing to the modification brought about in its Southern Slav question. Up to the present there had been, as has been said above, virtually two problems, Serb and Croat, the one mainly external the other wholly internal. After 1878 Austria found that she had added the Serb question to the Croat, and in the course of years a still more fateful result was gradually manifested at first in various forms but eventually taking the shape of a combined Serbo-Croat problem internal and external. The first effect was apparently to drive still farther the wedge between Serb and Croat. The Croats had throughout the nineteenth century clamoured for the incorporation of Dal- matia in the Triune Kingdom of which it was legally and constitutionally an integral member, and this claim was reinforced by the occupation, for Bosnia formed an im- portant link between the somewhat straggling portions of the kingdom. A glance at the map will show that Croatia, Slavonia, and Dalmatia form two long peninsulas, so to THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 89 speak, of territory, one pointing east and the other south- east, and that these two tongues of land are joined by a very narrow neck, whose phj'sical characteristics of the high and barren mountains of the Karst made it almost as much a barrier as a point of union. Bosnia, however, conveniently rounded off this area lying between the two peninsulas and forming with them a solid block of territory, while it opened up easier lines of access from the eastern parts of Croatia to the ports of the middle Adriatic. The Croats now demanded the incorporation of Bosnia also in the kingdom and thus came into violent conflict with the Serbs at home and abroad. For the Croats the demand was a scheme of aggrandizement going beyond their constitu- tional claims, for the Serbs it was an unprovoked attack upon their own legitimate aspirations delivered by a kindred people. This strife worked for the benefit of the Magyars, who promoted it in every way possible. In Croatia riots between the two elements were of frequent occurrence ; the Serb colours would be burnt or trampled on, while on their side the Serbs lent their aid to the Hungarian Bans and derided the Croat claims ; even the great Strossmayer was refused entry on one occasion to Belgrade. All this brought grist to the Magyar mill. In truth the position of the Magyars was precarious : a large accession had been made to the Southern Slavs of the Monarchy not because their presence was desired, for it was loathed, but partly in furtherance of the policy of expansion and partly to exorcise the danger from a strong Serb kingdom, but this accession might prove absolutely fatal if once the two Slav elements came to terms. The political forces and cross currents were subtle and intricate ; Austria had desired to prevent a greater Serbia, for one reason because of the danger that such a Serbia would attract the Southern Slavs of the Monarchy — a result which, as has been seen, would have been by no means certain if a friendly policy had been pursued by the Magyars to the Croats. The danger, however, of a similar result so far from being exorcised would actually have been created, and within 90 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the Monarchy itself, if Serbs and Croats joined hands. In short, in that event Austrian policy would have given form, substance, and opportunity to the very danger it had sought to avoid, and which, possibly, might have been avoided if concihation towards the Croats at home had been accom- panied by a sympathetic attitude towards the creation of a greater Serbia— a policy which in 1865, in the reign of Prince Michael had been tentatively accepted.^ There was great danger that Austria would find herself hoist with her own petard. Some years were to pass, never- theless, before the actual danger-point was reached, for until the first years of the p^resent century the Croats remained loyal to the dynasty. The demand for a greater Croatia was by no means inspired by feelings of hostility to the Habsburgs, for in spite of all discouragements the Croats had always been quite curiously devoted to the ruling House and "Vienna" : their quarrel was with Budapest. To the Magyars the design was one to be resisted at all costs, for its success would have deprived them not only of their position in the Monarchy as a whole, but in the "Hungarian" king- dom as well; it would have reduced them to the position primi inter pares, while their inordinate and stubborn pride demanded a position of predominance. The success of the Croats, also, would have been an encouragement and example to the two millions of Slovaks and the four milhons of Roumanians. The Southern Slav movement would not be checked — repression no longer had its ancient force, while in Dalmatia, owing to the milder methods of Vienna, it found a strong point d'appui whence it could exert its influence in Croatia untram- melled by Magyar police methods. The next step showed how Serbs and Croats were learning the lesson of adversity and the folly of internecine warfare, and in 1905, conse- quent on the resolutions passed at Rijeka (Fiume) and ' It has been frequently stated that in 1865 Austria herself expressed to Serbia her acquiescence in a future Serb occupation of Bosnia as far as the Vrbas. THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 91 Zadar (Zara), the Serbo-Croat Coalition was formed, embracing the greater part of the independent political parties in the Croatian and Dalmatian Sabors. This step alarmed the Magyars, for it destroyed at a blow the basis of their power in Croatia and was the hoisting of a danger-signal not to be disregarded. Henceforth there could be no doubt of the reality and strength of the Southern Slav movement. Not even yet was that movement anti-dynastic ; it was still directed only against the overweening pretensions of the Magyars. The leaders still desired an accord with Vienna, and for a moment even hoped for one with Budapest at the moment engaged in one of its periodical struggles against Austria. The situation moreover in Serbia, two years after the accession of King Peter, was not such as to lead any but the Serbs proper to turn their eyes in that direction. There was one man in the Monarchy who, if report speaks true, for he had the gift of silence, grasped the position and saw a way of turning it to the advantage of the ruling House and of the whole State, and that was the Archduke Francis Ferdinand. The Archduke was supposed to give his adhesion to what was known as the Greater Austria policy, a policy which was not content with the passive and secondary role which the Monarchy had been playing on the inter- national stage, but saw that a thorough reconstruction at home was necessary to any real forward movement abroad. One of the ideas attributed to the Archduke was the substitution of Trialism for Dualism — that is to say, the establishment of a third Southern Slav unit comprising Croatia, Bosnia, Dalmatia, and possibly the Slovene country, side by side with Austria and Hungary. This is perhaps doubtful. Another plan imputed to him was more thorough and far-reaching. This was the entire reconstruction of the Monarchy on a federal basis. Under this scheme all the national units would have been reconstituted as constituent elements of the State with a large measure of internal autonomy and with a 92 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS representation in a common federal parliament for the whole Monarchy. Either plan would have deprived the Magyars of their predominant position in Transleithania, and would have met with the bitterest opposition from them. Indeed it is doubtful whether either idea could have been carried out without a civil war which might have ended in complete disruption, and it was part of the tragedy of the Archduke's life that the man who saw the only chance of saving the House of Habsburg should have come on the scene when it was already too late for effect to be given to his ideas. There was no longer a locus pcenitentiae. To the Magyars he was openly antagonistic as to the great obstacle in his way, and the feeling was heartily reciprocated. Hardly less hostile was the German element whose position, in the larger scheme, was equally menaced. In one thing he was true to his ancestry — he planned for the House of Habsburg. Among the causes to which is due the failure of the Habsburgs to make use of the most magnificent oppor- tunities may be assigned two traits of character which have marked the House almost without interval from the days of Maximilian to the present time — lack of tolera- tion, its fervid ultramontanism, and lack of imagination. To the first they have frequently sacrificed their interests, to the second they owe the failure to make use of political openings almost without number. The Archduke was not without imagination — far from it ; for the Greater Austria idea based on federal reconstruction showed, if not the highest imagination, at any rate an imagination superior to that either of his immediate ancestors or of his uncle's statesmen. To a certain degree the idea may be said to be obvious — but many "statesmen" lack imagination to grasp the obvious. In his Southern Slav schemes there was one fatal flaw, due to the fact that he was a bigoted ultramontane like all his House. He thought of settling the Southern Slav question on a purely CathoHc Croat basis, and more, he is credited with having mingled his THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 93 political aims with a mystical dream in which he should be the instrument chosen to bring the Orthodox into the Catholic fold. If this be true — and it is asserted by those who claim some degree of intimate knowledge — it would have been more than sufficient to wreck his plans. Even the attempt to solve the Southern Slav question on a CathoHc Croat basis was impracticable. In former years the purely Croat problem might have been so treated, but never the whole Southern Slav question. Even the Catholicism of the Croats is not ultramontane in char- acter so far as the people itself is concerned. The day, however, had gone by for partial and separate solutions. The leaven had been at work, the occupation of Bosnia had quickened its action ; the Serbo-Croat Coalition had been formed, and the question could only be solved on a Serbo-Croat, Orthodox and Catholic, basis. The ultra- montane prejudices of the Archduke would not allow him, his imagination did not soar sufficiently high, to envisage himself as Orthodox Tsar as well as Catholic King. He found an able but unscrupulous collaborator in the late Count Aehrenthal, and in pursuance of his ideas in 1908 Bosnia was annexed to the Monarchy, having been hitherto only "occupied and administered". A sharp crisis with Serbia followed, in which the latter was forced to eat humble-pie, the form being that she was forced to swallow the words (that the matter was of European concern and affected her also) which had been placed in her mouth by the British Government. Austrian duplicity overreached itself in what followed. Anxious to get up a case against Serbia, the Ballplatz set abroad rumours of a pan-Serb plot, and in 1909 brought to trial the leaders of the Serbo-Croat Coalition in what is known as the Agram High Treason Trial. The accused were condemned by a scandalous judgment. The follow- ing year the same men, having been in the meantime amnestied, brought a libel action against the Austrian historian Dr. Friedjung, who in his polemic against them had asserted the existence of, and had quoted from, certain 94 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS incriminating documents. In the course of the trial at Vienna these documents alleging a pan-Serb conspiracy engineered from Belgrade and involving the Serbo-Croat leaders, v/ere proved to be forgeries, and their origin w&a subsequently traced to Count Forgach, Austrian Minister at Belgrade.' Count Aehrenthal, of course, was the prime mover. The result recoiled on the Austrian Government, since it not only failed to establish its case against Serbia, but also finally estranged the Southern Slavs of the Monarchy. The Archduke's plans had definitely come to grief, and it is extraordinary that he ever per- mitted a course of action so absolutely fatal. The successes of Serbia in the Balkan wars produced a pro- digious effect in the " Slavonic South" (Slovenski Jug); patriotism was inflamed and the people overcome with joy, for they set at rest any lingering doubts as to the ability of Serbia to play the part of a Southern JSlav Piedmont. The Southern Slavs turned aside from any idea of a Habsburg solution of their problem and based themselves on an independent footing ; their redemption was to be by their own kith and kin. So high did feeling rise in Dalmatia that most of the municipalities were dissolved and the towns placed under martial law, and when shortly before his death the Archduke visited Spljet (Spalato) the populace forced the band to repeat the Serb national anthem three times. The Southern Slavs had found themselves, and no longer distrusted their future, the resources of their race, or the leadership of Serbia. II The annexation of Bosnia aroused Serbia to a sense of her peril. Any lingering hope that she might still have • For a detailed account of these two trials see R. W. Seton-Watson, The Southern Slav Question and the Habsburg Monarchy. Less detailed accounts of them, together with summaries of subsequent treason trials to the present time (February 1917), will be found in Le Bdgime Politique d'Autriche-Hongrie en Bosnie-Herzegovint et lea Procei de Haute Trahison and in Les Persecutions des Yougoslaves, THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 95 cherished of obtaining access to the Adriatic through Bosnia was dispelled, and unless she bestirred herself her future in Old Serbia and Macedonia would also be lost. More than that, she saw herself designated as the next victim, and the loss of her independence to be the next step in Austria's course to Salonica. She knew, moreover, that if Austria had renounced her position in the sanjak of Novipazar, it was because the General Staff had come to the conclusion that the sanjak formed no practical military road to the ^gean, and that the only possible line of advance was the historic road up the Morava valley and down that of the Vardar. She lay directly in Austria's path and her danger was acute. For these eventualities she prepared herself with feverish energy, and the work of consolidation which had marked King Peter's reign was pressed forward with increased resolution, especially in military matters. The army was reorganized chiefly under the foster- ing care of General, now Vojvode (Field-Marshal) Putnik, first as Minister of War and then as Chief of the General Staff. The father of this famous officer had come to Serbia from southern Hungary and taken up work as a schoolmaster. The son entered the army and devoted himself entirely to a military career. Unlike many other Balkan soldiers he entirely eschewed politics and was noted for his taciturnity. If Moltke could be silent in seven languages Putnik is silent in five, and he is said to have remarked that only fools become politicians or journalists. The Serb artillery was rearmed with French guns from the famous Schneider-Canet firm of Creusot similar to the 75's of the French Army, magazine rifles were procured, and older rifles were con- verted at the arsenal of Kragujevac. Some batteries of howitzers were also procured to an extent that made Serbia the best provided of the Balkan States in this regard, though, as recent events have shown, not to the extent necessary in modern war against a Great Power. The artillery proved itself up to the standard of the best armies 96 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS and was greatly superior in the Balkan wars to that of foes or allies. The infantry proved dashing in attack and stubborn in defence, and tireless marchers. The Serb cavalry was also noted at the time as being the only cavalry in the Balkans trained in the manner of that of western States though it was small in numbers. The auxiliary services proved equal to the strain of the Balkan wars though in some respects, especially medical, over- powered by the demands of the Great War. During the Obrenovic Hgime the army had been scandalously neglected, its cadres were insufficient, its subsidiary services rudi- mentary, its moral shaken by neglect and interference in politics, and in the 'nineties it was notoriously the least prepared for war of any Balkan force. Since then the Serb as a soldier has come to his own again, and no more is heard now of the foolish disparagement that has already been noted ; indeed the tendency has rather been to an opposite exaggeration, and more has been expected of the Serb army than either it or perhaps any other army could perform. In the first Balkan war the great victory of Kumanovo, leading to the amusing invention of the Bulgarian victory at Kirk Kilisse, an action which never took place, which shattered the Turkish power in northern Macedonia, followed by the battles of Prihp and Bitolj, showed what the new Serb army was like. In the hard test of the second Balkan war it proved its efficiency on the Bregalnica against the Bulgars and firmly established its position. Of the victories of the Jadar, and the great rally on Mount Eudnik when the Austrians were hurled out of the country with a loss of 40,000 killed and wounded and 60,000 prisoners, it is unnecessary to speak. If in November 1915 it went down before the shock of the combined Austro-German-Bulgar forces it was because it was hopelessly outnumbered by at least three to one in men and ten to one in heavy artillery. The fact that the enemy considered that such a combined move was necessary speaks volumes for their opinion of the Serbs. Even before the great last attack the Serbs had placed THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 97 not less than 300,000 Austrians hors de combat,^ a figure equal to its own extreme numbers. Before the cUbdcle of December 1914 Danzer's Armee Zeitimg, the Austrian military organ, said in reference to Austrian reports of Serb demoralization : " In reality we are fighting an enemy who has scarcely his equal in courage and energy, and who defends every inch of the ground." Well equipped and well led the Serb army has proved itself a formidable fighting machine, even when faced by the troops of a Great Power. In military matters the wheel has come full circle, and here the national motto, " Tempus et meumjus ", has been justified. Not only, however, in military affairs has there been a veritable renascence.^ Military progress has been accompanied and made possible by political, economic, and financial advance of no mean order, and it is well to know that Serbia's progress is broad based on solid grounds, giving valid hopes of future stability. She is our ally ; we shall, after the war, have economic and commercial dealings with her, and her satisfactory internal position should be duly noted by our men of affairs as well as by politicians. During the present regime there has been great progress in all departments of the national life. Political life has followed normal courses, and the present King has known how to respect the Constitution of his realm, while not hesitating on occasion to avail himself of his royal preroga- tive in such matters, for example, as the refusal to accept the resignation of a Ministry when he considered such a course in the interests of the country. There has thus ' The Austrian losses in the Balkans up to February 1, 1916, are stated by the Budapest correspondent of the Morning Post to have amounted to 117,900 killed, 265,900 wounded, and 80,000 prisoners. The calculation is the work of a Hungarian statistician. Morning Post, March 17, 1916. =" In this section I deal of course with the progress made up to the recent wars. The latter have altered the economic conditions materially, yet the record of previous recent progress stands as an augury of the future. 7 98 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS been obtained a very fair measure of stability in adminis- tration, and constitutional crises are a thing of the past. This is a very different state of afifairs to that obtaining under King Alexander, whose poHtical instability and fre- quent coups d'etat made normal progress impossible. The foundation of all internal reforms and social progress is good finance, and here the advance is most noteworthy. It is only possible to carry the survey up to the period ante- cedent to the Balkan wars, which, of course, created fresh obligations (and assets) and have prevented the presentation of a normal budget. The following figures show the growth of the budget : — Year. Total Receipts. Total Expenditure. Surplus or Deficit. Frs. Frs. Frs. 1895 58,540,700 64,935,295 — 6,394,595 1900 77,179,397 78,710,708 — 1,531,310 1906 91,270,374 87,189,680 + 4,080,693 1907 94,324,117 86,689,952 + 8,134,164 1908 95,293,792 95,029,350 + 264,442 1909 105,130,472 103,831,367 + 1,299,105 1910 116,581,133 111,633,527 + 4,947,605 1911 126,078,673 111,990,364 + 14,088,309 Late years, it will be seen, have yielded a steady surplus, no deficit being incurred even in 1908, during the annexa- tion crisis. The reorganization of the State accounts has been carried out with the assistance of an expert lent by the French Government. The service of the debt is secured upon the monopoHes of tobacco, salt, petroleum, matches, and cigarette paper, the customs, and certain stamp duties and alimentary taxes. These taxes are paid in to the monopolies direction, which is sometimes described as autonomous. It does not, however, imply foreign control of these revenues, as, while the bondholders appoint two members to the administrative council of the monopoHes, the government itself appoints the remaining three. The surplus revenues of the administration after meeting the THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 99 debt service are handed over to the Treasury. The follow- ing figures show the increase in this surplus in spite of the increase of debt : — Year. Frs. Year. FrB. 1896 ... ... 1,556,143 1908 ... ... 12,078,744 1900 ... ... 7,635,608 1909 ... ... 11,489,225 1904 ... ... 11,742,906 1910 ... ... 10,268,074 1906 ... ... 14,404,340 1911 ... ... 15,482,725 1907 ... ... 14,627,678 In 1903 was instituted the gotovina, or Treasury reserve fund, fed by budget surplus and certain assigned revenues. The object of this fund is to provide a working balance pending the encashment of the revenue, to meet supple- mentary estimates, and to provide for extraordinary expen- diture included in the budget. Thanks to the reserve fund, it is some years since Serbia has issued Treasury Bills, the only recent issue being in 1911, advanced to the National Bank for the purpose of providing extra currency. In 1908, during the annexation crisis, the government was able to draw upon it to the extent of 18,000,000 francs, thus obviating the necessity of issuing Treasury Bills or con- tracting a loan. It has also enabled the State to pay off the balance of certain loans of no great amount, the presence of which swelled the number of outstanding loans. These, to the amount of 14,644,514 francs, have been paid off, as well as a further sum of 700,000 francs representing the last of the old floating debt. Notwithstanding all these pay- ments, the fund increased in the six years 1906-11 by a total of 11,000,000 francs. This result contrasts favourably with the former chronic deficits, which went to swell the amount of unproductive debt. The debt in 1912 amounted to 659,056,000 francs, representing a decrease, as compared with 1910, of 17,500,000 francs. The increase in Serbia's credit is indicated by the fact that the 1895 4 per cent, converted loan was issued at 69*5 and in 1912 stood at 90, an appreciation of 30 per cent. Coincidently the burden of the debt service on the revenue has decreased notably. In 1889 the annuities accounted for no less than 50 per cent, of 100 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the Government receipts, in 1895 33 per cent., in 1910 25 per cent., and in 1912 23'5 per cent. Serbia is predominantly an agricultural State of small peasant proprietors. Of the total population of the kingdom as it existed prior to the Balkan wars, 84*23 per cent, were engaged in agriculture, 6*68 per cent, in industry, 4'41 per cent, in trade, and 4" 68 in the professions or Government employment. The following table of figures, the most recent available though not quite up to date, gives an idea of the even excessive subdivision of property in the former kingdom : — No. of Propertiea. Extent of Each. Hectares (1 Hectare = 2-4 Acres). Percentage of Properties. 98,253 Up to 3 (acres 7-2) 33-49 62,622 3-5 (7-2-12) 21-16 80,822 5-10 (12-24) 27-55 40,782 10-20 (24-48) 13-87 7,663 20-30 (48-72) 2-60 2,138 30-40 (72-96) •73 846 40-50 (96-120) •29 345 50-60 (120-144) •12 198 60-70 (144-168) •07 99 70-80 (168-192) •03 63 80-90 (192-216) •02 37 90-100 (216-240) •01 41 100-125 (240-800) •01 17 125-150 (800-360) •005 17 150-200 (360-480) •005 2 200-250 (480-600) •001 3 250-300 (600-720) •001 3 Over 300 (over 720) •001 The need in such an economy for co-operation has not only been felt, but has largely been acted upon. There are in existence several hundred co-operative credit societies on the Raffeisen principle, granting loans to their members for such objects as the planting of vines and fruit trees, the purchase of beasts of burden and of agricultural implements, etc. Each association has also an adults' and children's THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 101 savings bank. There are also specific associations for the purchase of agricultural implements to be used in common. In virtue of the common guarantee of the members, funds are advanced by the Central Caisse of the agricultural co- operative societies. The societies possess their sowing machine, reaping and threshing machine, etc. As an illustration of the benefit conferred, it is stated that a small cart which used to cost 72 francs in Belgrade now costs 50 francs ; and that a Dutch reaper used to cost about 800 francs, while the Central Caisse can now get it delivered in Belgrade for 550 francs. The Central Caisse finances the local societies and also sells their products ; it is itself financed by the State. The various local societies can become members as share- holders, but no shareholder can hold more than 100 shares, and voting is by membership, irrespective of the amount of shares held. It should be mentioned that each society has its own tribunal, composed of two members chosen by the conflicting parties and a third co-opted as president. This tribunal settles petty disputes among the members con- nected with such matters as rights of way, damage done by beasts to crops, etc. Finally, all the co-operative societies, departmental unions, and the Central Caisse form the General Union of the agricultural co-operative societies, which defends their interests, undertakes the creation of new societies and the direction and control of those already existing. Six years ago there were already more than 500 agricultural co-operative societies and about 250 branches. In addition, there are over 50 public nurseries, ranging from 12 to 57 acres, conducted on " model " lines and comprising orchards, vineyards, poultry farms, etc. There are also official agricultural instructors, advising the peasants in their districts and working under the Ministry of Agriculture. Such is a resume of the means adopted to raise agri- culture and to free the peasants from the operations of the "gombeen man", while there is also a homestead law by which an area of about five acres, with the necessary 102 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS implements and beasts, cannot be sold for the satisfaction of private debts, and the peasants are forbidden to give bills of exchange. The restriction of credit thus brought about is ameliorated by the operation of the Eaffeisen societies. The Serbs take kindly to co-operation for two main reasons. The older social economy of the people v^as centred in the Zadriiga, or family group, which might even comprise as many as 300 members and include a whole village. The family owned their land in common and worked it in common under the direction of the staresina, or elder, by whom the products were apportioned. The members had a common dining-hall in the house of the staresina, with their individual cottages, in the case of married sons, grouped round the central homestead. Some family zadrugas are still to be found. They have also their moha and sprega, the former being the name given to mutual co-operation, as in times of harvest, when neighbours join together to help one who stands in need of further manual aid, the latter being the name of similar help given by the loan of draught or plough animals, etc. The co-operative society takes the place and even the name of the former zadruga, of which it may be said to be the modern form, it is in fact the new zadruga. In Serbia co-operation has no deep-rooted prejudices to overcome, as in our own country, and the habit of co-operation augurs well for the economic future of the country. The vitality and growth of a State depend not merely on valour in the field, which is truly a moral test, but in advance in those material and economic aspects of the national life which are in nations as necessarily united to moral soundness as body and soul in the individual. The work of railway construction which prior to the present regime had been confined to the Oriental lines, no subsequent construction at all having been undertaken, has also been pressed forward in recent years. The Brza Palanka-Ni§ line of normal gauge was completed just at the time of the Austro-Bulgar invasion, it forms the Serb portion of the future connection with Eoumania. Several THE RENASCENCE OF SERBIA 103 narrow-gauge lines have also been built such as the western Morava valley line from Stalac to Uzice, a line from Obrenovac on the Danube to Valjevo, another from Mlade- novac on the main line to the south of Belgrade to a junction to the last named at Lajkovac, and a line from ParaSin, on the main line, to Zajecar on the Timok valley line. The results of all this work of reconstruction were seen in the Balkan wars. The renascence of Serbia had been effected silently and in a manner that belied the common accusation that the Serbs are talkers rather than doers. Even the measures taken to emancipate Serbia from economic servitude to Austria following on the "pig war" of 1905-6 had not attracted the attention that might have been expected ; fresh outlets of trade had been created vid Salonica, and slaughter-houses had rendered the country less dependent on the export of live-stock. To those who were not cognizant of the work that had been done, the results of the Balkan wars were astonishing, and people realized that Serbia was not only an important mihtary State, but that its statesmen had proved them- selves organizers of no mean ability. The inception of the alliance itself was a tribute to the altered position of the country in the eyes of its neighbours who could no longer regard it as a negligible quantity. For Serbia the Turkish war was a desperate attempt to reach the sea and to forestall Austria's next step ; success might bring relief and possibly safety, failure would but anticipate an other- wise inevitable fate. She bore her part valiantly, and at Kumanovo avenged Kosovo; "We gained the country by the sword, and you have regained it by the sword," a Turk of Skoplje is said to have remarked to a Serb officer. At Adrianople the deciding factor was the Serb artillery, though the Bulgars endeavoured to belittle the aid received and showed scant courtesy to the Serb contingent who were not even thanked in general orders. Austria was disconcerted and alarmed at the results achieved, for she had reckoned on a Turkish victory and 104 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the possibility of her stepping in to "save" the Serbs. She refused Serbia the desired access to the Adriatic and intrigued with Bulgaria to break up the alliance.^ Disputes arose over the partition of Macedonia, and the second Balkan v^^ar broke out — the Balkan bloc V7as broken up. Again the result belied Austrian anticipations, and Serbia emerged victorious and still further aggrandized. In August 1913 Austria planned a war against Serbia,^ but the project was put off for the time being. The murder of the Archduke in June 1915 gave her the opportunity she desired and the Great "War was the result. In spite of the ordeal through which Serbia is passing, the work of regeneration outlined above gives good hope for the future in the event of a victory for the Allies. The renascence of Serbia in its essential and spiritual elements is an accomplished fact, the recent material loss is heavy indeed but it will be made good; Serbia will rise again from its ashes. ' For a discussion of the Macedonian question and the events leading up to the second Balkan war see below, Chapter VI. ' Revelation of Signor Giolitti, December 5, 1914. CHAPTEE IV THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC The programme of the Southern Slavs for their future is national union. As has been seen in the previous chapter, all three branches of the race are at length at one in the demand that, as the Germans and Italians in the nineteenth century and others before them attained national unity within the limits of a single State, so they also shall be allov^ed to attain the same end as the result of the present war. That indeed is the supreme aim which animates their courage and buoys up their spirit in adversity. Of the difficult questions which are involved in this demand the most difficult in fact, as it is perhaps the least difficult in abstract speculation, is the Adriatic question, which forms the most outstanding of the problems connected with that political reconstruction of south-eastern Europe which should be one of the solid gains of the war in the event of a complete victory for the Allies, which is the supposition necessarily ante- cedent to such a discussion as follows. In its essential elements the problem arises from the configuration of the Adriatic and the contrasting character of its two shores. In itself the Adriatic is a long arm of the Mediterranean thrust north-westwards, separating Italy from the Balkan Peninsula, and opening to its parent sea by the Strait of Otranto which is less than 105 106 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS fifty miles wide, the strait itself being commanded /rom ^ the fine bay of Valona or Avlona with its entrance guarded by the lofty Acroceraunian peninsula and the islet of Saseno. The ports on the western shore are outlets of Italian trade as the eastern ports should be for that of the Balkans, while Trieste and Rijeka (Fiume) at its extreme north-western and north-eastern limits are the ports of entry for the countries of the middle and upper Danube. The Italian shore of the Adriatic is low and singularly devoid of good natural ports, especially of ports capable of being made into strong naval bases. In the north are the ports of Trieste, Pola, aiid Rijeka, the last named naturally the least good of the three while Pola forms a splendid naval station. The eastern shore, in marked con- trast to the western, affords both to commerce and naval power all those facilities which the latter lacks. Formed by the subsidence of the land where the spurs of the Dinaric Alps run down to the sea the coast line is broken up into innumerable deep indentations running far into the land, occupying the place of former valleys and forming a series of magnificent harbours such as those of Sibenik (Sebenico), Split or Spljet (Spalato), Gruz (Gravosa), and Kotor (Cattaro), which are not only admirably adapted for commerce but form naturally some of the finest naval bases in Europe. The coast is flanked, moreover, by numerous islands which not only frequently possess good ports, notably Vis (Lissa), but also guard a marine covered- way leading along the coast between the sheltering islands and the mainland, which enhances the value of the ports and allows of a fleet making its way from Pola to Kotor free from interference by a hostile force. The water, moreover, is everywhere deep. During the nineteenth century from 1815 the whole of the eastern shore, with the exception of Albania with the bay of Valona and the inferior roadsteads of Durazzo and Medua, and of the short Montenegrin coast formerly Turkish, has been in the possession of the House of ' I Bay commanded " from " not " by " advisedly, vide infra IV. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 107 Austria. The result since the unification of Italy has been a constant and unconcealed rivalry between that Power and her Austrian ally, which of late years has become more acute owing to the growth of Austrian naval power. Powerful units were added to the fleet, subsidiary bases established at Teodo in the Bocche di Cattaro and at Sibenik, and when the war broke out Austria was engaged in the first steps towards the realization of an ambitious programme of construction which was to include several " Dreadnoughts." This naval growth pressed more and more hardly upon Italy, which felt acutely the dearth of natural ports on her eastern coast which, against an equal naval force, was difficult of defence from Venice or Taranto, the latter of which lies outside the Adriatic. During the latter years of the last century a new factor appeared on the scene in the shape of the Southern Slav renascence. To the conflicting ambitions of Italy and the House of Habsburg the Southern Slavs opposed the claim of their nationality and the demands of geography. When, after 1866, the Habsburgs had no further object in bolstering up the Italian element in their dominions and gave — until recent years — something like a free hand to the Serbo-Croats of Dalmatia the municipalities, despite an electoral law which unduly favoured the Italian element, fell one by one into Slav hands with the exception of Zadar (Zara). Without at first any definite political programme the Slavs were gradually " finding " themselves, and while the Italians lost ground politically in Dalmatia to the Serbo-Croats, the Germans found the Slovenes blocking their path to a sea which has always been within the scope of their ambitions. The mutual attitude of Italy and Austria to each other was illustrated by their handling of the problem of Albania. Owing to the position of Valona at the very mouth of the Adriatic, neither would permit the acquisition of that port by the other, since its occupa- tion by Italy would have meant for Austria that her sea gateway would have been commanded by her rival and her maritime pretensions throttled, while for Italy an 108 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Austrian occupation would have given complete physical command to her enemy and aggravated her own existing position. In Albania, therefore, each fostered its propa- ganda by every means in its power, education, commerce, and religion all being pressed into the national service, with results that on the whole were hardly proportionate to the energy expended, the Albanians being willing enough to take all that was offered to them but having a shrewd idea of the purpose that lurked behind the gifts. In general the Italians met with more success in the south, where Valona was of vital importance to them, while the Austrians were more successful among the Catholic tribes of the north, where they were able to keep a watch on the Serbs and Montenegrins. Eventually a self-denying ordinance was entered upon by both and served to stave off the day of open conflict, and it was provided that any Balkan acquisition on the part of one should involve compensation to the other and that no forward Balkan move should be undertaken by either without previous consultation with its ally. It was the breach of this last stipulation which formed one of the formal grounds of complaint by Italy against her quondam ally in 1914. The attempted formation of an Albanian State in 1912 was the ultimate form taken by this mutual renunciation, as the open rivalry of the two Powers was one of the reasons that the State was still-born. Schools were founded by the rivals in Scutari and Durazzo and banks in the former town, the Austrians finding a powerful lever in the protectorate which they enjoyed over the Catholics who are strong in the extreme north, while the Italians utilized the services of the Albanian colonists who for centuries have formed part of the population of Calabria. It was evident that neither party to the arrangement considered it as anything but provisional and a mere modus vivendi pending the time when the course of events should give to one or other an opportunity of effecting its own purpose. The flowing tide of the Southern Slav renascence excited an alarm in Italy out of all proportion to any possible THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 109 danger to Italian interests. Instead of looking upon that movement as an invaluable ally against the pretensions of the House of Habsburg, and as being the predestined instrument by means of which, coincidently with a strengthening of Italy's own position, a new and friendly Power might be installed upon the ruins of Austria's Adriatic dominions to take the place of the latter as Italy's vis-d-vis, Italian publicists affected, and apparently felt, a deep fear of the consequences to their country of such a bouleversement. In truth Italy, after a long period of recuperation following her Abyssinian disasters, apparently entered upon an imperialist foreign policy, divorced from her liberal and nationalist origin and past, and based upon the spirit of Prussian realismus. Determined to obtain for herself a more important position in the Mediterranean, and to strive after predominance in the eastern area of that sea, she seemed now nearer to her allies in the ethic of her international reactions than she had ever been before. In 1911 she annexed Tripoli from the Ottoman Empire and took in pledge ten of the islands of the Dodekanese,^ together with Kos and Rhodes, pending the fulfilment of all the stipulations of the Treaty of Lausanne, while Italian publicists found good reasons for suggesting the permanent retention of these Greek islands, raking out from the past the historical claims — so varied and abundant in the Near East, and mostly worthless — of the House of Savoy to Rhodes. The results of the Balkan war of 1912 found Italy in close agreement with Austria as to the means to be adopted in face of the new situation. In particular she showed the greatest jealousy of the approach of the Serbs to the Adriatic, as she did also of the increased strength of Greece's maritime position. With Austria she took a strong line in denying to Serbia any outlet on the Adriatic, how- ever exiguous, while she vetoed the extension of Greek rule ' The Dodekanese (Twelve Islands) consist of Ikaria, Patmos, Leros, Kalymnos, Astypalaia, Nisyros, Telos, Syme, Chalkeia, Karpathos, Kassos, and Kastellorizzo. The Italians hold all but the first and last, together with Rhodes and Kos. 110 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS to northern Epirus. As has been said, a common formula was found in the cry of Albania for the Albanians, the Nationalist argument proving useful for the nonce, and she strove to make the boundaries of the nev7 State as extensive as possible. The history of 1913 negatives the plea that Italy was conforming reluctantly to an Austrian initiative ; both her Press and her Ministers were eager for a large Albania and a small Serbia. It is difficult to assign any intelligible reason for the erection of the Serb bogey, the strengthening of Serbia being on any rational view of the situation essentially favourable to Italian interests. In the second Balkan war, which followed as the sequel to Serbia's exclusion from the Adriatic,^ Italian sympathies were manifested for Bulgaria ; in fact, the Marquis di San Giuliano followed in the track of Austria's Balkan policy in the hope of reducing Serbia's power and prestige, though at the same time he was in no mood to allow Austria to step into Serbia's place, as he showed when in August 1913 Austria proposed to attack her Southern Slav neighbour. It was a complicated and subtle line of policy designed upon the main- tenance of as much as possible of the status quo pending an opportunity for Italy to alter it according to her own purposes. With the outbreak of the Great War that opportunity arrived, and brought with it a plenitude of possible advan- tages beyond anything that could reasonably have been hoped for. The probable break up of Austria offered Italy not only the acquisition of Italia Irredenta but the possi- bility of establishing herself on the eastern Adriatic if only Southern Slav aspirations could be baulked, but as Serbia was in fact an ally of the Entente, though never treated as such, the latter possibility was not devoid of difficulty. In the meantime the sorry farce of the Albanian State as hitherto displayed was played out, and Italy was not long in occupying Valona,^ with the Islet of Saseno, which in ' See below, Chapter VI. * A "sanitary mission" was landed at Valona on October 25, 1914, Saseno was occupied on October 30, and Valona by a military force on December 25. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 111 1913 had been detached from Greece (who possessed it as one of the Ionian Islands) as belonging naturally to Albania. Greece coincidentally occupied northern Epirus. In October 1914 a strong Press campaign was opened against the pretensions of Serbia (as the representative of Southern Slav unity) to Dalmatia, which was claimed for Italy on several grounds — a campaign which was renewed in the spring of 1915 coincidently with Italy's negotiations with Austria. In those negotiations Italy demanded, in addition to the Trentino and a line to the east of the Isonzo, the establishment of Trieste as an independent State, and the southern Dalmatian islands of Vis (Lissa), Hvar (Lesina), Korcula (Curzola), SuSac (Cazza), Mljet (Meleda), and Lastovo (Lagosta), the last two of which had formerly belonged to the independent republic of Dubrovnik (Ea- gusa), and not to Venice.^ In the course of these conver- sations Italy, with a policy not without skill, put forward the demand for a Serb outlet. The cleverness with which she took upon herself to speak, unsought, in the name of Serbia was equalled by the address with which she posed the question as purely commercial in character, thus by implication denying that any question of nationality was involved. Concurrent negotiations had been carried on with the Entente culminating in the agreement of April 27 ^ and the entry of Italy into the war. The outbreak of the war was followed, as the opportunity served, by a remarkable growth in the extent of Italian claims in the Adriatic. The chance of asserting and en- forcing these claims was not likely to recur, especially if the end of the war were to see a strong Southern Slav State estab- lished on the opposite coast ; it was a chance not merely for the assertion of the rights which Italy has always main- tained, but for the acquisition of advantages for which she had long ceased to hope. Hitherto her demands had been confined to the reclamation of Italia Irredenta properly so ' These and other demands were formulated by Baron Sonnino on April 8, 1915. ' Vide infra VI. 112 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS called, i.e. the Trentino and the line of the Isonzo ; even Trieste, despite its predominantly Italian character, lay outside the scope of those ambitions which Italian statesmen regarded as practicable, while as to Dalmatia the feeling was hardly more than one of sentimental regret at the impossi- bility of recreating the old Venetian dominion. Thus in 1907 Dr. Seton-Watson could write: " Thus even the wildest Irre- dentists have come to recognize the hopelessness of reclaim- ing provinces where the Italian is in a minority of one in seven [he is speaking not only of Dalmatia, but of the whole coast from Trieste downwards] , and confine their aspira- tions to Trieste and its Littoral, and to the Trentino "J The growth of Italian claims after the commencement of the war, as also the attitude taken up towards Serbia and the Southern Slavs, can best be seen by the contents of the Italian Press, and it is better moreover, in view of inter- tional relationships, that the tale should be told by the writers themselves as far as possible rather than in the form of a foreign commentary. The trend of opinion was not satisfied with the probable disappearance of Austria from the Adriatic ; it desired that the Southern Slavs should not be permitted to step into Austria's shoes even in the lands which are incontcstably Slav by nationality, the most efficacious method of preventing which was to claim the regions concerned for Italy. In particular Italian claims were extended to Dalmatia, the figures of the Austrian census were questioned, and Signor Gayda, an extremist, claimed GO, 000 Italians in the province, though even this figure amounts to less than 10 per cent, of the whole, while the society Fro Dalmazia was founded with the object of arousing public opinion on the subject. The result was a violent polemic in the autumn of 1914 between the Italian and the Serb and liussian Press. Thus the semi-official Serb paper, Samouprava, reprinted from the Serb Politika an article headed "Let us save Dalmatia": " Serbia ", it said, " will not consent that this Slav country should pass from Austrian domination to another domina- ' li. W. Seton-Watson, The Future of Austria-Hungary, p. 31. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 113 tion, that of Italy ". Serbia " will have the courage, with the co-operation of the Dalmatians themselves, to defend it to the last against any attempt made in Italy to transform its liberation into a new servitude ". The Italians (as represented by the Press and politicians) were willing that Serbia should have a commercial outlet on the Adriatic but no more, and they disclaimed any feeling save that of self-interest. A political leader remarked more Prussico : " Serbia and Montenegro, Russia's pro- teges, have ambitions for a wider outlet on the Adriatic; but Italy with her 40,000,000 of people can hardly be considered in the same light as Serbia with her 3,000,000, or Montenegro". While Signor Bissolati, the w^ell-known Interventionist Socialist, and a member of the present Cabinet, maintained that Italy should appear as the sincere champion of the principle of nationality, which she could not be so long as she laid claims to the Dalmatian coast which was overwhelmingly Slav, Pro- fessor Fiorese had been previously constrained to admit in the Giornale d'ltalia of October 1, 1914, that "our collective opinion . . . does not yet think broadly of the possibility of making friends with the Serbs ". When, on October 18, Signor Salandra took over the Foreign Office pro tern., he said to the departmental chiefs, in a phrase that has become historic, " What is needed is ... a freedom from all preconceptions and prejudices, and from every sentiment except that of sacred egoism for Italy ". So on December 3, 1914, in his statement on foreign policy, he remarked : " Italy has vital interests to safeguard, just aspirations to affirm, and support of her position as a Great Power to maintain, not only intact, but such that it shall not be diminished by the possible aggrandizement of other States ".^ Two days later, when in the debate Signor Altobelli said that his sympathies were with the Entente, the Premier replied that Italians had only one feeling, that for Italy. The controversy dragged on along the same lines into ' at. the Morning Post, December 4, 1914. 8 114 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the spring of 1915. The paramount claims of nationality were denied : " There are political and military considera- tions which are above any question of nationality whatever," said the Giornale d'ltalia on April 4, and it added, "Let the Serbs have an ample outlet to the Adriatic, but do not let them aspire to conquer a pre- dominance in that sea ",^ a sentence which well exemplifies what seems to non-Italians the almost grotesque fear felt for a State which can never be a first-class Power, for as M. Supilo, the well-known Croat leader, remarked in Petrograd shortly afterwards, Italy has nothing to fear from a Southern Slav State only a third of her size. He added the grave warning that his countrymen would prefer Austrian to Italian rule. The more recent speeches made by the late Italian Ministers can hardly be described as being other than masterpieces of balanced ambiguity. Signor Orlando, for example, at Palermo on November 21, 1915, alluding to a sentimental and political reason acting strongly on Italian minds, said : "In the first we affirm all our admiration and all our solidarity towards the heroic Serb people ; in the second we affirm all the inestimable importance to Italy of the position of the Balkan peoples ".^ There is posed here an antithesis, or at any rate a contrast, between the solidarity towards the Serb people which is a sentimental reason, and the inestimable importance to Italy of the " position of the Balkan peoples " (in the plural) which is a political reason. This contrast is capable of more than one interpretation discussion of which is profitless, though those who have been at all behind the scenes will hardly be at a loss for an explanation. Baron Sonnino on December 1 alluded to Serbia in cordial terms while laying it down that it was a vital necessity to bring about a state of things in the Adriatic that would compensate Italy for the unfavourable configuration of the Adriatic coast, a proposition which is altogether legitimate. Signor Salandra, however, on December 11 ' at. The Times, die seq. ' Cif.'the Morning Post, die acq. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 115 was more oracular : " The unfortunate conditions which put us topographically at a disadvantage can only be altered by a victorious war, bringing us in the Adriatic not only the security of our country, but also the civil hegemony which (without excluding the peoples who have a right to border on the Adriatic) belongs to us by virtue of the superiority of our country, our territory, our population, and our civilization, which is the highest and oldest ".I "Civil hegemony" is ambiguous, and superiority of country and kultur is a familiar phrase, of which the rest of the world is weary : the wording was not happy. Signer Barzilai at Ancona on January 19, 1916, seemed to hint that the Serb debdcle was in the nature of a Providential chastisement : " I was not talking at random, as you begin to see, when I hinted the other day about the responsibility of the Balkan States for the fate which has overtaken them. If heroic Serbia, whose expansion towards the Adriatic we have never tried to thwart, is to-day healing all its strayings from the vision of its own interests and pledges with the sacrifice wherefrom will assuredly germinate the resurrec- tion of its future . . . ".^ Signor Martini at Florence on January 20 spoke of the day of peace, " the day when Italy, safe in her seas, will have the frontiers which Dante traced for her, when the Serb people will be re-established in the fulness of its independence", but it is to be feared that the Colonial Minister had for- gotten for the moment what were the frontiers which Dante traced for Italy.3 The declarations of the present Italian ministry have been marked by a like ambiguity. Signor Bissolati con- tinues to speak with sympathy of the Southern Slav cause and to plead for good relations between the two peoples. Thus in an interview with a French paper 4 he remarked : ' at. the Morning Post, die seq. ^ at. the Daily Chronicle, January 21, 1916. 3 Dante's Italy ended at Pola. 4 Le Matin, October 1, 1916. 116 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS " The Italian race has suffered too much from oppression to exercise oppression. We will not allow an irredentism to be created against us." The Secolo of the same date remarked : " She [Italy] detests the idea of creating on the other side of the Adriatic a counter-irredentism." The Premier, Signor Boselli, on the other hand, at Milan spoke of his salutation of the flag of Dalmatia. The Nationalist Press of Italy has lately adopted a line which cannot but gravely prejudice the cause of good relations between the two neighbours. In the first place must be put allegations more or less specific against the Southern Slav Committee. On October 7, 1916, the Starnpa published a telegram stating that Jugoslav circles in Geneva had pronounced in favour of a Jugoslavia under Habsburg auspices. Three days later the Idea Nazionale, republishing the telegram, stated that the Jugoslav Committee at Geneva had expressed itself : " The present war has shown that small States cannot live independently without exposing their national existence to a grave danger. That is why the Jugoslavs, in view of the impossibility of creating an independent Serb kingdom which would have included all the Jugoslav regions, would wish to see the union of the Jugoslav countries realized under the form of Trialism . . .". This elicited a reply from certain members of the Committee stating that there is no Jugoslav Committee of Geneva, although certain members of that Committee happen to live there ; that with the exception of the signatories no member of the Committee had been living at Geneva since the beginning of the year; and that they had neither collectively nor individually made the declaration attributed to them, nor any declaration like it. In its leading article the Idea Nazionale represented the Committee as being an instru- ment of Austrian poHcy. An exactly similar procedure had been adopted by the same paper in respect of the Cechs, for on September 23 it had published an interview with " a member of the Cech National Council, who declared that his people dissociated themselves completely from the Jugo- slav movement. To this the Council replied : " No member THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 117 of the National Council of the Cech Lands was in Italy during the month of September 1916, and therefore none could have spoken in its name." Other organs of the Italian Press adopted the same line. The Popolo d' Italia a little later stated that the conviction was general that the Jugoslav propaganda was supported financially from sources outside its own territories, and precisely in Austria, in order to injure Italy ; and Signor Caburi, in the Giornale d'ltalia of July 10, had previously declared that the Jugoslav programme was a programme of conquest elaborated by the clerical Croats in the service of Vienna and Budapest, and that the Serbs ought not to support it. In any case Italy would never consent to its realization. The Perseveranza of October 19 accused Professor Lazar Markovic, editor of the Serb paper La Serbie, published in Geneva, of having espoused the Trialist cause, while the Giornale of Turin, going further, stated in terms that he was an " Austrian agent, a traitor to his country," statements which drew from the calumniated editor an indignant response. ^ In December Signor Boselli, in the course of an ambiguous statement in the Italian Chamber in which he said that victory " will assure us the mastery of the Adriatic, which, for Italy, signifies a legiti- mate and necessary defence, and which, without forgetting the just needs of the neighbouring Slav nationalities and the necessities of their economic development, will assure equally its imprescriptible rights on the opposite coast to the Italian nationahty," spoke also of "the active propaganda of which it is necessary to seek the origins in the compre- hensible manoeuvres of the enemy." He thus gave the sanction of his high position to the insinuations referred to. To these accusations, the methods of whose authors bear an unpleasant resemblance to those generally associated with the names of Counts Aehrenthal and Forgach, the Jugoslav Committee gave an indignant denial through its president. Dr. Trumbic,^ in the course of which it was ' La Serbie, November 5, 1916. * Vide The Southern Slav Bulletin No. 25 ; La Serbie, December 3, 1916, for the full text. 118 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS pointed out that Committee derived its funds largely from American Jugoslavs (some of the South American Jugoslavs are enormously rich men, ten of them are said to control, each, a capital of over £4,000,000), and that the members of the Committee had been proceeded against in Austria, had suffered confiscation of property, had been struck off the professional rolls, and in some cases sentenced to death. The Committee, however, "has never been able to find for its defence the hospitality of the Italian Press, because our censorship tolerates no discussion on this subject favourable to the accused." ^ It is necessary to complete this survey by giving a few more examples a titre d' information. The facts of this unhappy controversy are known to all who have access, direct or indirect, to the foreign Press, and it is useless, and indeed harmful, to ignore them, for if a correct appre- ciation is to be made of matters which will have to come up for settlement knowledge is certainly a desideratum. They will be given without comment. The Corriere della Sera for October 7, 1916, gave its adhesion to the programme of the Committee Pro Dalmazia, and said that it was necessary to remember that one part of the Jugoslavs was fighting for Austria, and the other part trying to create distrust of Itahan rights. The Giornale d'ltalia, important because of its ownership, spoke of the Croats as " the most furious enemies of our race." It added that the Croats could have their economic outlets on the Croatian coast, and the Serbs theirs in southern Dalmatia, thus treating the two portions of the race as separate entities and postulating the question as one of commercial access. Signor Caburi, in the same paper for November 16, 17, 19, qualified the Croats as "Austrian Cossacks", and the Southern Slavs as the " Praetorians of the Habsburgs " ! Other Itahan writers, such as Signor Bianco, have insisted on dissociating Croats and Serbs, and persist in speaking of them as of different peoples ; they even urge that it is not to Serbia's interest to ' Statement of the republican deputy, S. Pirolini, in the Italian Chamber. Cit. La Serbie, December 24, 1916. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 119 achieve Southern Sla^v unity, as the simple, brave Serbs would be exploited by a Croat and Slovene oligarchy. The underlying motive vi^as plainly stated in an article in the Secolo as far back as May 8, 1915, in which it wrote: "If the Serbs were to succeed in including the Croats in their frontiers they will then become too powerful, and we must envisage all the possibilities. It is better for us to raise up two other nations (the Croats and the Albanians) and thus to divide the imperialist Serb bloc, reducing it to its just proportions, for it is better to have for neighbours two small States than a single State which includes them. With an Albania anti-Slav par excellence on one side and a Croatia anti-Serb and Catholic on the other, we should establish in the eastern Adriatic an advantageous equilibrium, dividing the Slav forces which have too great a tendency to increase but little to coalesce." ^ I do not understand this super- stitious fear of Serbia and the Southern Slavs ; evidently we have travelled far from Mazzini. Not all Italian writers take up this line ; on the contrary there are notable exceptions. Signor Mondaini, for example, in the Azione Socialista of August 12, 1916, published an article - against Adriatic Imperialism ; so also in the Secolo of November 28, Signor Ghisleri, writing on the proper mission of Italy, enters a plea for the Southern Slavs and for an Italo-Slav accord ; while Professor Salvemini has continued to express himself in the same sense as in his pamphlet Guerra o Neutralita ? Such has been the position as expressed in general terms ; but it is advisable to examine in detail the specific claims advanced, more especially in respect of Dalmatia and its islands, which form the crux of the question as between Southern Slavs and Italians, leaving the regions at the head of the Adriatic for later treatment. It will be well to con- sider the conflicting arguments on their merits, and without reference to the "Dalmatian Agreement," whose effect will be considered in the last section of this chapter. The argu- ' at. La Serbie, October 8, 1916. " Reprinted in the New Europe of October 26. 120 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS ment centres round three topics — historical, ethnographic, and strategic. II Before passing to the more substantial arguments ad- duced in support of Italian claims on the eastern shore of the Adriatic it is necessary to refer to a strange contention which has been seriously advanced by the more extreme partizans of Italian expansion, namely that Dalmatia forms a geographical part of Italy. Professor Cippico ^ has said : "Dalmatia and Istria have never neither in geography nor in history belonged to the Balkans".^ Signor Gayda has remarked that the great bastion of the Dinaric Alps divides Dalmatia from the Serb country, that commercial relation- ships are impossible between them, and that communica- tions are lacking. Another writer has ascribed the last fact to the difficulties of the mountains dividing Dalmatia from its backlands. That the Dinaric Alps do in a sense cut off and differentiate Dalmatia from Bosnia is of course true, but neither in the degree nor with the consequences asserted. All through the Middle Ages there was active intercourse with the interior both from the republic of Dubrovnik, which owed part of its wealth to its trade with medieval Serbia, and also from Spljet. In no sense are the Dinaric Alps a barrier in the same degree as the Great Alps, and for Italians, with the example of the great Alpine tunnels ever before them, to speak as though the Dinaric Alps were incapable of being pierced, or of affording means of communication, is absurd, apart altogether from the great breach opened in them by the Narenta valley. Alike from Knim to the valley of the Una and from Sinj vid the ' " II rispetto del Cippico per i dati di fatti non e soverchio." G. Prezzolini, La Dalmazia, p. 34 note. * A Cippico, Italy and the Adriatic. Fortnightly Review, August 1915, p. 300. " Non dic6 nulla di Cippico o di Dudan, scusabili per la lore incompetenza come per la passione che fa loro veder bianco il nero in questo argomento " is Prezzolini's comment on the attitude of which the quotation in the text is a manifestation. Ibid. p. 66. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 121 Ar^ano pass to Livno, there are practicable railway routes, infinitely easier than the great trans-Alpine lines, while Dubrovnik is already connected with the interior by a narrow-gauge railway running up the Narenta valley, while a short spur runs more directly inland to Trebinje. If these ways of communication have never been developed, that has been due to Magyar hostility directed against future rivals of Eijeka (Fiume) and to dislike of a development which would have made closer than hitherto the moral and material ties binding together the different elements of the Southern Slavs. That, with Austrian apathy, has been the sole reason why these lines of railway are still wanting despite repeated demands from the Dalmatian Diet. The writers who claim as part of Italy all that lies within the Alps and their continuations have not the courage of their convictions, for the line of the Dinaric Alps is continued by the southern spurs of the §ar Dagh to the Pindus and thence to the Gulf of Corinth, while the Maritime Alps also include all the French Eiviera. On the theory above stated not only Dalmatia, but Albania, Epirus, Acarnania, and ^tolia are "geographically" a part of Italy. It is not necessary to consider further an idea which is not only repugnant to common sense but is contradicted by Italian geographers themselves. The idea has been subjected to an unintentional reductio ad absurdum by a cartographist mentioned by Prezzolini, who has headed a map showing Dalmatia down to the Narenta as part of Italy with the inscription, " The 7ieio natural boundaries of Italy ". Solvuntur tabulae risu. The historical claims based upon the facts of the former Venetian dominion in the Adriatic require more serious treatment, both as earnestly put forward by Italian patriots and as carrying weight with foreign observers. Many "well-informed" Englishmen cognizant of the bare fact of this dominion have seen in it a proof of a veritable coloniza- tion in the English sense, and the impression has been heightened by the accident that the towns of the Dalmatian seaboard are usually known to us by their Italian names. 122 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS It is needless to cite the numerous instances of this con- fusion which are to be found in our daily and periodical Press. It suffices to point out that the actual form of the nomenclature carries no argument with it, just as we are not entitled to deduce that Koln, Mainz, Trier, and Aachen are French cities because usually known to us as Cologne, Mayence, Treves, and Aix-la-Chapelle. It is a mere matter of the source through which our general acquaintance with the places has been originally derived. It is generally unknown how scanty was the foothold of Venice on the mainland of Dalmatia until a comparatively recent epoch of the history of the republic. Till the end of * the seventeenth century Venetian territory was confined to a narrow strip a few miles wide along the sea coast, and it was not till the Treaty of Karlowitz, concluded in 1699, that the republic was confirmed in the possession of such inland places as Knim, Klissa, or Sinj, by the " Mocenigo line." Only by the Treaty of Passarowitz in 1719 did Venice extend her boundary to the line of the Dinaric Alps. As the republic fell in 1797, a period of one hundred years therefore covers the total duration of Venetian rule over the inland parts of Dalmatia, itself as a whole but a maritime province. In short, historically speaking, the Venetian dominion was restricted until the last years of her indepen- dent existence to a bare foothold on the actual coast, the coast towns and the connecting shore. Moreover, it has to be remembered that in Dalmatia, as the term is used now, there existed from early times an independent republic which was never a possession of Venice but on the contrary was her vigorous rival. Within the southern hmits of Dalmatia, stretching from a little south of the Narenta to the Bocche di Cattaro and including the islands of Lastovo, Mljet, Sipan, Lapud, and Calamotta, was the territory of the republic of Dubrovnik, Serb in race and popular speech though Italian in culture. Her merchant ships by trans- position of the initial letters of her Italian name are said to have given us the word Argosy originally Eagosie ; her vessels were to be found in the Spanish Armada; and THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 123 she was the home of the early Serb Hterary renaissance of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, producing works instinct with the national consciousness of the race, while in the eighteenth she produced the mathematician Boskovic. Reduced in wealth by earthquakes and the changing current of commerce she yet maintained her independence and even survived her mightier rival till she too had to yield her liberties to Napoleon in 1808. The character of the Venetian rule over Dalmatia was not such that its supersession by that of the Habsburgs brought anything of loss to the country, though it was regretted by the Itahan element of the towns. That rule exhibited the worst features of the "mercantile system" without the redeeming element of the opening up of new territories which operated in our own colonial empire of the eighteenth century. Throughout her dealings with her subjects Venice was actuated by her own selfish interests, and those conceived in the narrowest spirit. Her dominion to her was not a trust, nor an instrument of civilization, but merely a means of enriching the city of the lagoons, and what money she spent in Dalmatia was spent for the sake of its defence, in short, on behalf of those " strategical necessities " which are taking Italy to its shores in our own day. Her first aim was to secure the monopoly of com- merce and the carrying trade, an object which could most completely be achieved by the conquest of the Dalmatian ports and the regulations which she could thereupon enforce. The constant wars in which Venice was engaged with Hungary and its sister kingdom of Croatia were due entirely to the aggression practised against those kingdoms by Venice. They could not acquiesce in the foreign domination of their seaport towns, and the consequent strangling of their trade, its diversion to other channels, and its exploitation for the benefit of the " mistress of the Adriatic", and as surely as like causes produce like effects so a repetition of Venetian policy by Italy will lead to a repetition of the old struggle to be carried on with the future Southern Slav kingdom; the new position will be 124 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS an exact counterpart of the old and will lead to the same sense of rankling injustice and determination for redress. The history of the past should be studied for the lessons it brings for the present and the future, and though diplomacy never learns yet the peoples concerned should insist that old mistakes, the cost of which will fall upon them, should not be committed again. The lesson of Venice's ceaseless wars against the possessors of the eastern Adriatic backland constitutes a grave warning for those who will have the handling of the Near Eastern settlement. The policy of monopoly postulated the economic weak- ness of the colonies, and possible competition was elimi- nated by the most ruthless economic methods. To prevent the rise of a silk industry in Dalmatia Venice did not hesitate to take the drastic step of cutting down all the mulberry-trees, and it has been stated that after the change of masters the number of Dalmatian fishing and trading vessels was doubled in a single year. The last fact is easily accounted for when we remember that all commerce had to be carried in Venetian bottoms and by way of Venice. The contrast between the condition of the towns under Venetian rule and the free republic of Dubrovnik, which conducted its own commerce freely and by means of its own ships, pointed the moral and assigned the cause of the poverty of the former. While the one was prosperous, happy, and orderly, even in the days when its former glory had de- parted, the others were poor, torn by factions between the townsmen and peasants, and sunk in feebleness, a condition which was reflected in the state of agriculture. The mono- polist policy of Venice required and effected this state of affairs, and a recent Italian writer has said that the pros- perity of Venice depended on the poverty of Dalmatia and that historically the Venetian dominion was a long suffocation of the country.^ ' " La fortuna di Venezia dipendeva dalla sfortuna della Dalmazia e storicamente il dominio veneto non poteva rappresentare ne altro rappresentd che una lunga soffacazione del paese ". G. Prezzolini, La Dalmazia, p. 8. This invaluable brochure should be in the hands of THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 125 Apart from the stifling of competition, what Venice sought in Dalmatia was wood for shipbuilding and sailors for the fleet. It was the enormous demands of timber for the former purpose that was responsible for the destruction of the ancient forests for which the country was famous in classical times. This destruction has resulted in the denudation of the soil and the turning of large areas of it into practical desert. For this last result Venice cannot be held morally responsible, for it is only in our days that the need of reafforesting forest areas as they are felled has been recognized, and our neglect of forestry in own country and of reafforestation in many of our colonies is proof of how slowly the need, even when recognized, is acted upon in practice. Its Venetian rulers did not desire that the Dalmatians should be other than what they had been in times past, poor, hardy, simple, and a defence against the Turks. The absence of road-making, of instruction, and of economic development, has been defended on the strange ground of preserving a frontier territory whose condition would not attract the cupidity of its neighbours and the rude condition of whose inhabitants preserved the fitness of the latter as a semi-barbarous race of caterans useful for the defence of the marches. Any other government, say the apologists for the system, would have done the same, and perhaps have been less successful ! Even Tommaseo, while defending the moral character of Venetian rule, is reduced to pointing out that to leave unremedied a defect in man or nation is a different thing to introducing it.^ The damning fact remains that Venice, in not desiring the educational development of the country, so far from spreading Italian culture actually, by the measures it adopted, prevented, though of course not with that purpose, the introduction of learnmg. It is not too much to say that if northern Dalmatia is to-day a Slav and not an Italian land it is due every student of the question. It disposes of the case for annexation, and gives numerous quotations from documents not accessible to students in England. ' Git. Prezzoliui, ut supra, pp. 16-18 note. 126 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS to the restrictive policy of her former Italian mistress. No printing press was to be found in Dalmatia till about three hundred years after the setting up of the first press in Montenegro, for no books were published in the country of a date prior to 1774, nor was there any public school. A humorous illustration of the regard felt for her subjects from overseas is to be found in her authorization to the University of Padua of the conferring of the doctorate on such subjects on presentation of a certificate of proficiency given by two doctors of medicine or jurisconsults, the condition attached being that they should only practise in Dalmatia ! There is nothing therefore in the past of Dalmatia that can justify any historical claim on the part of Italy to its possession. Neither the duration of Venetian dominion over the interior, nor the character of that dominion, is of a nature to confer historical rights upon the heir of Venice. The ports of Dalmatia were regarded as convenient trading stations as were other cities in the Levant, while the possession of them stifled any possible competition. No right can be alleged in Dalmatia that could not equally be alleged in the case of Crete for example, though it is not to be forgotten that history has been invoked in the case of Rhodes, and Corfu also has been claimed as an Italian island. Dubrovnik and its territories at any rate were never Venetian, Kotor (Cattaro) was Serb till it fell into the hands of the Hungarians in 1371, Bar (Antivari) was recognized by the Serb monarchs as a sort of republic and allowed to coin its own money, Budva was also a Serb port and is noteworthy from the fact that its law is said to have been the source of DuSan's Zakonik. These two towns finally fell to Venice in 1442 and 1444. The kingdom of Croatia possesses prior historical rights over nothern Dalmatia. In fine, the Southern Slavs were in the country before the Venetians — and are there now. These "historical claims" are the sport of propagandists all over the Near East, and the history of these regions is such that almost any and every Power can advance some THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 127 sort of "historical" right to anything which it covets. Some are valid enough, others are comparable to our "rights" to Calais or Bordeaux. The continual insistence on these "historical" claims is one of the worst evils which have afflicted and still afflict the problems of the Balkans. There is no other quarter of the world where contending parties hark back to " rights " derived from so long distant a past, which not infrequently represent a possession quite ephemeral in its character. However keen may be the regret of patriotic Frenchmen for the loss of the splendid colonial empire which they possessed in the eighteenth century, no Frenchman urges the historical rights of France to Canada proper, perhaps the most outstanding feat of colonization in history in its character if regard be had to the manner in which, as in the ancient Greek colonies, the very civilization, culture, and atmosphere of the metropolis has been transplanted to a new land, though doubtless in the case cited a good deal of this resignation must be set down to the liberal policy pursued by England which has kept the French Canadians as British subjects without requiring them to abandon their national outlook or re- ligion. In the Near East, however, we have a veritable riot of conflicting historical claims of a nature which if applied elsewhere would, as Professor Cvijic has observed, require a remodelling of the map of Europe which, if per impossihile it were effected, would result in a state of affairs infinitely worse than that which prevails. The Magyars insist on the claims of that fetish of their chauvinism, the sacred crown of S. Stephen, whose worship requires that everything that ever fell under its sway or suzerainty should return again to its allegiance in defiance of the principles of nationality and historical growth and in repugnance to the dictates of the most ordinary common sense. Italy achieved her unity in despite of historical claims. The kingdom of the Two Sicilies was an ancient political organism with its roots deep in the history of the peninsula, and the Italian Bourbons and the House of Este have undeniable "his- torical" claims to their former territories. These claims 128 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS are rejected on the ground that they run counter to the principle of nationality and the right of every people to determine its political life. It is fortunate for Italy that neither English nor French, especially the latter, set any store on ancient historical claims. Do Italians accept the historical claims of the Pope to the Papal States ? Mace- donia again has been the prey of claims dating from the Middle Ages, and in some cases a particular town or district has acquired a sentimental importance quite incommen- surate with real values. One reason for this has already been given — the stamping flat of the Balkans by the Turkish conquest, with the result that the independent life of its peoples has been resumed from the late medieval standpoint — and it is a reason which must be allowed for and is in fact natural enough. The only real resolvent of these problems is the fact of nationality, and the real political frontiers are to be found in those geographical lines of demarcation which correspond most closely to the ethnographical. Ill Dalmatia is a Southern Slav country from the point of view of nationality. The Austrian census gives the population of the province as follows : Serbo-Croats 610,669 or 96 per cent. ; Italians 18,028 or slightly under 3 per cent. ; Germans 3,081, the total population being 634,855. In 1900 out of a total population of 584,823 the Italians numbered 15,279. Of the Serbo-Croats the Catholic Croats muster 80 per cent, of the total population and the Orthodox Serbs 105,335, or 16 per cent. Some 20,000 of the Orthodox are to be found in the extreme south in the district of Kotor, the remainder in the extreme north and in Sibenik. Of the Italians no fewer than 8,000 are to be found in the single town of Zadar (Zara). Signer Gayda has combated the correctness of these figures and prefers a calculation of his own. He alleges that 6,000 votes were cast for Italian candidates for the Beichsrath, that it is usual in THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 129 Austria to reckon one elector for every ten citizens, and that consequently the number of Italians should be 60,000. The immediate answer to this is obvious. In the first place the Italians, such as they number, are to be found in the towns which always give a higher percentage of votes cast than rural constituencies, and in the second place he gra- tuitously assumes that no Italian candidate received any but Italian votes. The contrary is known to be the case at Zadar, where Croat votes have been cast for Italian candidates. Moreover, his own calculation gives the Italian population at less than 10 per cent, of the total. He further alleges that as the result of governmental pressure many Italians are terrorized into concealing their nation- ality, and that owing to the same cause many Italians have become denationalized. As to government pressure, it has been pointed out by Dr. Seton- Watson that the munici- pality of Zadar, which is in the hands of Italians, is the only municipality in Dalmatia which has not been dissolved ; it has therefore received preferential treatment as compared with the Serbo-Croat councils. The arguments alleged require, however, more detailed treatment, and it will be necessary to see how far the latest figures are supported by previous estimates, and what is the historical testimony as to the ethnographic character of the country in the past. The inquiry will show what ground there is for saying that Dalmatia in the past was more Italian, and that the waning of Italianita is a modern process induced by illicit pressure. Here also, thanks to Professor Prezzolini, it will be possible to rely almost entirely on Italian evidence. In 1873 Maschek gives the population as containing 440,282 Serbo-Croats as against 27,305 ItaHans.^ In 1868 Tommaseo accepted the round figures of 400,000 Slavs and 20,000 Italians. ^ Sir Gardner Wilkinson, in his book Dalmatia and Montenegro published in 1848, gives the ' L. Maschek, Manuale del regno di Dalmazia per Vanno 1873. at. G. Prezzolini, ut supra, p. 43. * at. Prezzolini, ihid. 9 130 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS population of 1833 as embracing 360,000 Serbo-Croats and 16,000 Italians. So far then as the statistical estimates of the past century are concerned there is nothing to invalidate the correctness of the figures of the last census. The proportions vary, but not to any striking extent. In view of the growing national consciousness of the Serbo- Croats, we should expect a slightly larger percentage of them in the later figures, as many of the bilingual popula- tion who in former times would return themselves as Italians, as constituting the richer and more aristocratic element of the population, would latterly return themselves as Slavs. The Austrian census, it must be remembered, is by language, and a man speaking Serb at home but knowing Italian and using it for business purposes could return himself at will as being by language Serbo-Croat or Italian. The historical testimony of the past is quite conclusive in its results. Writing in 1500 Lucio states that the original Dalmatian population which spoke a corrupt Latin dialect had greatly decreased as the result of war, pestilence, and other causes, and that gradually the Slavs had pene- trated not only the mainland and the islands but into the cities, so that the "Dalmatians" were constrained to learn Slav and became bilingual, and owing to the prevalence of the Slav language were counted as Slavs by foreigners. That language, he says, was called Croat or Serb.^ These Romance-speaking people were not of course Italians but the descendants of the old Latin-speaking provincials of the Roman Empire. Nor was the process of infiltration a new one in Lucio's day. The Southern Slavs had early penetrated to the coast, and the earliest Croatian kingdom had its nucleus in northern Dalmatia, Sibenik for example having been the capital of King Kresimir, and Spljet of Zvonomir, but it is very probable that in the towns the ' Prezzolini, ut supra, p. 27, cit. Lucio, De regno Dalmatiae et Croatiae, vi, p. 219 : " Dalmatae tamen, ipsique contermini Slavi, linguam Slavam non dicunt, sed Heruatam vel Serblam, prout cuiusque dialectus est". THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 131 provincials were numerous, and that a further process of diminution, as Lucio says, was the result of frequent wars and the great pestilences of the fourteenth century. Even in 1177 the towns had been invaded, for we are told that when Pope Alexander III paid a visit to Zara he was conducted in procession by the inhabitants, who recited praises and songs "in loro lingua schiava". In 1553 a Venetian noble, Giustinian, who visited Dalmatia with a mission from the Government gave an account of his travels. At Zadar he found an Italianate gentry, but the populace, though speaking the lingua franca were Slav in their customs. At Sibenik he observes : '' The costumes of the inhabitants, the speech and the customs of these Sebenicans are all Slav in their character (all'usanza schiava)". Nearly all had the lingua franca and a few of the gentry dressed in Italian fashion. "The ladies", he adds, "all dress in Slav fashion and hardly any speak the lingua franca", an observation which is very significant of the real nationality of the people. At Trogir (Trau) he finds the same state of affairs, " nelle case loro parlano lingua schiava per rispetto delle donne, perche poche d'esse intendono lingua italiana, et si ben qualcuna I'intende, non vuol parlare, se non la lingua materna ", so that here also Italian or the lingua franca was only the language of business for the greater part of the inhabitants. He speaks in almost identical language of the neighbouring Spalatines, whose tongue he says is the Tuscan of Slav. The islands are more Italian in character.^ A similar account is given by another traveller of the independent republic of Dubrovnik. Here even the men only spoke Italian "here and there". "La lingua loro nativa e schiava, con la quale parlano gli altri Dalmatini ". Their Italian is corrupt. The Diario of 1571 gives similar testimony of a Slav- speaking population at Spljet (Spalato), men and women in the piazza using that language. ' Monumenta spectantia historiam alavorum meridionaUum, viii, pp. 197, etc. at. Prezzolini, ut supra, pp 28, 29. 132 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS In 1574 the Belazioyii de' rettori is full of the same evidence. The Spalatines complain "in their language". The Venetian procurators include in their advice to know v^hat the Spalatines say if they speak Slav. A significant incident is related at Trogir. An old soldier receives a solatium from the republic, he takes it, salutes, and goes off " singing in Slav of King Marko, and all the people and the bystanders sang it with him, as with one accord. For they all know this ballad (canzone)". ^ Here then we have a people which knows and spontaneously takes up some ballad of the famous Serb hero Marko Kraljevic. One consideration emerges plainly, and that is that even in the sixteenth century not only the country districts but the towns themselves were predominantly Slav. The people speak Serbo-Croat in their own homes, they com- monly dress in Slav costume, their habits are Slav, their popular songs are Slav. The townsmen however are generally bilingual, knowing also Italian, the lingua franca of commerce. It is this circumstance which may have created the impression of greater Italianita in the towns than really existed, since foreigners knowing Italian but no Serb could get a response in the towns while they were unable to obtain an answer in the country, thus acquiring the impression of an Italian town population as contrasted with a Serbo-Croat peasantry. The real line of demarcation seems to have been one of wealth — the wealthy classes were often genuine Italians while the Slav population comprised the poorer section of the community. Hence the great bitterness of the class feeling, breaking out in 1797 into an open Jacquerie, of which there is abundant evidence in the authorities referred to. Fortis, who wrote his Viaggio in Dalmazia in 1794, says that the Slavs spoke indifferently of " f ede di cane e fede d'italiano ", a dog's word, or an Italian's word. = When in 1797 the Austrian ' V. Solitro, Documenti siorici sulV Istria e sulla Dalmazia, 1841 : il Diario, pp 131-172, Lettere di Rettori, pp. 173-250. Cit. Prezzolini, ui supra, pp. 29-30. • Op. cit,, p. 50. Prezzolini, p. 21. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 133 general Rukavina, a Croat, entered Dalmatia, he and his soldiers were well received on account of their nationality. He addressed the people in Serbo-Croat, and at Trogir, when two companies of Croatian infantry were disembarked, the populace remarked on the fact that the soldiers spoke their own language, and that many had the same sur- names as themselves. It is not altogether surprising, in view of the evidence of which part has been adduced above, to find that the most patriotic Italian writers and thinkers, the real makers of modern Italy in the moral and spiritual elements which marked the risorgimento, have no doubt that Dalmatia is a Slav and not an Italian land. Tommaseo, who was himself by birth a Dalmatian, wrote in 1861: "I do not think that Dalmatia can ever form an appendage of Italy . . . because, if it has always been difficult to rule men speaking another language, for the Italians now it would be impossible if they wish to institute, I do not say material equality, but civil equity . . . her future destiny intends her to be the friend of Italy not her subject ". ^ He thought that Dalmatia should be joined to Serbia and the Serb provinces then under Turkish dominion i.e. Bosnia, etc. Croatia he regarded as being morally less free than these provinces. At that time, of course, the Croats were still under the glamour of the House of Habsburg, and their political ideas were vague and halting, and the same thought was expressed by Sir Arthur Evans in his Illyrian Letters. Time and circumstances have changed that attitude and, while geographically Dalmatia forms the complement of the Serb lands of Bosnia and the Hercegovina, such particularist ideas are now swallowed up in the greater ideal of a Southern Slav unity in which they have no place. Mazzini definitely assigned Dalmatia to the Slavs, whom he regarded — and rightly — as natural allies of Italy. " Pro- cure the election", he said, "of men to represent in one ' N. Tommaseo, Lettera ai Dalmati, p. 6. Cit. Prezzolini, ut supra, pp. 35, 36. 134 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS national assembly Carinthia, Kranjska (Carniola), Dalmatia, Croatia, Slavonia . . .". In 1866 he said: "For ethno- graphic, political, commercial reasons Istria is ours : as necessary to Italy as the ports of Dalmatia are necessary to the Southern Slavs ".^ After 1866 he considered the reten- tion of the island of Lissa to be necessary, influenced doubt- less by the Italian naval defeat. Valussi in 1871 distinguished between the Friulian- Istrian littoral and the " Hungarian-Dalmatian ", the first of which is within the natural boundaries of Cisalpine Italy, whereas in the second "the Italians are a colony on the maritime coast which belongs to another nationality whose territory extends to its shores ". He remarks again of Dalmatia that it is "destined henceforth to become the maritime coast and harbours of the future, and now, not far distant, Jugoslavia ".^ Cattaneo sees the natural boundary of Italy in the moun- tainous backbone of Istria : " Di la Slavia, la Fiume : di qua ritalia, di qua Trieste " (Beyond is Slavia and Fiume, on this side Italy and Trieste). Prezzolinis quotes also from a speech delivered in 1896 by a Signor Ziliotto, a champion of Italianita, in the Diet at Zara. " We, separated from Italy by the whole Adriatic, a few thousands scattered without territorial continuity among a people, not of hundreds of thousands, but of millions of Slavs, how could we ever think of union with Italy ? " The result of this inquiry, pursued in Italian sources, is quite conclusive. We have continuous testimony to the Slav character of Dalmatia, not only in the country dis- tricts, but, so far as the general populace is concerned, in the towns also. This was remarked upon by Venetian travellers quite early in the history of the Venetian occu- ' G. Mazzini, Opere, vol. xiv, passim. Cit. Prezzolini, p. 37. " "Essendo ormai la Dalmazia destinata a diventare la costa marittima portuosa della futura, ed ormai non molto piu lontana Jugoslavia". P. Valosi, L'Adriatico in relazione agli interessi nazionali delV Italia, pp. 29-30, 107-108. Cit. Prezzolini, p. 38. 3 TJt supra, p. 44. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 135 pation, itself until the end of the century confined to a narrow strip of coast line. Venice made no effort to Italianize the people, from motives partly of commercial jealousy and partly of military expediency. The great patriotic thinkers of the risorgiviento regard Dalmatia as Slav, destined to form part of a united Southern Slav king- dom the friend of Italy. There is no trace of a decreasing proportion of true Italians during the past century, though the growing national consciousness of the Slavs led to the overthrow of the political Italianita which till 1866 and even longer had, in point of fact, been bolstered up by the Austrian government both by the official use of Italian and by that manipulation of the franchise which still subsists for the local Diet. There is no reason for supposing any material inaccuracy in the census figures. Ethnographi- cally Dalmatia is a Serbo-Croat land. Not only is Dalmatia Serbo-Croat, but it is the very home of the movement for unity between the two branches of the race ; it has given birth to a vigorous national literature, the great sculptor Mestrovic is a Dalmatian from the neigh- bourhood of Sibenik, its politicians have been the foremost advocates of political reunion and have carried their prin- ciples into practice, a united Southern Slav kingdom with- out Dalmatia would be deprived of some of its most vigorous political elements, of the spiritual home of some of its fore- most champions. I So strongly rooted is Slav conservatism, even among the Roman Catholics, that in many parishes of the islands and the mainland the old GlagoHtic rite is still in use, despite former discouragement by the Vatican. Slav philologists resort to some of the islands of the Quarnero where the dialect represents the earliest known ' These points will be found fully treated by Dr. R. W. Seton- Watson in his brochure The Balkans, Italy, and the Adriatic, to which the reader is referred for information upon them. Goracuchi, in his work Attraits de Trieste, written in 1883, speaks with enthusiastic fervour of the great names contributed by the Southern Slavs of Dalmatia to the history of art, literature, and science. Himself an Italian, he acknow- ledges the Slav nationality of those of whom he speaks. Vide a passage cited in La Serbie, October 15, 1916. 136 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS form of the Slav tongue. As has been seen in the previous chapter, the Serbo-Croat Coahtion in Croatia was largely the work of Dalmatian politicians. We have seen also the joy with which the Serb successes in the Balkan wars were received, and the consequent dissolution by Imperial authority of several of the Dalmatian municipalities — Sig- ner Gayda himself has given a most vivid account of the demonstrations of joy, of the spiritual exaltation, and of the excited hopes of the Dalmatian populace. IV If the historical and ethnographic claims of Italy to Dalmatia are without substantial basis, and come into conflict with the principle of nationality, the demands advanced on the ground of strategic necessity are entitled to a respectful hearing in so far as they are concerned only with the legitimate needs of self-defence, and are neither extended to cover ideas of aggression nor pushed to a length where the wrong done to others by their gratifica- tion would be out of proportion to their benefit to Italy. The origin of these strategic claims has already been stated as due to the configuration of the Adriatic, the paucity of harbours on the Italian side, and the abundance of them on the eastern shore, which could become a menace to Italy if held by a strong naval Power. So far as the demands have a legitimate foundation they call for such a territorial settle- ment in the region of the Adriatic as may give reasonable security to Italy. "It was and is the possession of the eastern shore which gives command of the sea".^ In this sentence we have the root claim of Italy to territorial possession of the opposite coast expressed in its baldest and also its most far-reaching sense. If the dictum were true, then indeed there would hardly be a " problem " of the Adriatic ; cadit qucestio, and the only point to be determined would be whether Italy or ' J. A. R. Marriott, The Problem of the Adriatic. Nineteenth Century Review, December 1915, p. 1327. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 137 the Southern Slavs were to be put into this command as thus expressed. "Dalmatia", says an Itahan writer in the same train of ideas, " dominates the Adriatic " ; it has done so in the past, and the development of naval warfare by means of mines, torpedo, and submarine, will enable it to do so much more in the future ; whoever has sought to command the Adriatic has always been compelled to occupy the Dalmatian coasts. But is this true? Underlying these dicta is an assumption without warrant in history, plainly repugnant to the art of naval warfare as conceived by sailors, and akin to those " heresies " which have more than once threatened the supremacy of a naval Power. A coast does not, and cannot, command a sea ; it does not, and cannot, in itself command naval power in either sense of the phrase. If it be possession of the eastern coast that gives command of the Adriatic, if Dalmatia dominates the Adriatic, how is it that the Allies from the first day of the war have been in command of that sea, how is it that Italy at this moment dominates it ? If these dicta be true then Austria should be in command of the Adriatic, Austria should be able to navigate its area freely, transport her troops at will, forbid passage to the warships of her enemies and a fortiori to transports carry- ing troops. We find, on the contrary, that the reverse is the case ; the appearance of Austrian warships is rare and furtive, no troops have been or could have been transported across the Adriatic, though some perhaps have been moved down the coast under cover of the island barrier. On the other hand the Italian fleet, with some allied aid, has convoyed the transport of 260,000 men across the Adriatic in 250 vessels, and 300,000 cwt of materials in 100 vessels, while sovereigns and princes have crossed six times, and military and political officials more frequently.^ In short, the Allies have exercised command in spite of the continued and unthreatened occupation of Dalmatia by the Austriaus. Evidently, in face of facts which directly negative the validity of the dicta above quoted, there is some fatal flaw ' Vide Italian Official Note of February 24, 1916. 138 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS in them. That flaw is the confusion, which is often found in political discussions on this and kindred topics, between power itself and the means of acquiring power. If good ports constituted maritime power then Norway would be one of the most foremost naval Powers of the world, for its coast is a series of magnificent harbours, deep, well sheltered, and capable of easy defence. Greece, too, in that case would be the leading naval State of the Medi- terranean, which it would command by virtue of the same natural advantages as are possessed by Norway. No one, however, would pretend for a moment that the coast of Norway commands the North Sea, and that England cannot dominate that water unless she obtains the opposite coast. It is fleets, and fleets alone, that can command the sea, and, as the course of the war has shown, that command cannot be divided though it may be in suspense — the stronger fleet drives its rival off the open sea. To say, then, that Dalmatia "dominates" the Adriatic is plainly incorrect. Mr. Marriott's phrase that possession of the eastern shore " gives " command of that sea marks an approximation to the correct idea, but only an approxi- mation. The truth is that all such phrases are misleading. What is meant by them — or ought to be meant — is that such a harbour, position, or coast is of a nature to confer advantages or opportunities on its possessor greater than those afforded to its possessor by some other point or coast, in such manner that in certain circumstances the possessor of the first named will be clearly in a position to make good by naval means his command of the waters in question. Those circumstances consist in equality of resources for a naval establishment. The resources neces- sary in modern days for the maintenance of a great navy are only to be found in a first-class Power, a navy is a most expensive instrument to build up or maintain and it is an instrument that grows yearly more expensive. It requires also, if the fleet is to be built and provided for by its possessor, large industrial and manufacturing resources. These are the reasons for the practical disap- THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 139 pearance of secondary fleets as a factor in maritime war- fare. In the days of the Napoleonic wars, when a ship- of-the-line could be built for ^6100, 000 and, when built, was good for fifty years, the smaller States such as Denmark could maintain respectable fleets equal in quality of material to the best. Such a State could possess, say, some half-dozen ships-of-the-line besides frigates and smaller craft. The equivalent in modern days would cost £15,000,000 for the battleships alone, and in a dozen years they would be obsolescent and in twenty years obsolete. Harbours and coasts do not command a sea or constitute naval power, they only afford greater or less facilities for the acquisition of such power provided the possessor can also command the necessary resources in men, industry, and, above all, money. If then the possessor of Dalmatia be a Great Power it can command the Adriatic, but even so only if it employ the necessary resources. Austria is a Great Power, but in default of having employed the necessary resources she does not comm.and the Adriatic in spite of her being a first-class State. If the future possessor of Dalmatia do not command the resources of a Great Power, then that possessor can no more command the Adriatic than Norway can com- mand the North Sea ; Dalmatia in such an event will largely represent unrealizable potentialities. Dalmatia would of course confer advantages on such a possessor, its coast could easily be defended against attack, which is a defensive advantage, such naval power as might be possessed by the State in question would be more efficacious than if exercised from a poor coast devoid of natural harbours, but the fact remains that in default of the necessary resources such a State could not build or maintain a large fleet, and while, therefore, in a position to annoy her neighbour by minor warfare she could not command the sea. It is not Portsmouth that commands the Channel, but the fleet that we can maintain at Ports- mouth; in the Mediterranean it was not Gibraltar nor Malta that dominated the inland sea, but the fleet that 140 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS was maintained there. Give Gibraltar, Malta, and Aden to Monaco, yet Monaco will not command the Mediter- ranean nor maintain for twenty-four hours her hold on the great fortresses. All this is extremely elementary, yet it is constantly overlooked or confused by speakers and writers both in reference to ourselves and others. The future Southern Slav kingdom, as will be seen, cannot be, even if the Southern Slavs attain full national unity, more than one of a new order of secondary States ; it will not be in a position to compete with Italy or to maintain a first-class navy, nor will it desire to maintain even a rela- tively strong fleet unless forced to do so by an openly hostile Italy. That the point has not been laboured without cause is to be seen in the exaggerated language frequently held, not only by Italians, in this matter. Thus an English writer has said : " Should Europe be persuaded by the folly of the Greek and the greed of the Slav to acquiesce, through sheer weariness, in the eventual partition and destruction of Albania, the inevitable result will be that the eastern shores of the Adriatic will fall into Slav hands to the swamping of the fatuous Greeks and the reduction of Italy to a second or third-rate State. With the opposite coasts of the Adriatic from Trieste to Corfu in the hands of one strong Power, Italy knows that she would be thrust down to the position of a dependency . . .".^ It says little for the political grasp required by the British consular service that such opinions should find utterance from a consul of twenty years' standing at Skodra. There is no question of Trieste or Valona, of which the latter is already in Italian hands and the former will be in the event of an Allied victory. For the rest it is absurd to say that a State of less than one-third of her population and smaller in area could reduce Italy to a position of dependency by the mere possession of the eastern shores of the Adriatic, or that in such an event Italy would sink to a second- or ' Mr. Wadham Peacock, Italy and Albania. Contemporary Beview, February 1915, p. 362. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC Ml even third-class Power. Those shores have been for years in the hands of a first-class Power, but Italy has not therefore sunk to the level of a third-class State, and if Austria has maintained a certain ascendancy over Italy it has been due to the possession of a greatly superior army. Apparently, however, the writer considers 12,000,000 Southern Slavs to be worth very considerably more than 40,000,000 ItaHans, or than the 50,000,000 of Habsburg subjects including the greater number of those Southern Slavs. It is absurd. Signor Prezzolini has pointed out quite correctly that what has been the decisive factor in the dominion of the Adriatic has been the possession of a more powerful fleet and not the possession of Dalmatia, and he adds the striking comment that as a fact, with the exception of the defeat suffered in 1866 at Lissa by Persano, " and every one knows whose fault it was ", the victors in the Adriatic have always been those who sought to acquire Dalmatia and not those who were in possession of it. He cites the case of the Roman victory over the Liburnians, the conquest of Zara by the Venetians, the victories of the Genoese over the Venetians in 1298, 1354, 1379 (they were defeated the fol- lowing year off Chioggia), and of the English over the French at Lissa in 1811, while in 1859 the Franco-Sar- dinian fleet captured Lussinpiccolo : a series of historical events which amply bears out the argument which has been put forward above. It has been seen above (Section I) that in the negotia- tions with Austria Italy claimed certain of the southern Dalmatian islands. At the same time various projects were ventilated in the Italian Press, but these ideas have ceased to be of interest since the conclusion with the Entente of the Adriatic agreement, which has settled the extent of the territorial demands put forward by Italy. In accordance with the scheme of this chapter the discussion of that agreement is relegated to the last section, being postponed to the discussion of the problem on its merits. By putting forward claims to Dalmatia and its islands Italy is in reality U2THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS proclaiming a great distrust of the future Southern Slavdom, for if the result of the war be a complete victory for the AUies of a nature leading to the full satisfaction of their demands, the result will be that there will only be two States left on the Adriatic, Italy and greater Serbia. These territorial guarantees, then, are demanded as against Serbia, they have no other raison d'etre ; they imply either that Italy is hostile to Serbia or suspects the latter of present or future hostility to her. There can unfortunately be no doubt of the feeHng of the Italian Press, and it is idle and foolish to shut our eyes to facts, but these feelings are mis- taken and have no counterpart among Southern Slav states- men save in so far — and this is a saving clause which is tending to include an increasing content — as the attitude of Italy provokes an inevitable reaction in their minds. Thus the attitude of Italian publicists is tending more and more to evoke the very danger which they wish to guard against. The Southern Slavs cherish no feeling of hostility to Italy except as the result of Italian claims. The position is paradoxical : the possession of Dalmatia by Italy would tend to make its possession necessary, the abandon- ment of Italian claims would make its possession useless. That is to say that the effect of an Italian occupation will be the unsleeping hostility of the Southern Slavs, a hos- tility which will entail upon Italy the necessity of guarding against its effects, while the abandonment of the claim would gain Italy the friendship of her oversea neighbour and render precautions needless. Italians have claimed not merely a supremacy in the Adriatic but an absolute dominion of the most uncon- ditional character. The Giornale d'ltalia (whose two chief proprietors are Baron Sonnino and Signor Salandra) remarked on April 19, 1915 : " The principal objective of Italy in the Adriatic is the solution once for all of the politico- strategic question of a sea which is commanded in the military sense from the eastern shore, and such a problem can be solved only by one method — by eliminating from the Adriatic every other war fleet. . . . From the military point THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 143 of view Italy ought not to make a compromise . . . neither a fort nor a gun nor a submarine that is not Italian ought to be in the Adriatic. Otherwise the present most difficult situation in the Adriatic will be perpetuated, and will inevitably grow worse with time ". ^ This demand aims not only at a reasonable security for Itahan defensive interests but at an exclusive command of the Adriatic, so that it should become in reality " il mare nostro", an Italian lake, though there is no reason why the possessor of the western shore of that sea should claim it as a national property rather than the possessor of the eastern shore. Neither party has any right to an exclusive possession of what is by nature common to both, neither party can claim more than reasonable security and ordinary mari- time rights ; the claim is in fact the result of an inflated chauvinism very much akin to the claims of which we are accustomed to hear from Berlin. Indeed the claim of Ger- many to the mouths of the Rhine is on its merits incom- parably stronger than the Italian claim to Dalmatia. Even moderate Italian opinion which is not in favour of the extreme claims advanced for Italy and is willing to see Dalmatia in the hands of the Southern Slavs shows itself very jealous on the subject of a possible Southern Slav navy. Thus Professor G. Salvemini writes : " Italy will have the right, and — for its future security — it ought, to profit by the transition from the old to the new equilibrium to bind Serbia to itself by a convention not only military (terrestre), but also naval which could at the same time distribute the burdens of land (terrestre) defence and forbid Serbia any beginning of naval hopes. " We cannot prevent Austria having a fleet since she already possesses one. The Serbia of to-morrow we can prevent in its own interests arid ours. And we can profit by this moment, which will never recur in history, to exclude ' at. the Times, April 20 and 26, 1915. M. Charles Vellay quotes the last portion in a slightly different form: " Ni un port [?fort], ni un sous-marin, ni nne torpille ". La Question de VAdriatique, p. 54. The general sense is the same. 144 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS from the Adriatic Austria lohich has a fleet, and to sub- stitute for her a new State which has 710 fleet and which ice can prevent creating one ".^ This is the view not of an intransigeant but of a moderate man who views the formation of a united Southern Slav State with sympathy, and in the next paragraph adds with a wisdom rare in his compatriots — those at any rate of them whose views find expression — that even on the worst hypothesis, the foundation of a great Serbia with a fleet and alHed to Austria (what would remain of it, that is to say), such a transitory alliance would be a less evil than the permanent hostility of an aggrandized Austria. The same line is taken by Signor Prezzolini, whom we have seen as a vigorous opponent of that trend of thought which aims at the incorporation of Dalmatia. Like Pro- fessor Salvemini, he is willing to allow complete Southern Slav unity, save for an Italian occupation of Lissa and also of Zara — the latter apparently as a sort of museum,^ but on the other hand he postulates the prohibition of a Slav navy or naval ports, and the neutralization of the Serb coast line. The arguments which he advances are not due to any sentiment, but on the other hand lack nothing in "reality" of the most pronounced type. To him a Serbia with Cattaro and a fleet, even though Italy should have northern Dalmatia and the islands, is a greater danger than a completely united Southern Slavdom without a fleet. Here again we note the almost superstitious fear of what this people will be able to achieve on the water with their small resources. He advances his argument with admirable candour, " To neutralize the Adriatic, or rather to prevent the entrance of any fleet, to prevent the fortification of any island or port of Dalmatia, would be a much better guarantee for us than the possession of two-thirds of Dalmatia from which Cattaro was excluded. The more ' G. Salvemini, Guerra Neutralitd ? p. 17. Italics in the original. * " Zara e fuori questione . . . Zara restera all' incirca un museo ". G. Prezzolini, op. cit., p. 69. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 145 so because whilst neutralization would mean for Serbia that she would have no fleet, it would mean for us that we should have one in the Mediterranean, ready, whenever hostilities should bring about a rupture of the treaty to enter the Adriatic [my italics] ; the more so because neutraliza- tion would signify the exclusion from the Adriatic of every other fleet, and especially of the Russian, for which, once free ingress into the Mediterranean has been obtained, a Serb Cattaro would become the poiiit d'appui.^ " Nor are we under any illusions as to the eternity of neutralization. All agreements are subject to revision once there is a change in the equilibrium of forces from which they sprung. But we maintain that Serbia would have no interest in violating the neutralization and thus entering into conflict with us, save on the day on which it would be equally to her interest to contest with us the possession of Dalmatia. But, whilst neutralization would mean that we should find ourselves ranged against a Serbia, in possession indeed of Dalmatia, but without a fleet, and therefore of a useless Dalmatia [my italics] , where it would be easy to disembark, the conquest of Dalmatia [i.e. if Italy had northern Dalmatia and Serbia the southern part] would find us against a Serbia in possession of Cattaro and of a fleet which, with the addition of the Russian or the Greek, would not be despicable. Without being profound strategists, the first hypothesis seems to us preferable to the second ".^ ' The writer here contradicts his own observation made two pages previously that a united Southern Slav State, having no more to get from Eussia would pursue an independent policy. ' " Neutralizzare I'Adriatico, ossia impedire I'entrata a qualunque flotta, impedire la fortificazione di qualunque isola o porto della Dalmazia, sarebbe per noi una guaranzia assai migliore del possesso di due terzi della Dalmazia dai quali fosse escluso Cattaro. Tanto piu che mentre la neutralizzione significherebbe per la Serbia non avere flotta, per noi significherebbe averla in Mediterraneo, pronta, qualora le ostilit4 rompessero il trattato, a penetrare nell' Adriatico ; tanto piu che la neutralizzione significherebbe I'esclusione dall'Adriatico di ogni altra flotta, e specialmente di quella russa, per la quale, vma volta ottenuto il 10 146 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS The arguments which are here adduced in favour of the prohibition to the future Southern Slav kingdom of the creation of a fleet, whether combined or not with the occupation of northern Dalmatia, are sufficient to bring out the essential unfairness of any such proposal, and it is well therefore to have had them stated by a man of such moderation in his general handling of the problem. The policy of prohibiting a Southern Slav navy is based avowedly on the fact that such a prohibition would leave the Southern Slavs in their maritime activities more at the mercy of the Italians, even though the latter relin- quished all claims to Dalmatia, than would the occupation of a large part of the province without any such pro- hibition. It is pointed out with truth that Italy would still have her fleet in the Mediterranean (there being under ordinary circumstances no occasion for stationing it in the Adriatic), ready to enter the latter sea at a moment's notice, without the Serbs being in a position to take any safeguards whatever. The Serbs would hold a "useless" Dalmatia on which the Italians could land troops at will. In a word, while surrendering physical possession of Dalmatia Italy would in fact hold the destinies of that province in the hollow of her hand, and with it absolute power over any and every form of Serb maritime activity. Serb merchant vessels would navigate at Italy's good pleasure, the fishermen would fish by her permission, libero ingresso nel Mediterraneo, Cattaro diventera il punto di appoggio. Ne ci facciamo lillusioni sulla perennita della neutralizzione. Tutti i patti son soggetti a revisione una volta che sia mutato I'equilibrio di forze dal quale nacquero. Ma noi sosteniamo che la Serbia non avrebbe interesse a rompere la neutralizzionne e quindi a entrare in lotta con noi, che quel giorno in cui lo avesse egualmente per contes- tarci U dominio della Dalmazia. Ma, mentre la neutralizzione ci farebbe trovare contro una Serbia, sia pure in possesso della Dalmazia, ma senza flotta e dunque di una Dalmazia inutile, dove sarebbe facile sbarcare, la conquista della Dalmazia ci porrebbe contro a una Serbia in posseaso di Cattaro e di una flotta che, con I'aggunta di quella russa o di quella greca, non sarebbe spregevole. Senza essere profondi strateghi, la prima ipotesi ci pare preferibile alia seconda." G. Prezzolini, op. cit., pp. 62, 63. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 147 exportation would proceed under her practical surveillance, and the inhabitants of the coast towns would be able to call themselves Serb subjects just so long as it did not please Italy to annex them, for any sort of fortification would be forbidden and not merely the formation of fortified naval bases. I know of no such limitation in modern history of the sovereign rights of an independent State over its own shores : no such requirement that they should lie open to enemy attack. The Black Sea clauses of the Treaty of Paris forbade the presence of war fleets in the Euxine to all alike, and theoretically the configura- tion of its entrance would have enabled the guaranteeing Powers to prevent the violation of the provisions, save indeed in the case of a surprise movement of a Turkish -5llgean squadron through the Straits. In any case Turkey lay open to easy coercion in case of violation. In all these points the Black Sea clauses are fundamentally and essentially differentiated from the proposals before us. Britain is the mistress of the seas, and upon her mastery depends not only her empire but almost her very existence, at any rate her existence as a first-class Power and cer- tainly her existence in times of war. Yet she has never made any such demands as these upon Holland, The importance of the Dutch ports to us is enormous ; it is a maxim that whoever touches Holland, and especially who- ever touches Rotterdam or Flushing, touches England, and one of the reasons for which we are at war is that Germany has touched Belgium and Antwerp. Yet we have never demanded that Holland should possess no navy, we have never denied the right of the Netherlands to fortify their ports and their coasts. Even in the case of the fortifica- tion of Flushing, with its bearing upon the freedom of the Scheldt and our treaty right to succour Antwerp, we made no protest, we allowed full Dutch sovereignty over the mouth of the Scheldt, and drew the conclusion that we could not succour Antwerp by the sea, advantageous as such a course would have been. It is difficult then to see by what moral right Italy could assume the attitude 148 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS here proposed for her by some of her publicists ; she may be in a position to dictate such a prohibition, but it will only be on the principle that might is right — the very principle against which the other Allies, at any rate, are fighting. Nor would greater Serbia be left only at the mercy of Italy, but equally at the mercy of any other Power which possesses a navy of even the smallest dimensions, for who will care to guarantee international respect for the neutralization of Dalmatia? Any such prohibition would in fact be of the nature of an " uncon- scionable " agreement which would only lead to endless friction and the reopening of the question on the first convenient opportunity. The history of the Black Sea clauses of the Treaty of Paris already cited is full of warning. They created in Russia a resolution to put a term to their validity on the earliest possible occasion, and unhappily for one of the authors of them that occa- sion proved to be the Franco-German war, when Bismarck was enabled to offer to Russia as a bribe for her com- plaisance the abrogation of them. It would not be altogether far-fetched to see in the present world war a not too remote consequence of that portion of the Treaty of Paris ; at any rate, but for their existence the attitude of Russia in 1870 might easily have been different, and in consequence the subsequent history of Europe. Limitations of national sovereignty in the case of a proud and indepen- dent people always and inevitably lead to the same result, a vehement desire to be rid of the shackles imposed. It is unnecessary to repeat what has been said already as to the limited means available to Serbia (I use the word as a short term for the future Southern Slavdom) for the creation of a large war fleet, but the absence of any desire on her part to engage in such a task will bear repetition. If Italy does not antagonize her but shows herself a friend, the Southern Slavs will be eager to reciprocate her attitude, and in such reciprocity will be under no temptation to undertake so expensive, and under the circumstances so useless, a burden. In a word, THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 149 Serbia will be unable to create a great navy if she would, and if Italy proves a friend would not if she could. It is the reaction to Italian hostility or suspicion, above all the candid admission ithat Italy desires for Serbia a " useless " Dalmatia at Italian mercy, that alone will cause Serbia to create such naval forces as will lie within her competence ; apart from that attitude on the side of her neighbour her ambitions will be limited to a very modest form of naval defence. Even if it be admitted that submarines and mines will enable small States to play a more important part in naval affairs in the future, as has been seen, that would only mean a reversion to an older state of affairs ; so far, moreover, the submarine has failed as an offensive weapon. Of the idea of neutralization little need be said apart from the naval consequences just discussed. There are still to be found publicists who talk of a possible "neu- tralized " State of Constantinople, for example. If after the events of the past two years there are those who still believe that the word contains a valid international sie:- nificance in point of fact, that is a striking testimony to their idealism. For myself I do not consider the " neu- tralization " of Dalmatia or of anything else to be worth discussing. A hundred years hence international engage- ments may carry with them some assurance of sub- stantial existence, and neutralizations may be left till then. It will be long before any faith will be placed in the public law of mankind, and no Southern Slav can be expected to place any faith in neutralization — ironically enough Corfu, the training-place of the remnants of the Serb army for future employment, is neutralized. The legitimate claims of Italy, then, on strategical grounds cannot be held to extend to the incorporation in her dominions of the Serbo-Croat province of Dalmatia. Moreover in no event, whether Italy obtains a portion of Dalmatia or not, is there any justification for the demand that Serbia should not be allowed to possess any fleet. It is not only against Italy that a coast defence fleet might 150 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS be required, and as we all know the neutralization of Dalmatia would give no guarantee to the Serbs. Serbia, then, will have the right, like every other State, to build such a fleet as she may deem necessary whether she obtains all Dalmatia or not, and the more friendly Italy shows herself the more insignificant will be any fleet that Serbia may desire to construct. The strategical conditions in the Adriatic constitute, nevertheless, a source of legitimate anxiety for Italy which is abundantly entitled to demand that in any general resettlement she shall be placed in possession of adequate guarantees for the sufficiency of her naval defence, and that her position shall receive due recognition so that she may be able to face the future with confidence. Such guarantees can be given to her without any undue infringe- ment of the principle of nationality, without creating on the side of others a sense of grievance akin to her own, and without inflicting on others injuries out of proportion to the real benefits received by Italy. She is entitled to urge that however friendly may be the Southern Slavs at the present time no government can conduct its policy upon the supposition that future enmity is never to be feared from the friends of to-day ; that though the Southern Slavs number less than a third of her population yet their territory is large, some three-fourths of the extent of the Italian peninsula, and being at present comparatively thinly populated as compared with her own territory will be able to support in the future a population much more nearly approaching her own, even when due allowance has been made for the large unproductive Karst region and the absence of any such fertile area of great extent as the valley of the Po and its tributaries, a deficiency in part counterbalanced by a probable considerably higher mineralization ; and that consequently she is entitled in the settlement to consider not only the conditions of to-day but those which may be present in a not too distant future. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 151 Italy is already in occupation of Valona and its district, and it is certain that her continued occupation of the " gate of the Adriatic " after the war will not be called in question by any of the Allies. The occupation of this place in itself alters the whole strategical position in that sea. Its importance has been alluded to already, and was so highly valued by both Austria and Italy that neither would permit of its falling into the hands of the other. It is idle for any one to seek to diminish its strategical value at the present time, for any assertions to that effect are belied by the policy of the two Adriatic Powers in the past. They have set the seal of their military and naval judgment upon its position as giving the possibility of the command of the entry into the Adriatic, Italy placed so high a value upon it that its retention formed a demand si?ie qud non in the course of her negotiations with her rival previous to her entry into the war, and it cannot be pretended now that it is a position not of such value that its possession by Italy may be taken as going a long way towards meeting her legitimate claims. Guarding the forty-mile wide Strait of Otranto with its vis-d-vis Brindisi already in Italian hands, and Taranto in its gulf "round the corner" a great naval arsenal, Valona will enable Italy to close or open the Adriatic at her will, and that the more easily owing to the development of the mine and submarine. Its possession will enable Italy to exercise a permanent surveillance over all Southern Slav maritime activity other than merely local, and will give its owner a position of unquestioned mastery ; the jealousy of Austria in the past on this question is a proof of the fact. At the head of the Adriatic — to anticipate some of the conclusions of the next chapter — Italy can claim the great commercial port of Trieste, Monfalcone, and the enormously strong naval base of Pola. Installed thus at Valona, Brindisi, and Taranto at the entrance of the Adriatic, and at Venice, Trieste, and Pola at the head of the sea, Italy will be its veritable mistress, and will turn it into an Italian lake to as large an extent as is compatible with 152 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the just rights of the Southern Slavs as owners of the eastern shore, for after all they, as owners of one side of the Adriatic in virtue of nationality, have certain rights in that sea, the more so as it is their only coast, while Italy has her frontage south and west to the Mediterranean also. It is asserted that the island of Losinj (Lussin) forms a *' back door " to Pola and is in a sense complementary to that naval arsenal. If that be so, and if Italy set store upon its occupation, that demand also may be conceded without any great violation of the principle of nationality, since it possesses a large Italian element in its population, a fact which distinguishes it from the other islands of the Quarnero. Beyond the above it is difficult to see that Italy can put forward any well-grounded pretensions if her aim be merely the security of her own coasts. Other demands have the appearance of aiming not at securing her own position but of dominating that of her neighbours. These other demands are asserted, it is true, in the name of defence, but if defence be construed in this fashion then nothing will satisfy it but complete physical possession of the Adriatic. It is difficult, or impossible, to set a term to what can be demanded in the name of defence, for the only complete defence is sole possession. Readers of Beaconsfield's speeches in connection with the Treaty of Berlin may remember the indignant communication which he said that he had received from a correspondent in Cape Town. The latter pointed out that Kars was the key of Asia Minor, the latter in turn was the key of Egypt, as Egypt was of the Sudan, and so the chain of keys was lengthened till it ended at Cape Town. The Russian occupation of Kars, to which Beaconsfield had agreed, constituted therefore a menace to Cape Town. We may suspect that this correspondent had no existence outside Beaconsfield's dialectic, but the alleged letter was no exaggerated satire on a certain mode of reasoning which finds favour not only with the amateur strategist. Of such a texture are Italian demands beyond the great and valuable concessions outlined above. In particular it is THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 153 difficult to see how any case can be made out for an Italian occupation of Vis (Lissa). It has been called the key of the central Adriatic, and without a doubt it is one of the extremely numerous keys of that well-locked gulf, but this key at any rate might be left to its more natural possessors — no man would care to live in a house of which he possessed not a single key. Some, at any rate, of the importance it assumes in the eyes of Italians is due to the defeat of Persano off its harbour in 1866, an event which has always rankled in their minds, while the value of its position is enhanced by the possession of a fine harbour. It lies, however, close to the eastern shore, and is rather an outlying defence of that coast than of the western. It is in fact a pistol pointed at the heart of Serb Dalmatia, and if it were in the hands of the Italians the latter would be in a position not only to threaten Spljet and Gruz, but to dominate the whole of the Serb Adriatic coast and to exercise a close surveillance over even the coastwise trade of greater Serbia. Login] in their hands would enable them already to close the Quarnero, and therefore Bijeka, and Vis would perform the same function for southern Dalmatia. In a word, Valona and the entrance to the Adriatic would be Italy's, as also Trieste, Pola, and Istria at the head of the sea ; the western shore is hers already ; and finally the Slav eastern coast would be com- manded in the north by LoSinj and the centre and south by Vis, so that Eijeka, Spljet, and Gruz would be useful to their owners only so long as Italy wished. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that it is this and not legitimate anxiety for self-defence that forms the real underlying motive of the claim to Vis. As an outpost of the eastern coast without which sovereignty over that coast would be wellnigh nugatory, " useless ", jto use Prezzolini's phrase, and as being Slav by race, the island should go to the Southern Slavs free of those naval limitations which have been already considered. It was said by Mr. Paton that Bosnia was a head without a face, and Dalmatia a face without a head, and 154 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS it is true that the future of Dahnatia is bound up with its backland. The separation of the two provinces, when- ever they have been separated, has always been unnatural, and the possessor of the one has inevitably sought the dominion of the other also. In the Middle Ages till the fall of the Slav States they were not so separated, and their reunion achieved in a limited sense by the Austrian occupation of Bosnia should be extended and consolidated ; their permanent severance is unthinkable. The ports of Dalmatia are the natural outlets of the trade of the interior. Sibenik and Spljet by the continuation of the existing railway to form junctions with the interior systems, in the north by the valley of the Una and in the centre via the Arzano pass and Bugojno will be the natural ports for the greater part of Bosnia, and to the latter leads one of the traces of the proposed Danube-Adriatic line which would find its terminus here rather than farther south. This so-called Danube-Adriatic line is of course merely a portion of a much more extensive and important connection being designed to bring Eoumania and Russia into direct contact with that sea by the shortest through route. Dubrovnik to the south though eventually, when the narrow-gauge line is widened and a more direct route with the interior opened up by the extension of the short Trebinje spur, important for the trade of Danubian Serbia and the Hercegovina, is not the natural outlet for the larger part of Bosnia or of eastern Slavonia, as a glance at the map will show. Separated from the interior Dalmatia would languish, it would be bereft of its natural trade, and the connection with Italy would offer no com- pensation, for mutual trade postulates mutual prosperity, and of the latter Dalmatia, cut off from the resources of the inland and deprived of the transit trade, would have no share: its ports cannot thrive on purely local traffic. In Serb hands they would as a fact benefit Italian trade, for through them would pass manufactures from northern Italy, whose artizans in return would receive the agri- cultural products, the wheat and the meat, of Serbia. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 155 The settlement of this question on just hnes and with a due consideration of the claims of both parties is of interest not merely to the countries immediately concerned. The Southern Slav problem as a whole is a matter of vital concern to Europe and the cause of European peace, and the solution of the Adriatic question as a crucial part of that problem affects in its consequences the other European States which are deeply involved in the future course of Serbo-Italian relations. The past relations between Italy and Austria have been very largely, if not entirely, the result of a settlement partial and incomplete instead of final and conclusive, and a settlement of similar character between Serbia and Italy would inevitably be followed by similar consequences. If the eventual settlement of the Dalmatian question, for this is the kernel of the matter, be just and fair the result will be a permanent peace, as political permanency goes, in the Adriatic and a fruitful friendship between Italy and the Southern Slavs. If, on the other hand, Serbia be left with a festering sore in its territorial and national relationships, then the result after a period of suppression and inflammation will be that it will discharge in renewed bloodshed. The result of the annexation of a large area of Slav territory to Italy would be the creation of a Serbia Irredenta, and the ultimate con- sequence, not necessarily to-day or to-morrow, would be the outbreak of a fresh war, for to the Southern Slavs this unredeemed land would be what Italia Irredenta has been to Italy. "It is terrible to think", a well-known Croat leader remarked to me, "that, after all this horrible war in which the divided Southern Slavs have suffered so much, we should have to look forward in the future to yet another", and his manner expressed the pain which he felt at the prospect. It is necessary to look facts in the face, we have too long ignored the opinions, rights, and interests of the Southern Slavs, we have suffered grievously as the result, and worse lies before if we do not conduct our relations with them upon a basis of sympathy and know- ledge. The mishandling of the whole Balkan affair con- 156 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS tains abundant instruction and warning to all who do not wilfully or foolishly blunt their appreciations. If the war in its deeper aspects is teaching us anything it is the hideous failure of soullessness in diplomacy and national policy. The prime object of statesmanship in the remodelling of Europe should be to settle old questions without creating fresh ones of the same kind, but if the Adriatic settlement should involve the handing over of hundreds of thousands of Southern Slavs to Italian rule the result would be nothing less than a European disaster. For the present Austro-Serb question would be substituted an Italo-Serb problem of the same character and malignity, a problem which would evoke the sullen anger of the Southern Slavs and eat like a canker into the peace of south-eastern Europe. " If you imprison a Slav idea in the deepest dungeon of a fortress it will end by blowing up the whole fortress in its effort to escape ", but Slav per- tinacity and memory should be devoted to more fruitful aims than the relentless preparation for yet another day of reckoning. " The Balkans will be Austria's grave ", said Prince Gorcakov, and he has proved a true prophet ; there is warning here for others. On the other hand, a frank and friendly policy on Italy's part would redound to her advantage, free her from diplomatic and strategical preoccupations, and enable her to develop relations, com- mercial, political, and cultural, that would benefit both her and Serbia. The reaction of an unsatisfactory settlement may not improbably drive one or other of the two States into the arms of Germany in the future. It must not be forgotten that the Germans have for long looked upon Trieste as their future window on the Adriatic, an aspiration which has brought them into conflict with the Slovenes who block the way — always we return to the fact that the Southern Slavs are the bulwark against the eastward and southward trend of Germanism, the Drang nach Osten and the Stoss sudwdrts. So long ago as 1876 Sir Arthur Evans, in his book Through Bosnia and the Herzegovina, gave an I THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 157 instructive quotation from a German traveller who six years previously had been travelling through the Southern Slav lands: "We must not spare ourselves the realization of the bitter truth that the greater part of Styria and Carinthia [thus Sir A. Evans's author, but the "greater" part is incorrect as applied to these two provinces], and the whole of Carniola, Gorizia, Gradisca, and Istria, with the avenue to the Adriatic, are lost to us. Even supposing the whole of Southern Germany to have been fused with Northern, and the German element in Austria either under compulsion or of its free will to have followed the already torn away Bohemia and Moravia [!] even then we should have neither the might nor the right — though it matters less about the right — to break forcibly through Illyria to the Adriatic ".^ It was said to me by a Croatian, "If our cause is deserted by the Entente then by and by we may have to look for friends elsewhere — in Austria or," with a shrug, " in Germany ". The bearing of the words, though the topic was not pursued, was sufficiently evi- dent, and, while I should not wish to press unduly anything said under the influence of the chagrin caused by the then recently concluded Dalmatian agreement, the remark is symptomatic of the feelings which might be engendered by a mishandling of the question, and the possible tendency indicated calls not for surprise but for the most serious consideration. On the other hand it might be Italy which would enter upon the path indi- cated : her ties with Germany are very strong. Neither resultant of the extraordinarily complicated cross-currents involved is desirable for Europe. Italy, with a knowledge of German ambitions for Trieste, may be reckoning on the alliance of the Southern Slavs willy nilly in the event of a future advance in that direction by Germany, since the latter could only reach Trieste conveniently through part of the Slovene country, not only through Gorica and GradiSka but also through the most western part of ' Sir A. Evans, op. cit., p. 3, quoting Franz Maurer, Eeise (lurch Bosnien, etc., p. 45. 158 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Kranjska (Carniola) where the railway, after reaching Tolmino from Trieste, passes through the north-west corner of Kranjska to Villach, while the retention of Trieste would entail as well the possession of at least a part of Istria. It may be thought, therefore, that a German advance southwards would of necessity bring Germany up against the Southern Slavs, concerned to defend Kranjska against invasion and possible spoliation, and possibly unwilling to sacrifice a portion of that province even for Dalmatia and the islands — a very doubtful proposition. Thus Kranjska, a wedge of Southern Slav territory between Istria and German Austria, would become a bulwark of Italian Trieste, and the Southern Slavs might be compelled on this supposition to side with Italy against a German push to the Adriatic, thus becoming, to the ironic amusement of their allies, the champions of the alien lords of Dalmatia. On the other hand, the more Slav territory Italy acquires the less convincing does such a line of reasoning become. If Italy obtains all Istria and Gorica-Gradiska as well as a large part of Dalmatia with the islands together with south- western Kranjska then the interest of the Southern Slavs to come, pro domo sud, to Italy's aid becomes sensibly less and a German-Slav accord easier. Kranjska, though desirable for a German possessor of Trieste, is not absolutely essential if that possessor hold all the county of Gorica (apart from any possible acquisition of the line through Udine) and Gorica will already belong to Italy. Thus it would be open to Germany to offer the bribe of Dalmatia and the islands and to engage herself to respect Kranjska while pointing out that it should be a matter of indifference to the Southern Slavs whether Istria and Gorica were in Italian or German hands. It is extremely difficult to understand in what manner Italian politicians envisage the future in these regions. What is evident, however, is that a policy which should estrange the Southern Slavs opens up a vista of extreme peril to Italy, unless indeed she contemplates a reinsurance treaty, and with the Italians the THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 159 Southern Slavs might be dragged down also, for the pity of the whole controversy involved in this tangled Adriatic problem lies in the fact that the essential interests of Italians and Southern Slavs are identical, and they should be the closest allies. Italy can hardly oppose front both to Germany and the Southern Slavs. It must be remembered that in any case the Germans will remain a strong nation and that the time may come when, if favourable circum- stances offer, they may be tempted to renew their attempt to push not only eastwards but southwards. In such an eventuality it would obviously not be a matter of indifference to the other members of the Grand Alliance whether the Adriatic settlement which they would be called upon to defend were intrinsically just or not. Moreover, under those circumstances the Southern Slavs should be the natural and fervent allies of the Italians, and their aid will grow in importance with the years. A settlement which should risk throwing them into the arms of Germany would represent to Italy a double loss. The alternatives ultimately narrow themselves down to two ; on the one hand a hostility between the two peoples which will eventually result in war whenever a favourable opportunity occurs, which admittedly may not be for many a long year though it may occur sooner than is thought ; on the other hand a fair settlement resulting not merely in friendly relations but in a definite alliance. Under such circumstances Serbia and Italy left alone on the Adriatic to their mutual satisfaction would have every interest in combining against any Power which should threaten the newly established status quo, since any such aggression would be equally to the disadvantage of both. Neither would wish to see Germany installed in Trieste and neither would desire any weakening in the territorial position of the other. Indeed to remove Italian suspicion it might be laid down as a condition for the adoption of the Southern Slav contention that the new State should enter into a treaty of alliance with Italy for a term of years, fourteen or twenty, by which each would be bound to resist in common 160 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS any attempt to alter the new status quo in the Adriatic or the territories adjoining. The advantage of the aid of Italy to the Southern Slavs is obvious, v^hile the task of the Italian General Staff V70uld be enormously lightened by the knowledge that the forces which a united Southern Slavdom could put in the field would be found arrayed on their side and would not have to be regarded as potential foes. There are some Italians who already see the advantage of cultivating good relations with the Southern Slavs. "The truth . , . is", says Professor Salvemini, " that the establishment of a great Serbia can in no case, that is to say even on the hypothesis of a very great aggrandizement of Serbia, represent a loss for us ". ^ He concludes his remarks on the subject of Italy and Serbia by saying [his Italics] : "In fine even on the supposition that Serbia should acquire all the Austrian Adriatic provinces and that Italy should remain within its present boundaries, Italy in this conjuncture has nothing to lose and much to gai7i'\^ Signor Bissolati, the Reformist Socialist, is another who has pleaded, and still pleads, the cause of good relations between the two peoples, while the attitude of Signor Prezzolini has been abundantly illustrated above. The last-named perhaps lays his finger on the root of the mistrust when he says that "We are ignorant of Serbia ". The Southern Slavs on their side have given frequent expression to their feeling of friendship, a notable example of a plea for good feeling being the speech of M. Pasic in the Skupstina on April 28, 1915. An attitude on the part of Italy which would indicate a policy of Mediterranean imperialism would not be without interest for other States. In any case it is no mere question of an outlet for Serbia or of " compensations", it is a question of national unity pure and simple. ' G. Salvemini, Guerra o Neutralita ? p. 16. ' Ibid. p. 18. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC IGl VI To a certain extent it might seem that some of the foregoing remarks are of somewhat academic interest in view of the conclusion of the " Adriatic " or " Dalmatian " agreement between Italy and the Triple Entente; but not only is it necessary to examine the whole of the questions involved on their merits if an adequate appreciation of that agreement is sought, but the affectation of secrecy maintained on the subject since its conclusion invites this course. The Treaty was concluded on April 27, 1915, but the secret of it had been so ill kept that it was not long before its existence and the general tenor of its terms were pretty generally known. I myself was made cognizant of it in May, ^ a few days after Sir Arthur Evans, in his letter of May 10 to the Manchester Guardian, had given an outline of the Italian demands, of which I also gave a sketch in one of the Reviews in September. The in- formation then received has proved to be substantially accurate, requiring modification chiefly in the matter of the southern islands. Some of the terms of the agreement have been given by Dr. Seton- Watson in the English Beview for February 1916. ^ Italy receives by its provisions the Trentino, Gorica, and Trieste, and the whole of Istria and its islands, the continental boundary in this area starting from the neighbourhood of Rijeka (Fiume) and running along the line of the Julian Alps. Italy further receives the whole of northern Dalmatia and its islands to a line drawn between Trogir and Spljet and thence to the Dinaric Alps in the neighbourhood of the Arzano Pass, and also the islands of Vis, Hvar, and Korcula, ' In giving a short account of it in the British Review for September 1915, I inadvertently gave the month of signature as May instead of April. It was on May 28 that I received information of the agreement. ' R. W. Seton- Watson, The Failure of Sir Edioard Qreij. Eiujlish Eevieiv, February 1916, p. 148. 11 162 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS etc. This Treaty was not only concluded without any consultation with the Serb Government, but without that Government being informed that any such project was entertained, its only information being derived from common rumour. The whole manner of its conclusion was in the highest degree injurious to our ally, and in the plainest contradiction of those rights which our statesmen have so often proclaimed. The Dalmatians are of the same nationality of the Serbs, Serbia was an ally who for months had been detaining and defeating large Austrian armies, it was under the cover of the Serb army as a flanking guard that we were engaged on the Gallipoli expedition, and we had proclaimed ourselves the champions of small nations and of the rights of nationalities, yet on practically the first occasion on which our principles were put to the test they were betrayed. Our ally in a matter deeply affecting her interests in the war was ignored and kept in the dark, in fact she was not given the status of an independent ally at all, while the rights of nationalities were bartered away by the Great Powers concerned in Metternichian fashion. It is noteworthy that while Belgium has received ^ an assurance that she will be called upon to take part in the peace negotiations (i.e. that she will take her place as a sovereign contracting State and not merely be admitted to be heard in the anteroom) no such assurance has ever been given to Serbia, which has throughout been treated as a dependent until the Paris conference in March 1916 to which she was admitted. This attitude was deliberate and evidently due to the knowlege that Serbia would not have given her consent to the concessions made. At the same time the Itahan Press indulged in a campaign of falsification, with the obvious desire to throw dust into the eyes of the public at home and abroad, and English correspondents were telegraphing to their newspapers extracts from Italian papers dealing with alleged Serbo-Italian negotiations and a complete agreement between the two States for days ' On February 14, 1916. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 163 after even the present writer was aware on the best authority that no such negotiations were taking place. Evidently there was a feeling that the clandestine method of procedure would not meet with general acceptance. It is perhaps significant that up to the moment of writing the English Press has consistently ignored the treaty, while the majority of our publicists at the most have made an occasional vague allusion to some " alleged agreement", an attitude which is obviously assumed in view of the disclosures made. On the ethical side, then, the agreement connotes an abandonment pro tanto of the moral basis of the war and a return to the ideas of the Congress of Vienna, while on its material side it lies open to the objections which have already been made to proposals of the nature contained in the agreement. It can in no sense be reconciled with the doctrine of nationality, for by its terms nearly one million Southern Slavs will be included in the Italian Kingdom, namely some 450,000 of the population of Dalmatia, and the Slav inhabitants of _Trjeste, 60,000 ; ^ Istria, 224,000 ; Gorica 155,000 ; and some 100,000 of the population of KJranjska. As regards the latter regions a more detailed examination of the figures and the deductions to be drawn from them will be given in the next chapter. It is suffi- cient to say here that though in any case an appreciable number of Slavs would have to be included in the new boundaries of Italy the necessity falls considerably short of what is here conceded, for the boundary between Slavs and Italians is in a general way fairly definite and does not depart largely from the natural boundaries indicated by the geographical features of the country. In the case of Dalmatia the violation of the national rights of the Southern Slavs is flagrant and incontestable, and, as has been seen in the section devoted to the strategical aspect of the problem, quite unnecessary from the point of view of the legitimate requirements of Italy. The whole of the ' Census figures, in round numbers, of 1910. The figures in detail will be found in the following chapter. 164 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Dalmatian element in the above figures has been sacrificed without any valid necessity. While the incorporation of the province in a Southern Slav State would have affected only 18,000 Italians in a population of 630,000, the annexa- tion of a large area of the Dalmatian mainland and of the islands affects some 450,000 Slavs on a strictly moderate and reasonable estimate. The occupation of almost all the islands with the excep- tion of a few of the Ragusan group very effectually serves the purpose of rendering as " useless " as possible the coast line which is left to the Slavs, as a glance at the map will show. The islands in the Quarn^ro will enable the Italians to dominate absolutely all traffic to and from Rijeka, and moreover will cut off that port from the southern Dalma- tian coast left to the Serbs. Passing to the southern boundary of the new Italian Dalmatia it will be seen that it passes close to Spljet (Spalato), the opposite side of the bay being in fact in Italian hands, while the islands of Solta and Brae (Brazza) perform for the Italians here the function of the Quarnero islands in the north. It is diffi- cult to see how the Serbs can in the circumstances make any use of Spljet. Indeed it would be an act of supreme folly if they should endeavour to make it the terminus of a line to the interior and the outlet of a great part of their trade. The whole harbour and town can be commanded absolutely by batteries placed on the opposite Italian shore, so that within half an hour of the opening of hostilities every ship in the port could be sunk, the wharves, cranes, and warehouses destroyed, and the port rendered useless, nor could such a consummation be prevented by the forti- fication of the Slav shore except on the impossible assump- tion that the latter batteries were so immeasurably superior that the Italians would be almost instantaneously over- whelmed before they could do any damage. Without a doubt under the circumstances the Serbs will have to concentrate their attention on Dubrovnik in spite of the fact that its position makes it unsuited to be the trade outlet of a great deal of Bosnia. The development of Spljet, THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 165 if the present arrangements hold good, would be nothing less than a sign of incapacity on the part of the Serbs, and if this language be thought an exaggeration, the map again will prove a corrective. Below the delta of the Narenta the coast-line is broken by the long projection of the peninsula of PeljeSac or Sabioncello, off which lies the island of Korcula, and farther off Vis. These islands will be in Italian hands, and as the Quarnero islands isolate Rijcka, so these southern Dalmatian islands, besides giving the command of the Spljet-Narenta coast line to Italy, will cut off that stretch of shore from southernmost Dalmatia. The two strips of coast left to the Slavs will thus be divided into three portions by the islands held by the Italians, who will be in a position to cut them off from communication with each other by sea. Only when we come to the extreme south, to Dubrovnik and Kotor, do we find a coast where the Serbs will be masters in their own house. Even here a certain calculation has been probably made, but destined, as I believe, to be defeated. Imagine the inner as well as the outer Hebrides in the hands of a foreign Power possessed also of a block of the mainland, say of Argyll, and we have an adequate comparison of the situa- tion to be established on the eastern Adriatic. In Article VIII of their reply to President Wilson the Allies spoke of a " reorganization of Europe guaranteed by a stable regime and based at once on a respect for nationalities . . . and at the same time upon territorial conventions and international settlements such as to guarantee land and sea frontiers against unjustified attack ". These principles should be applied to the Adriatic, and such guarantees afforded to the future Southern Slav kingdom. The conclusion of this treaty has created a most painful effect on the Southern Slavs, and has aroused a feeling of keen resentment and profound disillusionment. They feel that for them the European struggle has largely altered its character, and that immense sacrifices have been and are being undergone by them in order that hundreds of thousands of their fellow-countrymen may exchange an 166 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Austrian for an Italian dominion, sacrificed in the cause of " sacred egoism". The result is noticeable enough though undisclosed by a discreet Press. There is no longer the same enthusiasm among the Serbo-Croats of former Habs- burg allegiance, the joyous hope of independence and national unity has largely deserted them, while the Serbs of the Kingdom are left in doubt as to whether even now they may not be forced to pay blackmail to Bulgaria. East and west the Southern Slavs see their interests sacrificed or menaced and their national heritage turned into a common fund out of which large bribes are to be given — by their Allies — with which now this State now that may be gained over. The House of Habsburg, quick to see its advantage, has sent large numbers of Southern Slav troops to its Itahan frontier, where they are taking a valiant part in the defence. These results were easily to be foreseen except by those who, unwilling to face realities, prefer to take their fancies for facts, and their hopes for accomplishments, but the expression of this opinion has largely been denied publicity. I Unfortunately a "delicate situation" does not cease to be delicate because the difficulties of it are shirked. The situation has to be dealt with at some time, and the sooner all the facts are realized the sooner will people be able to arrive at a correct appreciation of the position. Writing in the early part of 1915 Professor Denis gave utterance to a warning which has fallen upon deaf ears. He said : " La question de la cote orientale de I'Adriatique n'interesse pas seulement I'ltalie et la Serbie. C'est une question d'ordre universel, et il n'y a aucune exageration a dire que I'avenir du monde peut dans une large mesure en dependre. Car, enfin, si une puissance so regie uniquement sur ses convenances momentanees, il est absurde d'exiger des autres un renoncement qui, au milieu de I'egoisme universel, ne serait plus qu'une niaiserie. . . . ' Letters to the Press forecasting the untoward effects of possible ItaUan action of the nature indicated were refused publication in November 1914. THE PROBLEM OF THE ADRIATIC 1G7 Partir en guerre pour supprimer la guerre et preparer de nouveaux conflits ; inscrire sur son drapeau le respect des nationalites et la liberte des peuples, et aboutir k un nouveau congres de Vienne ; etre les heritiers legitimes des humanistes du XVP siecle et des nationalistes du XVIII ° pour chausser les bottes de Metternich et de Guillaume II, quelle decheance et quelle banqueroute ! " ^ That which he posed as supposition is now fact. Nothing that has here been v/ritten has been written in in any spirit of hostihty to Italy. The writer was brought up to believe, and still believes, that the accomplishment of Italian unity was one of the finest and grandest things that happened in the nineteenth century, nor was the name of any foreigner so familiar to him in childhood, not by contemporary knowledge but in political conversation of the past, as that of Garibaldi, who became to him an almost " legendary " hero. What has made the attitude of Italian politicians so painful to those who remember her past, and the generous enthusiasms which it evoked, is that their attitude in Southern Slav affairs is a flat negation of the whole historical and ethical basis of the Italian Kingdom. They would seem to have turned their backs on the generous ideals of nationality to which Italy owes her existence in the pursuit of an imperialist policy. That Italy, the product of those ideals, the result of the union of a formerly disunited people, compounded of several States, some independent, some enslaved, which had the House of Habsburg for her hereditary enemy, which made her appeal to liberal Europe, should place herself in opposi- tion to the Southern Slavs whose present position is a picture of her own past, as her present position is the goal at which they aim, inspired like her by the teaching of Mazzini, the exploits of Garibaldi, is one of the saddest things possible for those who still retain any hopes of national idealism. Surely the Italian people must bo nobler and more generous than those who speak in its name. Let that people hear the words of Signor Tittoni, a ' E. Denis, La Grande Serhic, p. 320. 168 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS former Foreign Minister and lately Ambassador in Paris, uttered in a speech delivered on December 18, 1906, which as I have them only in a French rendering I will not submit to a further process of translation. His reasoning applies with equal force to the present situation. " Je repousse done le conseil qui m'est attribue, de proposer a I'Autriche-Hongrie des partages de territoires ou de pousser a des occupations que ne prevoit pas le traite de Berlin, afin d'exiger ensuite pour nous des compensations territoriales. Un semblable precede serait en contradiction avec les principles sur lesquels est basee I'unite de I'ltalie ; il ne serait pas compatible avec les principes qui nous ont diriges jusqu'ici ; il nous jetterait dans les perils, parce qu'il serait un precedent qui, a I'avenir, nous serait souvent oppose. En un mot, il obscurerait les huts evidents de notre politique en I'Orient ". CHAPTER V PROPOSED FRONTIERS The actual area of the national territory of the Southern Slavs which can be included in the future State depends naturally upon the extent of the Allied victory and the terms which the Allies can therefore enforce upon the vanquished, and in particular upon the continued existence or disappearance of Austria-Hungary. As the extent of the victory cannot be foretold, and because in any event it is necessary to have in mind an ideal solution of the question which should be aimed at in proportion to our success in the field, it is necessary and in any case best to assume that such an ideal solution will lie within our grasp, and to examine the problem on the basis of that assumption. The Dalmatian question having been treated of, the next and cognate element that calls for consideration is the future status of the lands at the head of the Adriatic, that is to say, Istria, Trieste, the county of Gorica-GradiSka, Kranjska (Carniola), Carinthia, and the southern portion of Styria. The following table gives the population of these countries according to the last Austrian census of 1910. Slavs. Italians. Germans. Total population. Istria Trieste Gorica-GradiSka Elranjska ... 224,400 59,974 155,039 492,043 147,417 118,959 90,119 369 12,735 11,856 4,486 27,915 386,463 190,913 249,893 520,327 In Carinthia there are some 120,000 Slavs and 300,000 Germans, and in southern Styria some 400,000 Slavs. Of 169 170 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the Slav population that of Istria is divided between the Croats, 168,184, and Slovenes, 55,134, the remaining Slavs in these regions are chiefly Slovenes. In Istria the Italians are found in a majority in the western portion of the peninsula, while the central and eastern parts are predominantly Slav. In the county of Gorica the Italians inhabit the country to the west of the lower Isonzo, while they form also the majority in the district of Monfalcone and in the town of Gorica. To the north of that town the ethnographical boundary crosses the existing frontier of Italy, which here already includes in its dominions a Slovene population. From the neighbourhood of the Pon- tebba Pass the racial line dividing Slovenes from Germans runs roughly to the river Drave above Villach, thence it follows the course of the river to the boundary of Styria. From this point it runs north of the river to the town of Eadkersburg or Eadbona on the Mur. Immediately to the east of Eadkersburg a wedge of Slovene country runs north as far as S. Gotthard on the Eaab in Hungary, the boundary returning south to the Mur, and thence the frontier between Slovenes and Croats follows the boundary of Croatia and Kranjska. In parts of this region the interests of Italy are great and incontestable. Western Istria with Pola are of prime importance to her naval position, and as has been seen are predominantly Italian in population. Venice is no longer, in view of modern requirements and the increased size of shipping, the naval base that it was in past years, and the Italians have not in recent years based, I believe, their eastern squadrons on the aforetime mistress of the Adriatic, preferring for the purpose Taranto, which is out- side that sea. With Pola in her hands the position would be fundamentally altered in her favour ; she would have in these northern waters the base which she requires, connected by rail with the peninsular railways, well sheltered, and naturally strong. In the previous chapter it has been sug- gested that Lo§inj (Lussin) should also be assigned to Italy if she desires it, thus assuring her the mastery of these waters. PROPOSED FRONTIERS 171 Trieste occupies both historically and commercially a peculiar position. For over five centuries it has been a possession of the House of Habsburg ; it is the port of entry and egress for a vast backland inhabited by various races, and, as the Germans have frequently pointed out, is only two hundred miles from the Bavarian frontier. Racially, in spite of the recent grovfth of the Slovene element, it is predominantly Italian, even if the contention of the Slovenes be true that their element is under- estimated in the census by some 20,000 persons. The municipality is in the hands of the Italians, and it seems to be substantiated that the scholastic needs of the Slovenes have been purposely neglected, the Italians, perhaps not unnaturally, having been greatly alarmed at the height reached by the fiovi^ing tide of Slavs, so that the town has become one of the focus points of racial strife and propaganda. Despite, hov^ever, the contentions of the more extreme propagandists, there can be no hesitation in assigning Trieste to the Italians, who on the ground of nationality have an incontestable claim, while the culture of the town has always been Italian. It is true that Trieste is the port of a great deal of the Slovene backland, but it is the port likewise of the German backland, and it is unwise to advance an argument that elsewhere might be turned against its authors. The commercial position of Trieste undoubtedly complicates matters. If the port were included in the Italian customs area, then part of the Slovene country would be deprived of its natural outlet, as also the whole of German Austria, and beyond that the Bohemian country (Bohemia and Moravia). It is by this trade that Trieste lives, and if it were diverted the result would be commercial ruin for the port and a grievance for the interior. The difficulty is by no means insuperable, and could be overcome by the suggestion of Dr. Seton- Watson that it should be made a free port. Traffic then from the interior would pass through its harbour as at present, without imposition of a customs tariff, only goods destined for consumption in Italy being 172 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS subject to the Italian tariff. The duty-free trade could be carried in what may be called " bonded " trains through Italian territory to its destination. Such a proposal is not less in the interests of Italy than of the port and of the interior, and would not in any way derogate from Italian sovereignty over the town and harbour. In the county of Gorica-Gradi§ka it is inevitable that a certain Slovene population should pass under Italian rule. The Italians in no case would be now satisfied with the line of the Isonzo, and would require in the south a good connection between their peninsular territory and Istria. The heights to the east of the river would form a natural and defensible frontier, and would give to Italy the positions for which she is now fighting. Monfalcone would be hers, Gradiska, Gorica, the positions of Doberdo, Plava, Podgora (all three Slav names), and more to the northward Tolmino, Plezzo, and the Predil Pass, beyond which (Malborghetto, etc.) the future frontier of Italy does not concern the Southern Slavs. Entrenched on this line, with lateral communication behind along the valley of the Isonzo, Italy could contemplate with assurance the defence of this portion of her frontier against even the strongest assailant. In effect, Italy would thus secure more than half the area of the province, and probably would take under her rule not less than 75,000 Slovenes, as well as all the Italians, so that the suggestion can hardly be described as niggardly, or as characterized by lack of appreciation for her strategical necessities, going as it does far beyond her pre-war aspirations. The frontier, more- over, would be a natural one. The suggested land frontier then would start at the estuary of the Arsa, and gain the mountain backbone of the Istrian peninsula which traverses the country nearer to the eastern than the western shore, and to the east of the railway which connects Pola with Trieste. It would follow the course of this range northward, and eventually strike the boundary of Kranjska at the point in the lati- tude of Trieste where the boundaries of Istria, Kranjska, PROPOSED FRONTIERS 173 and the district of Gorica-Gradigka meet. Thence it would coincide with the boundary of Kranjska to the point where the latter turns northward not far from S. Daniel, from which point the line would continue its north-westward course in the direction of the town of Gorica, leavinir the inland railway Gorica-Trieste in Italian hands as well as the coast route, until it struck the mountains which border the east bank of the Isonzo, and so along the range which forms its watershed to the north to the Predil Pass and Tarvis. As already stated, this would leave in Italian hands all the strong positions for which they are fighting at the time of writing — the positions round Gorica, Tolmino, the Kern heights, the Cal Pass and Plezzo, the Predil Pass and Tarvis. In addition to some 75,000 Slovenes in Gorica-GradiSka, the territory would include the 60,000 Slavs of Trieste and approxi- mately 100,000 of the Slovenes and Croats of Istria, a total of about 235,000, together with practically the whole Italian population, some 350,000, of these provinces. The suggested frontier would not altogether meet the wishes of the Southern Slavs, but I have reason to believe that if their claim to Dalmatia were met no serious opposition would be manifested towards it. The secret treaty with Italy gives the latter considerably more than the above territories. The boundary starts a little to the west of Eijeka, and follows approximately the frontier between Croatia and Istria, then entering Kranjska follows the Julian Alps, cutting off the south-western portion of that homogeneous province, the centre of Slovene nationality, till it reaches the boundary of Gorica in the northern part of that county. This trace in- cidentally severs the direct railway line from Ljubljana (Laibach) to Bijeka, and the former town would thus be reduced for communication with the port to the roundabout route via Karlovac. All Istria therefore goes to Italy with its 224,000 Slavs, all Gorica with 155,000, Trieste with 60,000, and a slice of Kranjska with about 100,000 Slovenes. The population of the ceded area will therefore 174 THE FUTUBE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS comprise some 539,000 Southern Slavs and 357,000 Italians, as a reference to the table previously given will show. The whole future of this region is naturally dependent upon the extent of the Allied victory and the demands which can be made upon Austria, for while the Monarchy could lose Galicia, Transylvania, Croatia, and Dalmatia, without ceasing to exist as a considerable State with its own seaboard, the loss of the territories now under con- sideration would connote the disappearance of the Habsburg realm as a distinct entity. To put it in another form, if the Allies should be in a position to force the House of Habsburg to cede these territories in addition to the others mentioned, they would in the nature of things be equally in a position also to enforce the complete dis- memberment of the Monarchy, In an article contributed to the British Review for April 1915 I said that the more desirable event would be the formation of a Habsburg federal State, consisting of a Cech-Slovak kingdom, a purely Magyar Hungary, an Austrian German State, and a Slovene State, the latter of which would of necessity include Istria and Trieste. The formation of such a Habsburg Monarchy would incidentally limit Italian accession of territory in the northern Adriatic to the actual line of the Isonzo river, and the future Southern Slav territory would in a similar manner be limited in this direction by the western frontier of Croatia. The argument that weighed with the writer was that the alternative would entail the absorption of the old Austrian German duchies into the German Empire, and the conse- quent near approach of the latter to the Adriatic. Further consideration, however, and the increased subserviency of Austria-Hungary to Germany, which has marked the pro- gress of the war and will evidently characterize the ensuing peace, have led me to reject the opinion expressed in that article. It is now evident that such a State would become politically, economically, and in military matters, a mere satellite of Germany, for the Cechs and Slovenes would be outnumbered by the Germans and Magyars and forced to PROPOSED FRONTIERS 175 follow in their wake. The effective strength of Germany would consequently be increased by the resources of a monarchy numbering some 35,000,000 inhabitants. The more the problem is considered the more funda- mentally erroneous appears the view to which expression was given in the article mentioned. If Germany has been able to maintain herself in arms against the greater part of Europe, it has been owing to her control of the resources of Austria-Hungary — that is to say, of a State which is predominantly non-German and non-Magyar. Southern Slav, Italian, Roumanian, Cech, Pole, Euthene, all have provided cannon fodder for the German High Command, and without these supplies Germany would have been lost long ago. Any future Habsburg monarchy will inevitably gravitate within the German orbit and bring its resources to the aid of Prussianism, and hence the absolute necessity of shearing off from the Habsburg dominions all that is not German or Magyar. In practice that would mean the creation of an independent Bohemia, to include all the Cechs and Slovaks, the creation of a purely Magyar Hun- gary, and almost certainly the incorporation of the Austrian Germans in the German Empire. It is the latter fact that causes hesitation with some people, but evidently with very little cause. The Austrians would bring to Germany an accretion of some 8,000,000 of population, but such an accretion is greatly less than the 30,000,000 to 35,000,000 of a reduced Austria which would equally be at the service of Germany ; it would, in short, represent the lesser evil of the two. Such a Germany, deprived of all other means of support, could never make head again in face of the Grand Alliance, or even of Russia and France, sup- ported as these would be by Bohemia and the Southern Slav kingdom. To some it is repugnant to think of the final prostration of the Habsburgs before the Hohenzollerns, but that sentiment rests on no solid basis. The Habsburgs have always been disloyal, intolerant, perfidious, and reac- tionary ; and Gladstone was right in saying that nowhere had Austria (i.e. the House of Habsburg) done good. There 176 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS are few things more curious in history that the glamour which this House has managed to cast over all sorts of men in various countries, but now at last it is open to all to see it in its true colours. That some who call themselves Liberals should come forward as the champions of Austria is something truly astonishing, and can only be due to that kink which causes some men always to be apparently, and in good faith, on the side of their country's enemies. Far truer was the teaching of Gladstone and of Professor Free- man, to the latter of whom so deep a debt is due for his clear teaching on this subject. If the writer of this in the article quoted spoke in favour of a reduced Austria, it was not for love of the Habsburgs or of Austria, for the burning words of the great Professor had left their mark years before, but for the reason assigned in the text, a reason now clearly seen to be superficial. Indeed, it is not too much to say that the question of the dismemberment of Austria-Hungary is the question of whether we want to win the war or lose it, or more correctly of whether, having won the war, we wish to win the peace. It is noteworthy that French opinion, which at the beginning of the war showed some tenderness to Austria, shows signs of hardening in the opposite direction. While M. Bainville considered the destruction of Austria as a European disaster (in which case it is curious that he should have made it an accusation against the Jugoslav Committee that it was, according to him, subsidized by Austria), M. Herbette looked to a group- ing of the Austrians proper with the Southern Germans. This latter idea is not incompatible with the destruction of Austria-Hungary as at present existing, but is based upon a misconception of German feeling. Readers of the Hohen- lohe Memoirs will remember that the great impulse towards unity came precisely from the South Germans, and that their particularism is directed also against each other. On the other hand M. Cheradame is explicitly for dismemberment. Thus he wrote: "All who have studied on the spot the problem of Central Europe are unanimous in declaring that the liquidation of Austria-Hungary is an absolute neces- PROPOSED FRONTIERS 177 sity ".^ M. Dubosc has stated the reasons with admirable precision and conciseness: "In short, if we are of 'those who speak of demohshing Austria and do not speak of demolishing Germany ', it is because (1) the demolition of the one appears to us definitive, while that of the second appears ephemeral ; (2) because the demolition of Germany seems to us superfluous on the day when Prussia will be cast down ; (3) because the demolition of Austria will be the ruin of the bloc of Central Europe, which was hostile to us, and in particular of the mutual aid of German and Hungarian assured by the Austro-Hungarian compromise of 1867 ".2 The Temps and Matin in leading articles, and other writers such as M. Gauvain, have adopted the same line of reasoning, and have pointed also to the doctrine of nationality as necessitating a final liquidation of the Danu- bian Monarchy. The Allies' note to Mr. Wilson, and Mr. Balfour's letter, if words mean anything, have endorsed the policy as being the aim of the Grand Alliance. Henceforth the matter should be chose jugee, unless we are to go back upon our word, upon our moral obligations to our Allies, upon the definite treaties with some of them and upon our own interests. Austria delenda est. The complete disruption of the Monarchy would be attended by the cession to the Southern Slavs and to Italy of the territory which has just been considered, and the formation of independent kingdoms of Bohemia, including Moravia, Austrian Silesia, and the Slovak districts of Hun- gary, and of Magyar Hungary. The German Austrian provinces would then inevitably enter the German Empire, which in their 8,000,000 inhabitants would find some com- pensation for its losses elsewhere. The accession of strength would nevertheless be considerably less than that which would fall to her lot in the alternative considered above. Even if an independent Hungary gravitated towards Ger- many, and such a course is perhaps less likely in an inde- pendent Hungary than in a Hungary tied to German ' Bappel, July 10, 1916. » Faris-Midi, July 15, 1916. 12 178 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Austria,^ there would be a counterbalance in a Cech-Slovak Bohemia of some 10,000,000 inhabitants, while the Slovene and Italian country would also be lost. If, then, the Allies should be in a position to demand the cession of the Slovene and Italian Adriatic lands, that demand should be main- tained, with the consequent disruption of the Monarchy into its constituent elements, the latter event being, as said above, a necessary result of the former in poHtical conse- quence, as it would ex hypothesi lie equally within the power of the Allies to enforce. The less complete the victory of the Allies, the less, obviously, shall we be in a position to demand, but it must be remembered that these cessions of territory alone will give an adequate and permanent solution to the Southern Slav and ItaHan questions. It is not a mere question of a province more or less, as in the case of the dynastic wars of the eighteenth century on the Continent, but of utiHzing a unique opportunity of recasting the map of Europe on national and rational lines. As regards the northern boundary of the Southern Slavs in this region it could be drawn along the river Drave, following the ethnographic line of cleavage from the neighbourhood of Villach to the Styrian frontier, thence in a more or less direct line to Eadkersburg on the Mur. There is, as stated above, a northerly wedge of Slovene territory running from this point to S. Gotthard on the Eaab containing some 100,000 inhabi- tants, but I do not think that this wedge could be included in the Southern Slav State. It is impossible to make the political boundary follow in every detail the linguistic or ethnographic, as the result of such an attempt would lead to many inconveniences and anomalies. The principle should be the natural or geographical boundary — if such exists — which coincides most nearly with the racial, pro- vided that the application of this principle does not exclude ' Such a complete disruption would probably bring in its train a considerable modification in the internal condition of Hungary in the direction of the loss of their power by the Magyar magnates. PROPOSED FRONTIERS 179 large racial areas from their co-national State. In general, also, in estimating what should fall within a racial area regard should be paid to the manner in which the races are juxtaposed. Small racial "islands" in a surroundinf^ sea of another race must be lost to the racial stock. This last consideration does not apply to the Slovenes in question, as the area adjoins the main block of Slovene and Croat territory, still its inclusion -would make an awkward boundary. The frontier from Eadkersburg should run along the Mur to its junction with the Drave. Croatia would thus receive again the little territory of the Medju- murje of some 735 square kilometres, which lies here between the two rivers. Of its population of 90,357 82,829 are Croats. The territory belonged to Croatia till 1861, when it was filched by Hungary, and its possession has always been claimed by its former owners. It was the seat of the great family of the Zrinjski. The future of Croatia has been much canvassed and various rumours have at different times been in circulation on the subject, and even now, as has been seen in the previous chapter, some Italian papers are not yet reconciled to the idea of Serbo-Croat unity.^^ The secret treaty with Italy lays it down that the future status of the country shall be declared by the Croatians themselves. The result of any plebiscite is a foregone conclusion — the Croats will declare for union in some form or another with the Serbs and the formation of a united Southern Slav State. Owing to the presence among the Allies of many Southern Slav refugees drawn from each province inhabitated by the race we have had abundant opportunities of learning the sentiments of the people, the more so as these refugees are thoroughly representative of the political and economic life of their people. They include members of the Austrian and Hungarian Parliaments, and of the Dalmatian, Croatian, and Bosnian Sabors (Diets), town ' That unity is recognized in the ofBcial Austrian census statistics, which speak always of Serbo-Croats. The Austrian census is by language. 180 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS councillors, priests, lawyers, bankers, journalists, and men of letters. The testimony they give is unambiguous and decisive. The Serbo-Croats in America at the congress held at Chicago endorsed the national programme of unity, and they also puWished in a Southern Slav news- paper of New York a violent manifesto in reply to the Austrian consul's request that Austrian Southern Slav emigrants should return to Europe for military duty. The Croatian Committee in Rome has stated : " The official acts of the Croatian Diet at Zagreb testify, in fact, to the will of the Croatian people to consider itself as forming a single nation with the Serb people, to which it is united by the sacred ties of the soil, of blood, and of language". In May 1915 M. Trumbic, a member of the Dalmatian Sabor and a former mayor of Splj'et, said to M. Delcasse when presenting his collea- gues : " As the Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes form one [la meme] Jugoslav [Southern Slav] nation we desire the liberation of all our co-nationals now under the Austro- Hungarian yoke and their union with our Serb brothers of Serbia and Montenegro in a single State. ... In order that the Jugoslav nation may be able henceforth to accomplish its noble national and civilizing task, it is indispensable that all its members should be joined together in a compact and united State ".^ " The Southern Slav people aspires to unite its territories in a single independent State", says the Jugoslav Committee in its appeal to the British nation and parliament. In a conversation on this subject which I had with Dr. Hinko Hinkovic, the well-known advocate of the accused in the Agram High Treason Trial and one of the leaders of the Serbo-Croat Coalition, he said that the old bitter Catholic-Croat anti-Serb feeling was dead in Croatia except among a few politicians and their followers of the older school, the younger generation would have nothing to do with such ideas. Nor was there, in his opinion, he remarked in answer to a specific question, any danger of a ' at. C. Vellay, La Question de VAdriatique, p. 75 note. PROPOSED FRONTIERS ISl revulsion of sentiment after the war when Magj'ar oppres- sion would be a thing of the past. The feeling of solidarity was not a mere reaction to alien tyranny, however powerful an agent that had been in awakening national self-con- sciousness. The Croats, it must be remembered, though Catholic, were by no means ultramontane, following in this the example of the great Strossmayer. This latter point was confirmed from another source, the Serb monk. Father Nicholas Velimirovic, to whose reputation in his own country has been added the consideration he has gained for himself in England. Discussing the future relations of Croats and Serbs he bade me remember that the Croats are not particularly fond of "the Vatican". In his pamphlet on Beligion and Nationality in Serbia he has borne testimony to the great part played in the furtherance of the programme of Southern Slav unity by the Catholic priests, many of whom have suffered, and are suffering, for their racial patriotism. Some, as also Orthodox priests, have given their lives to the cause. The point is of extreme importance when it is remembered how in the Near East religion has proved a solvent of nationality, and in the past hardly anywhere more conspicuously than in the case of the Southern Slavs. "It may be objected that this may be so in the day of trouble, but that all may be different to-morrow, with the return of peace. ... On this point I venture to say that history will not repeat itself ; what has been will never be again. . . . All we Jugoslavs are sure that there will be harmony and unanimity between the two priesthoods, the two confessions, and the two Churches in the future Serbian State ".^ This feeling of solidarity has been a long time in coming, and perhaps will be all the more enduring and surely based because the lesson has been learned in the hard school of adversity, of frustrated hopes, of spurned loyalty, and of common suffering, and it has completely altered the terms of the problem as it formerly existed. There can be no doubt * Father Nicholas Velimirovic, Beligion and Nationality in Serbia, pp. 19, 22. 182 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS as to the result of a consultation of the Croat people as to its future : they will elect to stand with their Serb brothers. The position of Rijeka is a close counterpart commer- cially of that of Trieste in that it serves a large backland of various national elements. The loss of Croatia would cut off Hungary from the sea, and, though there might be some poetic justice in that in view of her action towards Serbia, she would be entitled to a guarantee of the right of free exportation and importation through Bijeka and a fair railway tariff to the port. Croats and Serbs occupy a considerable area in southern Hungary in the districts of Baranja, Ba5ka, and the Banat of Temesvar, the two latter corresponding roughly to the former Serb Vojvodina (Duchy), and it is necessary to examine Southern Slav claims in these regions and to arrive at an estimate of what may rightly be included in the future Southern Slav State. Baranja is one of the southerly counties of Hungary, bounded on the south by the Drave and on the east by the Danube, with an area of 5,105 square kilometres. The number of Serbo-Croats in the county according to the census of 1910 is 36,000. The figure is disputed by the representatives of the race, who assert that the returns have been falsified by the Magyar authorities, and the real number of Southern Slavs is 70,000. Apart, however, from the Magyar population the number of German settlers amount to 103,000, so that the Serbo-Croats do not form the most numerous section of the population. Unfortunately the local distribution of the racial elements is thoroughly mixed, and it would be difficult to carve out of the country any considerable area of homogeneous character. "While some Serbo-Croat colonies are to be found in the northern portion even to the south and east of Pecuh (Pecs), where the bulk of the Slavs live, they are mingled with large German and Magyar elements. Under the circumstances it seems hardly prac- ticable, and in the interest of the Southern Slavs them- selves undesirable, that the future State should here cross the natural boundary of the Drave, even though the PROPOSED FRONTIERS 183 reluctance to leave any portion of the race under Magyar misrule is natural enough in view of all that it has suffered at the hands of Magyar chauvinism. There are certain considerations affecting the distribu- tion of territory in southern Hungary which should, I think influence the result of any concrete inquiry and proposals, which apply not only to Baranija, but also to the Backa, and the Banat, which may be stated at this point. It would be a bad thing for the Southern Slav kingdom if it sacrificed its intension for the sake of extension. Serbia has owed a great deal to its homogeneity, and the consequent concentration of its political aims and national feeling ; it has been her intension which has given her her relatively great strength, and the same considerations would apply to a wider Southern Slav State. Nor is it at all desirable in the interests of the Southern Slavs themselves that the territorial frontiers of their kingdom should be so extended as to make its borderlands a miniature Austria- Hungary in the variety of its ethnical elements ; it would lose, not gain, by having for its frontier provinces a sort of ethnological museum. The guiding principle should, therefore, be to include all the compact masses of the race, but to eschew annexations which would bring with them the complications of an alien population. Such comphca- tions cannot altogether be avoided, but they should be reduced within the narrowest possible limits. Especially should Southern Slavdom avoid the needless inclusion of German elements. The Germans, as the war has shown, are extremely indigestible ; even in the United States, that great melting-pot of nationality, we have seen — in some ways more markedly than elsewhere — how the German has placed the interests of his country of origin altogether above the interests of his adopted country and his own duties as a citizen. Political, financial, commercial, and journalistic action have not exhausted his activities, but arson, murder — as witness the loss of life in the various dynamiting outrages — and outrage have also been called into service. Doubtless the German inhabitants of southern 184 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Hungary are compacted of milder stuff ^ and are relatively less numerous, still the Southern Slavs would be better without them. As regards some of the German colonies, which necessarily will be included in the new State, I have not hesitated in a later chapter to suggest some drastic steps. Without anticipating what will be suggested later, it may be pointed out here, that not only will the Serbs be well within their rights in repatriating the strategic colonies which have been deliberately planted in certain parts of Bosnia and Srem (Syrmia), but that somewhat similar steps may have to be taken in regard to other Germans. Any rearrangement of frontiers will probably lead of itself to a certain amount of cross migration, and that process will be all to the good even if not unattended by a certain hardship. Such hardship will add but little to the vast sum of human misery caused by the war, while the results of the process will make for peace in the future and a more settled condition of affairs in the various racial frontier regions. So far, however, as any governmental suasion is to be employed, that will only be legitimate if the frontiers are so drawn as to include the minimum of alien elements. If the frontiers are so traced as to include only compact blocks of Serbo-Croat nationality, with no more than islands of foreign elements, then some such measures as suggested may justifiably be employed, — I am speaking only of the Germans. If, however, the frontiers are traced in such a manner as to include all the Serbo-Croats, even where it is they them- selves that are islands in an alien sea, then any such measures would be in the highest degree without justifica- tion, for the Serbo-Croats could not claim to include solid blocks of aliens and then to treat them as intruders, nor is there the slightest reason to suppose that any such unjust course would suggest itself to them. In fine, a studious moderation in the trace of the frontiers in the ' According to Budapest reports, however, they have shown a marked pan-German feeling during the passage of German troops in the campaign against Serbia which has given concern to the Magyars. PROPOSED FRONTIERS 185 manner indicated would carry with it a certain latitude of conduct towards the engulphed Germans, while e con- verso the Serbs would be estopped from such a course by needless territorial extension. Finally, the place of the rejected elements could be taken by immigrants of their own nationality. For these reasons I do not think that a good case can be made out for the annexation of Baranja or even for any considerable portion of it, and the wiser course would be to rest content with the Drave frontier. The adjacent region is the Backa, which is bounded on the east by the Theiss and on the south and west by the Danube, which makes a right-angled turn below its confluence with the Drave ; it corresponds to the Hungarian county of Bacs-Bodrog. The population of the county is composed chiefly of Serbo-Croats, Magyars, and Germans, with a few thousand Slovenes and Kuthenes. The statistics of the Hungarian census are disputed, and it is probable that they underrate the number of Serbo- Croats and exaggerate those of the Magyars, for the latter, unlike the government of Vienna, have a direct interest in the manipulation of the nationality returns. Unfor- tunately, not only is the population mixed, considered as a whole, but the different elements are commingled in an inextricable manner. The eastern part is predomi- nantly Serbo-Croat beyond a line drawn roughly north and south from Novisad (Neusatz) on the Danube to Sentoma§ on the Backi canal, which runs in an easterly direction from the Danube to the Theiss. The former of these towns is an old Serb centre, in fact before the resurrection of independent Serbia it, together with its near neighbour Karlovci, was the cultural centre of the Serb stock, and most of the educated Serbs of the early days of the Principality owed their education directly or indirectly to Novisad, many too of the Serbs of this southern region of Hungary, Ba6ka, and the Banat, emi- grated to the Principality when it gained its autonomy, and this applies especially to the educated element. 186 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Obradovi6, who made spoken Serb the literary language, also was a native of southern Hungary, and in more recent times the father of the Vojvoda (Field-Marshal) Putnik was an immigrant from the same region. Of late years Novisad has been forced to yield its place as the Serb cultural centre to Belgrade, while that of the Croats is at Agram, and the Germans have made considerable progress in the town. Another considerable block of Serb inhabited territory is to be found in the neighbourhood of Subotica (Maria Theresiopol). The intervening areas along the Danube to the west of the line Novisad-Sentomag, and to the north of the Backi canal are inhabited by a confused medley of Serbo-Croats, Magyars, and Germans, interspersed with each other in a manner which forbids the drawing of a frontier which should correspond closely with the lines of racial demarcation. Thus the Serbo-Croats of the Subotica region, and those also of Sombor, are separated from the fairly homogeneous south-eastern Ba6ka by these polyglot areas. As the Serbs are probably the most numerous nationality it is natural that the whole of the Ba6ka should be claimed for the new Southern Slavdom. Here again, however, the considerations to which I have adverted above call for examination. It is doubtful, as already stated, whether it would be in the interest of the Southern Slavs to burden themselves with an area of such diverse ethnic elements. It would add enormously to the tasks of the administration and might easily be a source of trouble and international complications. It has always to be remembered also by the Southern Slav leaders that it is far easier to deal by way of legislation with the foreigner, to circumscribe his commercial activities and exploiting proclivities, to curtail the extent of his banking operations and so forth, than to deal with the man of alien race who is a native-born ^subject, as these Germans and Magyars would become, unless they were given, and exercised, permission to opt for Hungarian nationality, in which case the confusion would be worse confounded. Hard as it might be to the Southern Slavs to renounce PROPOSED FRONTIERS 187 claims to a region rich in historic memories of national struggle, I think (and those Serbs who know me know that it is the thought of a sincere friend) that it would be wiser, if they have the choice, to exercise a severe modera- tion. The south-easterly corner within the limits already defined — south of the Backi canal and cast of the line Novisad-Sentomag — might perhaps be claimed for the Southern Slav State, and the claim might include Novisad itself for historical reasons and for the practical reason that to it crosses the railway bridge over the Danube from Petrovaradin, but beyond that in their own larger interests I think that they would do well not to press tlieir claims.* The last region of southern Hungary with which we are concerned is the Banat of Temesvar, which includes the greater part of the former Serb Vojvodina and comprises the counties of Torontal, Temes, and Krasso Szoreny (Serb, KraSovo-Severin). The southern boundary is the Danube, and it extends east and west from the borders of Roumania and Transylvania to the Theiss, while on the north it reaches to the Maros. The Banat also is a country of mixed nationality, its population comprising Serbs, Roumanians, Magyars, and Germans, while other races are represented, particularly the Slovaks. The western portion, including the major part of the county of Torontal and part of Temes, is predominantly Serb. This portion includes the towns of Velika Kikinda and Veliki Be5kerek, and extends some distance eastward in the southern part to YrSac, Bela Crkva (Weisskirchen, Fehertemplon), aud Bazjas. The population even here is by no means homo- geneous, but includes large bodies of Roumanians in the neighbourhood of Alibunar and of Germans and Magyars in that of Pancevo. The eastern portion of the Banat, ' If in pursuance with the remarks made above a scheme of cross- migration, directed chiefly with a view to the Germans and possibly to Magyar "islets," be adopted (of which more is said in Chapter IX), then the south-west of the Backa should be attributed to Serbia as well as the south-east. This would give the whole line of the Backi canal as the northern boundary. In any case tens of thousands of Serbs will be excluded. 188 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS comprising the county of Krasso and part of Temes to the east of the line Temesvar-VrSac is predominantly Roumanian. Besides Germans and Magyars this portion includes numerous Serb islands as in the neighbourhood of Temesvar and Pardany. In former days the Serbs occupied a more important position than they do now, as they have lost a lot of ground to the Roumanians in the east. Here many Serb districts remain only as islands in a Roumanian sea, and Serb ecclesiastical foundations, far removed from Serb settlements of the present day, have passed into Roumanian hands. The northern portion of the Banat is very mixed in population, and a wedge of German and Magyar colonies with a Serb and Roumanian admixture is thrust southward to Veliki Beckerek between the main masses of Serbs and Roumanians. The detailed study of this region carried out by Dr. Seton- Watson in his book Boumania and the Great War,^ as part of the study of all the Roumanian districts of Hungary, enables one to arrive at a fair conclusion as to the future lines of demarcation. The eastern county of Krasso Szoreny is so far Roumanian as to lie outside the purview of legitimate Serb aspirations, which can only be concerned with the counties of Torontal and Temes. In the county of Torontal the districts of Torok Kanizsa and Nagy Szent-Miklos in the north-west are Magyar though the former contains a large Serb population, while the district of Perjamos in the north centre is mainly German, the Roumanian being the next most numerous element, the Serbs being in very small minority. Dr. Seton-Watson assigns seven districts to the Serbs : Vehka Kikinda, Torok- Be6se, Veliki BeCkerek, Zsombolya, PanSevo, and Pan6evo Town. The total population of these districts is 298,823, ' This book contains an invaluable series of appendices, chiefly of statistical tables showing the population of Transylvania and eastern Hungary in great detail, to which I am deeply indebted throughout this particular section. See especially for my purpose pp. 81, 82, 86, and 87. I do not quite follow portions of his summary on page 89, but this does not affect the matters with which I deal. PROPOSED FRONTIERS 189 and it includes 114,595 Serbs, 32,170 Roumanians, 54,502 Magyars, and 77,855 Germans. The details of the districts disclose the fact that in the district of Zsombolya the Serbs form a very small minority — 3,687 Serbs, 4,643 Roumanians, 12,026 Magyars, and 25,552 Germans. For the reasons more than once given, I think that were I a Serb states- man I should willingly renounce any claim to this district. The Roumanians advance considerable claims in the Banat (the necessity of harmonizing Serb and Roumanian pre- tensions is the reason for the detailed consideration here given to this region), and apparently are not afflicted by any doubts as to the number of aliens who may be in- cluded in the Roumanian Kingdom — some Roumanians have gone so far as to claim the line of the Theiss, i.e. all the Banat and much else. This perhaps is due to the fact that the satisfaction of their legitimate claims will necessarily result in the inclusion of the large Saxon and Szekel islands (234,085, and 501,930) which are situated near to the Roumanian frontier, so that a few thousands more or less of Germans and Magyars will not greatly affect them. The Serbs are in a happier position and should take advantage of it. The district of Zsombolya, then, should be renounced by them to the Roumanians, the more so as its cession will not materially break the continuity of Serb territory though making its northern portion rather a narrow tongue of land. If this be done the population of the remaining districts ^ under considera- tion will work out as follows : Serbs 110,908, Roumanians 27,527, Magyars 42,476, Germans 52,303. It will be observed that the result is greatly to increase the ratio of Serbs to both Magyars and Germans. The process could be carried a step further. A solid block of German and Magyar territory extends right up to Veliki BeSkerek, and if the new boundary were taken close to the east of that town, but so as to leave the Beckerek-Pancevo railway in Serb hands, the number of Germans and Magyars would be still further reduced. ' Of the county of Torontal. 190 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Mixed Serbo-Roumanian districts are Csene, Pardany, Modos, Banlak, and Alibunar extending roughly in a crescent with horns pointing west with the centre to the south-east of VeUki Beckerek. Of these the first is mainly German, and should share the lot of Zsombolya, in fact if the latter (and the region last mentioned) be assigned to Eoumania, Csene would of necessity from its position go also. In Pardany the Serbs are the most numerous element closely followed by the Germans who in Modos and Banlak take first place while in the latter Magyars and Roumanians are more numerous than the Serbs. In these districts it is possible to work out a redistribution by communes by which the Serb and Roumanian ele- ments will be disentangled, but the result leaves the Serb districts with a large leaven of Magyars and Germans.! Here also the Serbs would be wise to resign to the Roumanians all but a few communes in the west which are mainly Serb and adjoin the main block of Serb territory. The district of Alibunar stands in a different case. It is possible so to disentangle the com- munes as to give two regions, one predominantly Roumanian and the other predominantly Serb with only small minorities of other nations. The difficulty, however, is that Alibunar projects deeply into Serb country, and unless the boundary is to be extremely in and out the whole district should go to the Serbs. This is the less important because not only does the distribution outlined above give large Serb islands to the Roumanians, but the two races are remarkable among Balkan peoples in that their rela- tions are generally characterized by mutual liking instead of mutual hatred : they are noted for getting on well together. In the county of Temes the Serbs are in a small minority in most of the districts though their number in these districts amounts to 30,129, but that is out of a total population of 416,998. In VrSac Town they are numerous ' Vide R. W. Seton-Watson, op. cit. p. 87. In Pardany, after sub- tracting Roumanian districts, 9,196 Serbs are left in a population of 26,029 ; in Modos 6,899 out of 23,468 ; in Banlak 3,658 out of 19,777 PROPOSED FRONTIERS 191 (8,602 out of 27,370, but 13,556 Germans), but the town must follow the fortunes of the district in which the Serbs only number 5,531 out of 36,978 (18,174 Roumanians, 8,605 Germans). Kevevara is Serb, and so is Bela Crkva with the exception of three communes. The boundary, then, of Serb territory in the Banat might be traced roughly as follows ' : Leaving the river Theiss somewhat to the north of 'Zenta it would run eastward to a point between Mako on the Maros and Velika Kikinda, then it would run southward slightly to the east of Velika Kikinda and continue its course to a point shghtly east of Veliki Beckerek, leaving, as said, the railway V. Be6kerek- Pancevo in Serb hands. Thence with a slight southward bulge it would run to the river Temes north of Botos and continue up the river to above Srpska-Boka. It would then run with a northward bend to the Brzava canal between Partes and Kanak and follow the canal south- westerly to the junction with the Theresien canal. From this point it would run south to the neighbourhood of the railway between Szamos and Ilanesa, and follow the railway — a little to the east of it — till just east of Alibunar it would cross the railway Alibunar- VrSac, This railway it would follow — slightly to the south of it — to a point between Ulma and VrSac, whence it would take a south- easterly course to Bela Crkva and Bazja§ on the Danube. The island of Moldova on the Danube below BazjaS would also go to the Serbs. If this trace were followed the result would be represented in the following table : — Serbs. Boumanians. Magyars. Germans. Total. Torontal (district of V. Kikinda, T. Becse, V. Beikerek, Antafalva, Panoevo) Alibunar district Temes, Kevevara district Bela Crkva diBtrict 110,908 11,743 16,795 20,863 27,2'37 14,082 5,705 1,160 42,476 588 5,355 circa 700 52,303 755 6,587 circa 4,600 251,9J9 29,292 35,482 29,227 160,309 49,374 49,119 64,!225 345,950 Stieler's AUas will enable the line to be followed easily. 192 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS From these figures an appreciable reduction must be made in respect of the Germans and Magyars inhabiting the excluded portion of Veliki Beckerek and a slight addition to the number of Serbs in respect of the communes alluded to above of Modos, Pardany, and Banlak districts. If three Roumanian communes of Alibunar were excluded there would remain in that district 9,938 Serbs and only 126 Roumanians, out of a total of 12,193 inhabitants, but these communes could hardly be excluded for geographical reasons. These figures could, and probably would, be modified considerably by cross-migration after a resettle- ment of frontiers. Some 90,000 Serbs would, upon the above distribution, be left in Roumanian territory, accept- ing the total figures of the Hungarian census of the counties of Torontal and Temes which exceed by several thousands the sum of the detailed figures of the districts. Many of these would doubtless be willing to emigrate into the new Serb territory to take the place of Roumanians equally desirous of emigrating. Any such movement should be encouraged but not in any way forced, for the employ- ment of pressure would create a grievance which would react on the political relations of two States whose interests are identical and will remain so and whose people are mutually sympathetic. The same remarks apply to the Magyars also, many of whom would be likely to refuse to pass under the government of the despised "nationalities". The case of the Germans is considered in Chapter IX. If the boundary here suggested be compared with that proposed by Dr. Seton-Watson in his book already cited it will be seen that the chief difference is to be found in the exclusion of Zsombolya from the Serb area. The line here given, roughly speaking, leaves Dr. Seton- Watson' s line near Velika Kikinda and rejoins it in the neighbourhood of Vr§ac. Though it gives to the Serbs slightly less in area yet it has the advantage, which is very considerable, of including far fewer Germans and Magyars while the number of Serbs it excludes is comparatively small. Discussing the question of the PROPOSED FRONTIERS 193 Banat, a well-known Serb geographer and publicist traced roughly for me on a map a line with which he said he had reason to believe the Roumanian Government would be satisfied. That line — I have kept the map — corresponds generally with Dr. Seton- Watson's line, though drawn slightly to the east of it. I gathered that the Serbs also would not be dissatisfied with the line given to me, and I trust, therefore, that the trace which I have suggested would meet with no insuperable objections from them while, by giving a slightly increased area to Roumania, it might be acceptable there also. The future of Macedonia at the time of writing is still uncertain, though loyalty to an ally and the necessities of plain honesty should have deprived the situation in that region of all ambiguity in the event of victory for the Allies. I assume here for my immediate purpose that King Ferdinand and the Bulgars will at the end play the Germans false as they have previously played us false : that an appeal will be made to England, whose infatuation for Bulgaria has already cost us so dear in the Balkans ; that an immediate response will be evoked, and that at least a portion of Macedonia will be demanded for our enemies to console them for their non-success against us. I am bound also to assume that even such modified treason to our ally will be repudiated, in spite of powerful pro- Bulgar influences.^ Without a doubt some sort of union will eventually be achieved between Montenegro and the remainder of Southern Slavdom, though the exact nature of that union and even the hour of its accomplishment is in doubt, and will depend in part on how far the Powers show them- ' A discussion of the Macedonian problem and of the nature of the settlement which should be made with Bulgaria will be found in the two following chapters. The district of Strumica should be included in Serbia which, in view of Greece's attitude, should receive also the Fiorina district which has a Slav population. The latter cession would give her a mountain frontier instead of an arbitrary line across the Pelagonian plain. The chain runs south from Kajmakcalan west of Lake Ostrovo, 13 194 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS selves capable of taking long national views to the exclusion of immediate dynastic and diplomatic matters. Just before the outbreak of war negotiations were in progress with a good hope of success for a union between Serbia and Montenegro in matters of common concern. The proposal was for a single army, a single Foreign Office, and a customs union. In former years King Nicholas was an ardent advocate of Serb union, and even wrote that he would be content to be the sentinel before the King of Serbia's tent, and it has been asserted that in the days of Prince Michael of Serbia there was an actual agreement that in the event of the two States becoming coterminous there should be a sort of federal union between them, Montenegro becoming a principality within the Kingdom. How far there has been an alteration in the old King's personal sentiments it is difficult to know, but the brilliant marriages of his daughters and the union of the Crown Prince to a German princess have greatly increased the dynastic feeling of the family and exalted its notions of its courtly position — from being the household of a tribal chief it has become a recognized Eoyal family. It was asserted — though I do not know with what truth — that King Nicholas himself was averse to taking the title of King, and that it was urged upon him by his family, and even more significantly by the Austrian Emperor, who wished thus to effect a breach between Serbia and Montenegro since it would be more difficult for a King to concede what would be comparatively easy for a Prince. A great deal of mystery surrounds the alleged surrender of the Montenegrin government to Austria at the time of the loss of Lov5en. It seems perhaps not improbable, though the suggestion is offered with diffidence, that the court camarilla which, as has been said, paid of recent years greater heed to dynastic than Southern Slav national considerations, and which is stated to be headed by the Princess Vera, did induce the King to offer a surrender, but that the latter was met with a refusal by the army (it is important to remember that, PROPOSED FRONTIERS 195 as I was pointedly informed, the Montenegrin General Staff was composed of Serb officers) and that the King thereupon reversed his decision. The position of the dynasty was weakened by the events of the Balkan wars. The Montenegrins were dissatisfied with the conduct of the princes who do not seem to have shared the hardships of the soldiers, while the latter contrasted the results achieved with those obtained by the Serbs. When in the second Balkan war Montenegrins and Serbs fought side hj side the contrast in resources was further brought home to the former who saw that Montenegro was too small and too poor even to organize efficiently the resources they possessed. There was consequently a general feeling both among Serbs and Montenegrins that, while no great change might take place in the lifetime of old King Nicholas who has played a great and noble part for his country, after his decease there should be a union of the two States the Montenegrin princes receiving appanages from the civil list. During the lifetime of King Nicholas there should be at any rate a federal union which would have the incidental advantage of placing beyond doubt the consummation of complete union in the future and of eliminating the danger of any intrigue directed against that consummation. During the war rumour has been busy with the subject of Montenegro and its ruling House, and with intrigues real or alleged in which the little country has figured, and there can be little doubt apart from details that there has been substantial basis for some at least of these rumours. In the spring of 1915 I was told the story of an intrigue which has not hitherto been published whose authenticity was accepted in Southern Slav circles. It is asserted that at that time — April-May 1915 — a certain Power had urged Montenegro to stipulate from the Entente for the cession to her of all the Hercegovina to the south of the Narenta, an area which would include Dubrovnik (Eagusa). The result would be twofold. In the first place, such a cession would reduce the future outlet of 196 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Serbia proper on the Adriatic to the very narrowest proportions. The second result would be to make less likely the union of Serbia and Montenegro. The acquisi- tion of such an area including Dubrovnik would further exalt the dynastic pride of the ruling House, while the Montenegrin people also, in view of the increase of its resources, might change its opinion that the country was too small and too poor to stand alone and should join its larger neighbour. The comment on this subtle idea made to me by a Southern Slav was emphatic: "We wish no harm to old King Nicholas who used to be a great patriot, but if he intrigues with against Southern Slav unity he will have to go." No one can feel anything but compassion for the old chieftain of the Black Mountain forced in these dark days to leave his home and the little country which he has so dearly loved, and every one must hope that his life may be spared to see the dawn of a happier day not only for Montenegro but for all that Southern Slav race whose union inspired all his policy in former years and formed the theme of his play Carica Ballianska (the Empress of the Balkans). There can, however, be not the slightest doubt as to what should be the future of his country. Whatever provisional arrangements may be made for the lifetime of King Nicholas, Montenegro after his death should be completely fused with Serbia. His family does not command the respect and allegiance which belong to the old King, and its attitude of recent years has made it suspect of being lukewarm in the cause of national unity — that unity which more than ever, as stern events point to its absolute necessity if the race is to have a future, is the goal for which every Southern Slav passionately strives, treachery to which is the one sin that has no forgiveness. That union is equally in the interest of the Montenegrins ; their country is small and it is poor, even the great forests of the Brda cannot be exploited by its own resources, and fusion with the rest of the race would enable it to enter into a larger life, would dispense with the expense PROPOSED FRONTIERS 197 of a separate administration, and would enable it to share in the resources of the whole country, and to obtain subventions for educational and other purposes which it cannot supply itself. It is to be hoped that such a con- summation will not be hindered by the dynastic ties which unite other ruling families to the House of Petrovic. The position of the latter would be no worse than that of many German and Italian Houses which had to yield place in the cause of national unity, and the statesmen of the Allies should see the matter from the broad view of inter- national policy and the national desires of the Southern Slavs rather than from that of the editor of the Almanach de Gotha, or of those who forget that if there is a King of Italy it is because one king and several lesser potentates, not to mention the Pope, have had to make way for him. It must be remembered that the not too popular heir- apparent is married to a German princess and has no children, and that the next heir is Prince Mirko, whose role in recent events has been more than equivocal. He remained behind in the country after the great retreat, and is now in Austria, where rumour has been busy with his name as a possible " tame " sub-king of an Austrian Jugoslavia. There can be but little doubt of the fusion of Montenegro with the rest of the Southern Slavs whatever arrangements may be made at the peace. If they are for a time separated it will only mean a revolution the more, similar to that which chased from their thrones the King of Naples and the Dukes of Tuscany, Parma, etc., and with a similar result, for no Holy Alliance is likely to attempt to stay the progress of events and there are limits to the extent to which any single State can flout public opinion. Political wisdom, however, endeavours to obviate the necessity for revolutions. There are two or three shght rectifications which should be effected in the Serbo-Albanian frontier, though the amount of territory affected is small. The first of these is that the hne of the Bojana should be secured, the present frontier leaving the river just below Gorica and 198 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS passing north-west to the lake of Skodra. A small river is not usually a good frontier except on the map, but in this case the character of the two banks is different and the line of the Bojana is in reality the line of the hills which come down to its western bank. In the neighbour- hood of Gusinje the present frontier cuts across the upper valley of the Lim part of the valley — both sides — being Montenegrin and part Albanian. The difficulty here is that the upper part of the valley is inhabited by an offshoot of the Klementi tribe from over the mountains, but at any rate the boundary could be so modified as to include in Montenegrin territory the headwaters of the affluent which joins the Lim at Andrijevica, which would give a continuous mountain frontier in this neighbourhood. The new boundary would follow the hills which divide the headwaters of the Andrijevica tributary from those of the Lim. The total area involved would not be more than some fifty square miles, but the result would be a natural frontier. A more important rectification is necessary between Djakovica and Prizren. The present frontier leaves the mountains to the south of Djakovica and strikes north-east to the junction of the Erenik with the White Drin and then follows the course of the latter to the west of Prizren. As a consequence, in this portion of its course the valley of the river is divided between Serbia and Albania. As has just been remarked, a small river is not a good frontier, for the reason that the social and economic life of its banks is the same. Moreover, in this case the strip of Albanian land is cut off from the rest of Albania by the mountains which bound the western side of the valley. A modification of the frontier would be expedient by which the new line should follow the mountains just mentioned to the narrow gorges west of Prizren in the neighbourhood of Vranica where it would cross the river where the valley is confined and thence rejoin the present frontier to the south of Prizren. Here also the result would be a practically continuous mountain frontier. To the south of Prizren at the point last PROPOSED FRONTIERS 199 mentioned, the present frontier makes a loop eastward of almost three-quarters of a circle pointing in the direc- tion of Tetovo, and abandoning the main line of the southern extension of the Sar Mountains. The new line should follow the main chain and thus cut the neck of the loop, giving once more a natural frontier. The sum total of these last two losses to Albania would not be above some three or four hundred square miles at the outside. In the event of Albania being re-established in a real independence, i.e. without any right of occupation, administration, protectorate, or tutelage being granted to any single Power, she could be amply compensated by the valley of the Eadika, at present Serb, and even by the town of Debar itself, which would be worth much more to her than the areas relinquished to Serbia. In the event of any other future being marked out for Albania, then an entirely new set of circumstances would arise which it would be useless to discuss here. The failure of the late experiment in Albania lay in the circumstances in which it was conceived, the agents by whom it was worked, and the jealousies which strove to wreck it. This virile people should not be despaired of. Progress will be slow — the Highlands were not tamed in a day — but there seems no reason why a really honest attempt, made without arrUre pensSe, to found an independent Albania should not succeed. If an administrator of the calibre of, e.g., Lord Milner ^ were to be sent out for ten years, the way would then be clear for a princely government. A " Constitution " would of course be the last work, not the first. ' Written before party politicians had re-discovered him. Presumably we shall henceforth use his talents for ourselves. CHAPTER VI MACEDONIA: THE SERBO-BULGARIAN TREATY OF 1912 It is necessary that some reference should be made in a book deahng with the future of the Southern Slavs to the Macedonian question, however great may be the impatience of many Englishmen at the mention of that, to them, wearisome topic. It might have been thought that the question of the future of Macedonia has been settled by the course of events : Serbia has been our faithful ally, which has repulsed all overtures for the negotiation of a separate peace when such were made to her, while Bul- garia has been to us as well as to Serbia a treacherous enemy, so that to those unacquainted with the methods of modern British diplomacy it might seem that no other course could, or would be, followed save that of restoring the province to our ally in the event of victory. The facts, however, are otherwise, and consequently the main outlines of the problem must be restated in the barest possible form. There are one or two common misconceptions, widely held in England and fostered by the ever-active Bulgarian pro- pagandists, which require at any rate passing notice. Reference has been made more than once to the frequency with which historical claims dating from the Middle Ages are advanced to various Near Eastern lands and provinces, and Macedonia in particular has been the object of such claims based upon the conquests made by the contending MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 201 parties in medieval times. Professor Cvijic, the Eector of the University of Belgrade, has pointed out in his mono- graph on the Nationality of the Macedonian Slavs that if historical arguments were to have full sway, the entire map of Europe would have to be recast with most unsatis- factory results, and it must be remembered that these "historical" claims are frequently in plainest contradiction to arguments, such as the ethnological, to which much greater deference should be paid. The fact, however, that these arguments are frequently advanced and have had undoubtedly so large an influence entails a brief glance at the history of Macedonia subsequent to the irruption of the Slavs. A very common misconception in England is that during the greater part of the Middle Ages Macedonia was almost continuously a Bulgarian province, which fell into the hands of the Serbs for a short time during the reign of Stephen Dugan,^ before passing under the rule of the Turks. This is an entire mistake as will be seen, however little bearing the historical question has upon the racial character of the inhabitants or their political desires, if they possess any desires beyond the wish to be allowed to cultivate their lands in peace and quietness. Unimportant in itself, a sketch of Macedonian history becomes necessary when the alleged facts of this history are seriously advanced as a contribution to the present political solution of the problem of Macedonia's destinies. Another common misconception is a confusion between the great importance of the Archi- episcopal see of Ochrida, whose occupant bore the title of Primate of Justiniana Prima and Bulgaria, in the ecclesi- astical history of the Orthodox Church and its ephemeral importance as the capital for a few years of a Bulgarian Empire. The two things have been consistently confounded by those whose object was to make pohtical profit out of the confusion. With this latter [matter it is not my intention to deal, as the facts can be found elsewhere in ' See for example an article on The Macedonian Problem, by Mr. Ledward in the Fortnightly Review, August 1915. 202 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS greater detail than is warranted by the purpose of this volume. I The "first Bulgarian Empire" was founded by Simeon, 893-927, who proclaimed himself Tsar, and held Macedonia, Albania, and part of Serbia, including Ni§ and Belgrade. Subsequently the empire split into two portions, of which the eastern fell before the Greek Emperor Zimisces, in 972. The western empire was founded in 963 by Sisman of Trnovo, who held Macedonia and Albania. His son, Stephen Samuel also held Macedonia, Albania, Ni§, and Belgrade. His troops suffered a disastrous defeat at BelaSica at the hands of Basil II, the " Bulgar Slayer," in 1014, which he did not long survive. A short period of anarchy and internecine strife was followed by the extinction of the Western Bulgarian Empire in 1018, and the whole territory, though the ecclesiastical organization survived, was incor- porated into the Eastern Empire and parcelled out into governorships. It so remained for a period of 160 years, from 1018 to II86.2 In 1186 a revival of Bulgarian power took place under John Asen, who, it is to be noted, was a Vlach and whose dominion is frequently described as Vlacho-Bulgarian. John Asen II prided himself in a document addressed to the Pope on being a Roman. This revival had its origin in northern Bulgaria, Macedonia at the time being under an independent ruler named Strez, variously described as a Serb and a Bulgar. Tsar Kalojan, son of Asen, 1197-1207, took posses- sion of northern Macedonia, and the revived empire had its greatest extension under John Asen II, 1218-1241, whose dominions touched the Black Sea, the ^gean, and the Adriatic, including Albania up to Durazzo. Macedonia and ' Vide a sketch of Macedonian history by Professor P. Popovic in the Near East for September 10, 1915, which has since been repubhshed as a pamphlet, for some interesting information on the subject on the see of Ochrida. * It is maintained by Professor Popovid, ut supra, that the " Western Bulgarian Empire" should be regarded as a separate "Macedonian" State of non-Bulgarian character. He cites Jirecek, Geschichte der Serben, as now adhering to this view. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 203 Thrace were lost by Koloman, son of John Asen II, the date of the loss being given as 1254-1257, during the last years of his reign, ^ while Constantino Asen, or Tic, a Serb by race, 1258-1277, was the last Tsar who occupied upper Macedonia, and then only for a short time.* The second period of Bulgarian possession, then, lasted only some fifty years, on the most generous estimate, if we compute the time from the occupation of upper Macedonia by Kalojan. The Greeks had immediately to defend it against the Serbs, who, under Stephen Milutin, 1281-1321, penetrated to the Struma and the Lakes, and maintained his hold on northern Macedonia. Under his grandson, Stephen DuSan, all Macedonia and much else fell to the Serbs as a capture, not from the Bulgars but from the Greeks. On his death in 1356 Macedonia fell to one of his nobles Vukasin, and subsequently became the principality of the famous Marko Kraljevic. It continued under Serb rulers till the Turkish definite conquest in 1396, having acknowledged Ottoman suzerainty since the battle of the Marica in 1371. It will be seen, then, that there was nothing like a con- tinuous Bulgarian occupation in the Middle Ages. On the contrary, after the fall of the first Bulgarian Empire, which had held Macedonia for 160 years, including the duration of the " Western Bulgarian Empire," during the 370 years from 1088-1396 the Bulgars only held the province for some fifty years, the Serbs holding it in sovereignty or under suzerainty for about a century at the close of the period, and the Greeks for periods of some 160 years and fifty years. Another point which becomes evident is that no revival of Bulgarian power had its origin in Macedonia, in spite of the difficult nature of the country; the province fell to Bulgaria as a result of later conquest, and at times had its own princes of Bulgar or Serb race. I lay no great stress on this confused medieval ' at. Lavisse and Eambaud, Histoire Generate, Tome iii, p. 909. Professor Popovic gives the date of acquisition as 1230 (this would refer to all Macedonia), and of its loss as 1246. * at. William Miller, Travel and Politics in tlie Near East, p. 874. 204 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS history, but if it be cited it should be cited correctly, which is rarely the case with the Bulgar propagandists, native or foreign. Historically the Serbs have a good claim, and M. Vesnic, the Minister of Serbia in Paris, has told me that such public works as remain from the medieval period date from the years of Serb supremacy. In our own days Serb influence was paramount during the nineteenth century till 1878, when it waned as the result of various causes — the abortive Treaty of San Stefano, the operations of the Bulgarian Exarchate, Turkish fear of Serb nationalism which led to the suppression of the Serb schools, and the operations of the "Macedonian Com- mittee " which seems to have killed considerably more Macedonians than Turks. As for the ethnology of the Macedonian Slavs the best opinion is that it is not unlike what we might expect from this previous history. The original Slavs must have been of the same general stock as their Serb neighbours and the original Slav inhabitants of Bulgaria, and that original stock has at different times received an infiltration of Bulgarians. East of the middle Vardar valley they may be described as Bulgarians, and north of the line Stip- Gostivar as Serbs, the remainder living in the Slav portions of the former vilayet of Monastir are neither pure Serb nor pure Bulgar. I may cite two English authorities, the quotations forming part of the discussion of the subject by the authors cited. Sir Charles Eliot says : — The result of this investigation, then, is that it is not easy to dis- tinguish Servians and Bulgarians beyond the boundaries of their respective countries. We have in reality three categories : pure Slavs, Slavised Bulgarians (the original un-Slavised Bulgarians having long ago disappeared), and pure Slavs who have been influenced by Slavised Bulgarians. ... Of the remaining Slavs [i.e. between the Struma and the Sar Mountains] an impartial observer can only say that they are intermediate between the Serbs and Bulgarians; but I think that traces of Mongolian — that is, Bulgarian — physiognomy can be seen as far west as Ochrida. The practical conclusion is that neither Greeks, Servians, nor Bulgarians have a right to claim central Macedonia.' Sir Charles Eliot, Turkey in Europe, pp. 337, 338. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 205 Mr. Brailsford, whose Bulgarophil sentiments arc well known, writes : — Are the Macedonians Serbs or Bulgars ? . . . The lesson of history obviously is that there is no answer at all. They are not Serbs for their blood can hardly be pure Slavonic. . . . On the other hand, they can hardly be Bulgarians, for quite clearly the Servian immigrations and conquests must have left much Servian blood in their veins and the admixture of non-Aryan blood can scarcely be so considerable as it is in Bulgaria. They are probably very much what they were before either a Bulgarian or a Servian Empire existed — a Slav people derived from rather various stocks who invaded the peninsula at different periods. But they had originally no clear consciousness of race, and any strong Slavonic Power was able to impose itself upon them. One may safely say that for historical reasons the people of Kossovo and the North-West are definitely Serb, while the people of Ochrida are clearly Bulgarians. The affimties of the rest are decided on purely political grounds. Language teaches us very little. The differences between literary Servian and Bulgarian are not considerable but they are very definite. The Macedonian dialect is neither one nor the other, but in certain structural features it agrees rather with Bulgarian than with Servian. This, however, means little ; for modern Servian is not the language of Dushan, but the dialect of Belgrade. A southern Mace- donian finds no difficulty in making himself understood in Dushan' a country (Uskub and Prizrend) though he will feel a foreigner in Belgrade. One must also discount the effect of propaganda. A priest or teacher from Sofia or Belgrade who settles in a village, will modify its dialect considerably in the course of a generation. . . . The Servians have a respectable historical and ethnographical claim to be reckoned a Macedonian race.' It is true that he claims them very definitely for the Bulgarians and decisively rejects Serb claims, but it is on grounds of political affinity. M. Berard, in his book on Macedonia, differs with regard to the inhabitants of the Ochrida region : " Les Slaves des Dibres et des Lacs se disaient volontiers Serbes." Professor Cvijic is also of opinion that they are of intermediate type, but considers that the central Macedonians as far east as the Vardar- Struma waterparting have Serb characteristics in their customs, songs, and some of the elements of the language. It is curious that the Bulgars and their backers insist so ' H. N. Brailsford, Macedonia, pp. 101, 105. 206 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS strongly on their alleged ethnographical claims to Mace- donia while claiming in Thrace a large area which is Greco-Turkish by race, as well as Kavala, etc., which is undoubtedly Greek. The geographical, commercial, and strategic reasons which they advance in these latter cases are equally operative for the Serbs in Macedonia. Mr. Brailsford found no native traditions of the old Bulgarian Empire, such traditions as the people possess being rather of the days of Serb rule. Bulgarians them- selves have admitted it. It is this indeterminate character of the population that has so embittered the Serbo-Bulgarian struggle for Macedonia. The Macedonian speaks a patois which is identical with the literary language of neither Serb nor Bulgar, but is mutually intelligible with both. When he is educated he learns either the one or the other literary language, and becomes, as the case may be, Serb or Bulgar. If the Bulgars have made great progress in the past, that is due largely to political causes and the methods of the Macedonian Committee, and whichever State could hold Macedonia for a generation would succeed in convert- ing its inhabitants to its own nationality. Neither side could rest secure in the belief that eventually the people would remain in its fold in spite of a passing foreign domination. It is a testimony to the correctness of this view that most ethnologists are agreed that prior to 1878 the population of the country between Ni§ and Sofia was of the same intermediate character, and it is a fact that villages on what is now the Bulgarian side of the line asked to be included in Serbia. Yet at the present day the political boundary has become a genuinely national one. At one time, if the Bulgars claimed Ni§, the Serbs claimed Sofia. All this explains, if it does not excuse, the bitter struggles for the Macedonian heritage. In reply to Bulgarian efforts the Serbs in later years pushed a vigorous propaganda in Macedonia not only in ecclesias- tical matters, which, as we shall see, were themselves political, but by the foundation of schools, etc. A note must be made of the great influence of the MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 207 Exarchist Church in promoting Bulgarian influence. Up to 1870 the Orthodox inhabitants of European Turkey were forced to submit to the ministrations of priests who were Greek by race, and a general confusion was made between Greeks (Hellenes) and "Greeks" by religion. The Slavs demanded priests of their own ; the Patriarch refused the request. Then in 1870 was formed the Exarchist Church by an act of formal, though not material, schism, rendered necessary by that refusal. The Serbs, it must be remem- bered, took an active part at Constantinople in forwarding the movement and even brought diplomatic pressure to bear at the Porte in its favour. The original sphere of the operations of this body, which, it must be remembered always, differs in no matter of doctrine, ritual, or religious observance from the Patriarchist Church, was in Bulgaria proper. Its operations were gradually extended to Mace- donia, where it became a Bulgarizing agency. The Serbs of the Principality had their own autocephalous Church in communion with the Patriarch, and this body was unable to send a mission into Macedonia without com- mitting an act of schism. The result was that the Exarchist Church had matters all its own way, since the only method by which the Slavs could obtain the services of a Slav clergy was by adhesion to the Exarchist body. It was not till 1897 that the Serbs were able to obtain the appointment of one of their own race as Patriarchist Metropolitan of Skoplje, and only in 1900 that the Serbs of Turkey were recognized as a separate millet or politico- religious community. From the Serb point of view, therefore, action against the Exarchist clergy is purely political, since an Exarchist Church in Serb territory can have only, in present circumstances, a political raison d'etre ; namely, to teach the inhabitants of Macedonia that they are Bulgars, and therefore, if they want a Slav clergy, should have Bulgar and not Serb priests. That in spite of its terrorist methods the Macedonian Committee did not obtain so large a hold over the Slav Macedonian population as is often supposed is shown by 208 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the fiasco of the much-advertised "great rising" of 1903. During that rising, according to Mr, Brailsford, no more than 4,800 insurgents were under arms, a number which is very small if comparison be made with the total popula- tion of the districts affected and in great contrast to the great popular insurrections which at different times have had their origin in the Balkans. Even when allowance be made for lack of arms and for the discouraging effects of previous abortive rebellions the number seems inadequate to sustain the contention that it was a genuine popular revolt of the central Macedonian people. Moreover, the very methods to which the Bulgarian Committee had recourse, the frequent assassinations, the raiding of villages for supplies not willingly afforded, the taking of hostages, the terrorism exercised not less upon the villagers than upon the Turkish officials, argue an inherent v/eakness in the cause it sustained. Not thus was it with the frequent Greek and Serb insurrections of earlier days, when supplies were willingly accorded and there was no need for the insurgents to take measures against those upon whose behalf they were fighting, since these latter recognized their mission and assisted the hajduks or klephts to the best of their ability. The Committee throughout the history of its operations was always compelled to take the severest measures against the peasantry, not only Greek or Vlach but also Slav, which argues that at least a large proportion of the villagers had but little sympathy with their self-styled champions ; indeed it was frequently only by force that villages could be induced to enrol themselves in the cause of the Committee. Everything then points to the same conclusion of a peasantry Slav by race, but in the mass largely untouched by nationalist propaganda, probably confining their conscious desires to security for life and freedom from extortion and excessive taxation, and capable of being moulded into Serbs or Bulgars according as their destinies lead them. I am speaking of the people of central Macedonia. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 209 II Undoubtedly the Serb cause has been prejudiced in England by the view taken of the provisions of the Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty of 1912 which preceded the first Balkan war. It has been argued that the Serbs by agreeing to the territorial delimitation contained in that Treaty acknowledged the ethnographical rights of Bulgaria over the region assigned to her, and were therefore morally debarred from demanding any revision in the terms of the treaty so far as the territorial arrangements contained in it were concerned, and could not put forward any claim to central Macedonia without thereby disavowing those rights of nationality upon which is based the whole Southern Slav case. It is contended further that in consequence of the foregoing arguments Serb rights in central Macedonia are based purely upon the successful issue of the second Balkan war, i.e. upon force, and that in any general Balkan settlement a return must be made to the provisions of the 1912 Treaty as representing the considered moral judgment of the two States themselves upon the question at issue. It is urged even further that in pursuit of the aim of a Balkan accord in spite of Bulgaria's treacherous stab in the back these views must find concrete expression in the proposals of the Allies notwithstanding Serbia's position as an ally and Bulgaria's hostility, and although these same Allies have already signed away large areas of territory which are as indis- putable in their Southern Slav character as the nationality of the central Macedonians is disputable. There are here evidently two main points. The first is matter of fact and historical argument, the second, partly dependent upon the first, is largely matter of policy and honest dealing with an ally. The first is concerned with the genesis, the aims, the underlying causes, and the rupture of the Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty of 1912, and the second with the policy which ought, in view of all that has happened, to be pursued by the Allies in the Balkan 14 210 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS settlement. In this section I will endeavour to set forth the truth about the 1912 Treaty. A commonly received view is that the first real, as apart from formal, breach of the Treaty was made when Serbia demanded a redistribution of the spheres allotted to the two States by the set terms of the Treaty, and this view necessitates the consideration of the motives that underlay that distribution. The Bulgarians, as we have seen, have long laid claim to practically the whole of Macedonia and of what the Serbs call Skoplian Old Serbia, i.e. the districts of Skoplje, Kumanovo, etc. The general history of those claims has already been reviewed. In these pretensions of the Bulgars the Serbs never ac- quiesced, even though prior to 1878 they concerned themselves more immediately with their prospects in Bosnia and the Hercegovina. They claimed that the inhabitants of central and southern Macedonia were at least as much Serb as Bulgar, and that their own historic claims were as good as those of their rivals. Unless it is recognized that the Serbs never acknowledged Bulgarian claims to Macedonia on ethnological grounds, we shall fail to understand the reasons which led them at a later date to reassert their own claims by the demand for a revision of the 1912 Treaty. The main object of Serbia in concluding the Treaty was to secure an outlet to the Adriatic under her own control- It is unnecessary to deal with the conditions, economic and political, which pressed heavily on the State and made this desire imperative, as they are sufficiently well known. Under the terms of the Treaty Bulgaria was to furnish 100,000 men for operations in Macedonia and 200,000 against Austria if Serbia were to be attacked by that Power. There was also a territorial delimita- tion of the future acquisitions to be made in Macedonia, assigning by far the greater part of Macedonia to Bulgaria. The reason why Serbia made these large concessions was, as has been said above, the need of a port on the MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 211 Adriatic, for the possession of which she was wiHing to pay a high price ; and this was perfectly understood by the Bulgarian statesmen with whom the Treaty was con- cluded. The Macedonian concessions to Bulgaria were made to her in return for her support in the matter of an Adriatic outlet, which for Serbia was the governing motive throughout for entering upon the Treaty at all. " Why, under these circumstances ", I asked a well-known Serb in a position to know the facts, " was not the question of a port definitely included in the terms of the Treaty? Your attitude then could not have been liable to misrepre- sentation". "We made a mistake in not doing so", was the reply, ** a great mistake which we bitterly regret. But we did not want to alarm Europe ". Forced by the jealousies of the Powers to conceal their plans under the usual guise of a demand for Macedonian reform, the Balkan States desired no disclosure of the fact that in reality they intended a root-and-branch settlement of the Balkan question. " The extent of the concessions ", it was added, " was due to the fact that we, like the Bulgarians, did not think that we were so strong as we were ". When, therefore, at a later date the Bulgarians argued that there was no mention of Albania, i.e. of the Adriatic outlet, in the Treaty, they were literally accurate, but at the same time they knew that, though not mentioned in terms, the matter was fundamental — was, in fact, virtually a suppressed clause. It is this that gives real importance to a visit paid in November 1912 to Budapest by M. Danev, an ex-Premier and at the time President of the Bulgarian Sobranje. He went avowedly as the representative of his Government. On November 10 he was received by Count Berchtold (the Delegations were sitting at Budapest at the time), and in Hungarian official quarters he is stated to have intimated that Bulgaria was not bound unconditionally to support Serb claims in controverted territorial questions. Yet on the day following the Bulgarian semi-official Mir itself acknowledged that the question of a Serb outlet 212 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS was a sine qud non.^ For Serbia this action of Dr. Danev, the first of an ill-fated series connected with the name of that unhappy statesman, constituted nothing less than a breach of the Treaty. If Austria had attacked Serbia in arms Bulgaria was bound to come to her aid with 200,000 men, 2 and a fortiori, if the attack took a diplomatic form, she was bound to aid her diplomatically. It cannot be argued that, though bound to military aid if required, she was free to withhold her diplomatic- assistance. Yet here Bulgaria, far from doing diplomatic service, actually did her Ally a disservice, and so far as the diplomatic field was concerned abandoned her. To Austria the information was important. It must be remembered that at this date — early November 1912 — the decision as to the Adriatic outlet had not yet been given definitely against Serbia, though Austria was loudly declaring the impossibility of conceding it. She knew, after Dr. Danev's declarations, that on this point the Allies were divided and that she had nothing to fear from Bulgaria, which would certainly not support her Ally in arms in a question which she had already declared was no affair of hers. It is true that in any event the military situation was such as to preclude any help from Bulgaria reaching Serbia, since the former State had some 50,000 to 70,000 men locked up around Adrianople, while the rest of her army was before the lines of Tchatalja. This, however, really means that the terms of the Treaty had become impossible of fulfilment on the military side as they had already been repudiated on the diplomatic. Doubtless the position of ' So also Dr. Danev : " I should explain to you that, during the crisis of 1912, the most important question for the future of Serbia was her outlet on the Adriatic Sea. Austria was opposed to that. If the Allies ever meant to execute the clause of which we speak [Article III of the Military Convention between Serbia and Bulgaria], no better opportu- nity could have been presented. But no one, much less Serbia herself, thought of it ". — Speech in the Sobranje, May 1914. Cit. " Balkanicus ", The Aspirations of Bulgaria, p. 85. Dr. Danev was trying to disprove the obligation of Article III, but the admission remains. ' Article III of the Military Convention. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 213 Bulgaria was a difficult one, but at the same time Serbia was entitled to urge that by default, apart from stress of circumstances, her Ally had failed to give her the quid pro quo for the Macedonian partition boundary, and was consequently in no position to demand those con- cessions the return for which she had failed to render. The next point that calls for consideration is the position of affairs at the time when the first peace negotiations between the Allies and Turkey were broken off. The question of the Adriatic outlet had been settled against Serbia; the whole of Macedonia and Southern Epirus were in the hands of the Allies ; the Bulgarians were before Adrianople and Tchatalja. The negotiations had been broken off on the question of Adrianople at the demand of Bulgaria, though in fact the Great Powers had signified that they would themselves see to it that the town should pass into Bulgarian hands. The other Allies had obtained all that they required, and there was no mention in the Treaty, implicit or explicit, of Adrianople or Thrace,^ both of which by race are predominantly Greco-Turkish, yet they loyally continued the war. The action of Bulgaria appears to be the more self-willed as she now declares that Thrace is of only secondary interest to her and not worth bothering about. If that attitude represents her real opinion, then her action in 1913 becomes almost incredibly foolish. It has been a matter of dispute as to when Serbia first made known her desire for the modification of the Treaty. So far as Russia was concerned she was informed in December 1912, as appears from a dispatch of M. Sazonov to M. Hartwig, Russian Minister at Belgrade, under date December 16, 1912, in which the former states : — "Dans la conversation qu'il a eue avec notre ambassa- deur h, Paris, M. Novakovitch lui a dit qu'en cas d'un refus des grandes puissances de lui laisser en propriet6 ' "Now when in the month of May ... we have got an enviable part of Thrace which we did not hope to get ".—Speech of Dr. Genadiev May 22, 1914, referring to the position the previous year. 2U THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS souveraine un port de I'Adriatique, la Serbie sera contrainte de demander des compensations en Macedoine, au del^ des fronti^res fixees dans le traits serbo-bulgare ".^ He added that he could give no support. At Paris also M. Danev learnt that Serbia would ask for a rectifi- cation of the Macedonian delimitation. The Bulgarians, unable to make sufficient progress in front of Adrianople, asked Serbia for help. It has been suggested ^ that Serbia did not at this juncture demand an alteration in the Macedonian terms of the Treaty. I am in a position to set that right. Serbia replied that she was sending forward two divisions, 50,000 men, with practically the whole of her siege artillery, but in view of the altered circumstances must demand compensation. This compensa- tion, of course, could only be had in Macedonia. Bulgaria tacitly accepted the aid, but made no reply to the note. The last point for consideration is the situation that immediately preceded the outbreak of war between the former Allies, and the attendant negotiations. Bulgaria claimed practically the whole of Macedonia in virtue of the Treaty with Serbia ; Thrace she claimed in virtue of con- quest ; Kavala by occupation and as a commercial outlet ; and finally Salonica, which was not hers by treaty nor nationality nor conquest, because she wanted it. To the last-named port she had early asserted her claims. On December 15, 1912, M. Isvolski reported from Paris to M. Sazonov, inter alia : — " A une question que je lui posais sur les difficultes k prevoir a ce sujet [division of territory] M. Danef repondit que la Bulgarie en aucun cas at k aucun prix n'abandonnera la ville de Salonique et me pria de porter k votre connaissance que c'etait une question de vie ou de mort pour la Bulgarie et que le gouvernement bulgare ne pouvait consentir k la soumettre a I'arbitrage ". 3 ' Vide Russian Orange Book, Becueil de documents di^lomatique$ concernant les evenements des Balkans. • Mr. Frank Fox, Bulgaria's Attitude, Fortnightly Beview, March 1915, p. 488. 3 Yide Russian Orange Book, ut au^ra. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 215 Easily recognizable here is the inflexible temperament and brusquerie of the minister who — in so far as he was not the agent of others — has to bear so large a responsibility for the misfortunes of his country. Bulgaria had not conquered Salonica, her troops were only there e;i droit d'allies, and yet before any negotiations have been entered upon she demands the town, while asserting in advance that she will not submit the matter to arbitration. Later on Bulgaria refused a general arbitration on the matters in dispute with Serbia on the ground that the Treaty provided only for specific arbitration on a particular point, but this predetermined refusal of arbitration on a point not covered by any treaty throws doubt on the bona fides of her plea in the other case : evidently she preferred to "hack her way through". Wherever, then, Bulgaria could advance a plea of treaty or nationality or conquest, that particular plea was advanced, and where such pleas were wanting she fell back upon her desires backed by force. When to this general attitude is added the oft-repeated boast that the Bulgars were the Prussians of the Balkans (a boast not without elements of justifica- tion), it is no wonder that Serbia and Greece took alarm, and asked themselves whether they were cast for the parts of Bavaria and Wurtemberg. Evidently they were face to face with the design of a Bulgarian Balkan Empire. The occupation of the whole of Macedonia by Bulgaria coupled with a return to an Austrophil attitude on her part, as indicated by various symptoms, would mean absolute ruin for Serbia. Serbia was willing to submit the whole Treaty to the arbitration of the Tsar, not the delimitation clause only.^ * Article II of the Secret Annexe to the Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty contains the " delimitation clause " and provides for the arbitrations of the Tsar within the limits contained therein. Article IV, however, is a general arbitration clause providing for the definite submission to Russia of every dispute which might arise concerning the inter- pretation or execution of any stipulation of the Treaty, the Secret Annexe, or the Military Convention. It would follow that a dispute solely concerned with the delimitation pt territory would be decided 216 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Her plea was that the reciprocal obligations should be examined and the degree in which they had been ful- filled. Thus the non-fulfilment of Bulgarian aid in the Adriatic affair would carry with it a reconsideration of the delimitation agreed upon as consideration. Bulgaria, dominated by Austrian counsels, claimed her price though the consideration had not been forthcoming. Two methods of easing the crisis commended themselves to Russia : a partial demobilization and a meeting of the Balkan Premiers. On May 20, 1913, M. Sazonov proposed a reduction of forces to a third or a quarter — a proposition which a little later, on the initiative of Russia, was adopted by the conference of Ambassadors in London, and on May 31 Petrograd was able to announce that the pro- posal had been accepted. Bulgaria, however, adopted an equivocal attitude, and on June 7 M. Sazonov in- tructed M. Nekliudov to put the pointed question to Bulgaria : — *' d'ou vient maintenant le retard de la Bulgarie a proceder k cette mesure simultanement avec les allies. Cette pro- position nous a ete formulee par la Bulgarie, qui, a ce qu'il parait, evite maintenant de la remplir, ainsi que by the arbitration provided for by Article II and within the limits of that Article. If, however, the dispute were concerned with the whole question of the applicability of Article II, with its proposed delimitation of territory and the specific arbitration provided in that regard, to the changed circumstances then such dispute would fall under the general Arbitration clause of Article IV being a matter concerning the stipulations of Article II of the Secret Annexe. Russia would thus have to decide first on this latter dispute. It was for the arbitra- tion under Article IV that the Serbs stipulated, the Bulgars for the specific arbitration of Article II. The text of these conventions with a full discussion will be found in " Balkanicus ", The Aspirations of Bulgaria. The Bulgarian case is given by Dr. Gesov in The Balkan Alliance. The demand of the Serbs was justified by the text of Article IV, for otherwise the subject-matter of Article II (the delimita- tion and specific arbitration) would have been expressly excluded from the purview of the general arbitration provided for by Article IV. The matter in dispute was the applicability of Article II in toto to the changed circumstances, and that would certainly seem to be fit matter for the general arbitration proposed by Article IV. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 217 de prendre part a I'entrevue des quatre presidents du conseil a Salonique". The Bulgarians made conditions of a joint occupation of Macedonia, and the proposal fell through, although again directly advanced by Serbia. The second measure proposed by Kussia was a meeting of the Premiers. It is incorrect to represent Russia as stiffening the attitude of Serbia or as lukewarm in the cause of peace. "While Count Tisza was championing the right of the Balkan States to engage in internecine war, Russia strove for peace in every way and was ready to approve of anything that would tend towards securing it. In April M. Nekliudov reported the warlike feeling in Sofia, and added that M. GeSov was evidently powerless to control events. On the 22nd of that month the Russian Foreign Minister proposed a meeting of the Balkan Premiers, but was informed from Sofia that the idea found no sympathy there. Throughout Bulgaria was opposed to a round-table conference, since her object was, after obtaining a settlement of the dispute with Serbia, to be left face to face with Greece. Russia, while advo- cating a general reliance on the Treaty, was in favour of reasonable concessions by Bulgaria as being likely to contribute to the solidity of the alliance. She naturally had no liking for the invidious task of arbitration which M. Sazonov confessed would be tres pSiiible for her, and she therefore welcomed the meeting between the Serb and Bulgar Premiers and counselled a meeting with M. Venizelos also. In the event of these meetings proving fruitless, she would welcome the Premiers to Petrograd. Time pressed, and the idea of a general preliminary meeting was abandoned, and Russia asked for a meeting in her capital, which M. Pa§ic considered more likely to lead to the desired end. Bulgaria again adopted an equivocal attitude : she was willing to accede to the idea if her point of view were adopted previously, to which the Russian Minister replied that if all the matters in dispute were cleared up beforehand there would 218 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAYS obviously be no need for the meeting itself. On June 17, ten days after the Tsar's telegram, he wrote to M. Nekliudov : — " Nous insistons done pour obtenir de M. Danef la reponse la plus prompte : desire-t-il, oui ou non, venir a S. Petersbourg " ? Finally M. Danev caused M. Sazonov to be informed that the Bulgarian condition that the arbitration should be confined to the specific territorial stipulations of the Treaty was his last word. This was on June 25, and early on June 30 the Bulgarian attack was made. There has been printed ^ a private letter from the Bulgarian Minister to Russia, M. Bobcev to M. Todorov, the Bulgarian Finance Minister, which throws a vivid light on how the situation was regarded by the former. It is dated June 20, and in it occur the following words : — "... Le refus de notre premier ministre de se rendre ici a la conference produira le plus terrible, le pire effet. On le prendra comme une offense a I'Empereur lui-meme. Que la guerre doive avoir lieu ou non, j'estime que nous ne pouvons pas nous refuser a prendre part a la conference. . . . L'Empereur et la gouvernement sont decides a I'arbitrage conformement au traite et dans son cadre. . . . Que le premier ministre vienne ici et qu'il dise sa pensee ; mais qu'il vienne. . . . M. Delcasse . . . m'a dit, ' Gar- dez-vous des conseils secrets qu'on vous donne, car ils ne visent que les interets de leurs auteurs . . .' ". It was not for want of good advice that Bulgaria fell ; she had been warned by Russia of the Turkish and Roumanian dangers, and the result bore out the words of M. Sazonov that it was clear to him that Bulgaria was acting on the suggestion of others who were holding out hopes which would only lead to bitter disillusionment. The poignant words of the Bulgarian Minister passed unheeded. The nature of the Bulgarian attack is well known, as ' M. Yakchitch, La seconde guerre BalJcanique, La Revue Politique Internationale, April 1914. This article gives extracts from the Eussian Orange Book for which I am indebted. MACEDONIA: TREATY OF 1912 219 also General Savov's truly extraordinary reasons, that it was necessary to raise the moral of the troops and make them consider their ex-allies as enemies, to make the allies more conciliatory as a result of the " violent blows " that would be dealt to them, and to put Russian policy in face of the danger of a commencement of a war! The Bulgarians subsequently explained that they did not regard the attack as a beginning of war and were apparently astonished that their violent blows had failed in their conciliatory object.^ Even Serb forbearance was distorted into a confession of weakness by the Bulgarian command, which paid an unconscious tribute to their enemy's desire for peace. General Kova6ev, commanding the Fourth Bulgarian Army, in an order, No. 29, dated June 17, said : — " Our men must be told that the Greek and Serb soldiers, so courageous against defenceless populations, are only cowards whom our approach alone has terrified. . . . By allowing the various echelons of our army, at the moment of concentration, to pass before the front of the Serb troops without acting against them, our enemies have clearly shown their moral state, and the fear they have of measuring themselves against us. If it were otherwise, they would never have allowed our concentration to be effected without hindrance in conditions altogether unknown hitherto in history ". It is useless and harmful talk to hark back to the Treaty of 1912 as a basis of proposals. The Treaty is as dead as Jacob Marley, it belongs to conditions that are past, was entered upon by Serbia for a consideration not received and for motives no longer operative, and has finally been ruptured by Bulgaria's second declaration of war. It is true that as a result of the war she will obtain an Adriatic coast line, but that will not be thanks to Bulgaria, and the • The documentary evidence produced by "Balkanicus" in The Aspirations of Bulgaria proves conclusively that the treacherous Bulgarian attack had been deliberately prepared for by both the civil and military administrations. 220 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS former concessions can therefore no longer be in question. Before the war we recognized Germany's rights in the Bagdad railway, and were about to negotiate with her on the basis of recognizing further rights of German com- mercial exploitation in Asia Minor. Does any one suppose, however, that if successful we shall hand over the Bagdad railway to Germany and Asia Minor also for pacific pene- tration? Why then should we deal otherwise with the interests of our ally ? In both cases the war has funda- mentally altered the conditions of the problem. The same holds good of the otherwise well-founded claim of Germany to the possession of a colonial empire : we, I imagine, will not return South-West Africa, or German East Africa. If it be argued that the cases are differentiated on the ground that the principle of nationality is involved, and that Serbia in 1912 recognized the Bulgarian character of central Macedonia, that point has been dealt with above. CHAPTER VII THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA In the previous chapter the conflicting claims to Macedonia derived from the past history of the province and from its ethnographical characteristics have been examined, and the result was to establish the fact that in the Middle Ages there was no continuous Bulgarian rule over that country, but that it passed to Bulgar, to Greek, or to Serb, accord- ing to which of the three States was able at the moment to exercise supremacy in those regions, and that in fact from 1018 onwards the Bulgarians only held Macedonia for a period of fifty years on a liberal estimate, and assum- ing the Bulgarian character of the rule of the Asen family. It was seen, also, that the racial character of the people is indeterminate so far as central Macedonia is concerned, the inhabitants belonging to a primitive Slav stock without definite national consciousness and capable of being moulded into Serbs or Bulgars as each may be able to subject them to a generation of rule and schooling. The Treaty of 1912 was also considered in its inception, the motives which underlay the territorial distribution contained in it, and the events which led to the second Balkan war. It was observed that there was no implied recognition of the validity of Bulgarian ethnographical claims, but that the delimitation proposed was set forward as consideration for access to the Adriatic by Serbia, was in fact the price which Serbia was prepared to pay in order that she might make use of the opportunity which offered of securing her econo- mic emancipation. It remains now to be considered what 222 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS should be the line of policy to be pursued by the Allies in the present situation, in view of all that has passed, and having regard to the actual attitude of the different parties to the Allies and to the objects and aims pursued by them, account being duly taken of the facts established in the previous chapter. While, then, in view of the events of the last few months, it would seem that no question as to the future of Mace- donia can arise, seeing that Serbia has been for nearly two years a loyal ally in arms, and that she has been treacher- ously attacked by Bulgaria, who has thus become our enemy as well, yet, on the other hand, it is by no means certain that the disastrous course of sacrificing Serbia to Bulgaria has even yet been abandoned. So far our Balkan policy has had Bulgaria as its pivot, and our relations to Greece seem to have been based on the idea that if we could not win over Bulgaria to our side by any means, then we did not want any other Balkan ally — at any rate Greek aid, when proffered, was refused, and an attempt made to get Greece to cede to Bulgaria the Greek region of Kavala. There are still ^ a number of people in our midst who care more for the interests of our Bulgarian enemy than of our Serb ally, who continually urge a course of policy which should aim at buying Bulgarian support at the expense of Serb territory. More frequently such a course is urged on the specious ground of the necessity of securing a Balkan accord and a permanent settlement with which all the Balkan States will be satisfied. Thus Mr. J. L. Garvin, whom I do not include in the category just men- tioned, and whose talents, as I happen to know, are highly appreciated in Southern Slav circles, despite things which have wounded them, wrote as follows in the Observer of April 2, 1916: "Again, despite all that has happened, and all the iniquities of King Fox's policy in Bulgaria, the fundamental problem remains just what it was in 1912 — ' March 1917. In spite of Bulgarian engagements against Russian troops, we are still without a pronouncement on the official attitude of the Entente towards the Macedonian problem. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 223 to establish a system by which bearable relations between neighbouring peoples may be restored and racial hate may cease to be the master-passion of the Balkans. In grasp of this fact still lies the key to the creation of a Greater Serbia, which, with an enlarged Boumania, would rank high indeed, next to the leading Powers amongst the king- doms of the new Europe." This, perhaps, puts the argu- ment at its best, but it requires little consideration to see how weak is the case made out. It cannot be said that the Balkan problem remains what it was in 1912. Since then Bulgaria has twice stabbed her neighbour in the back, Bulgarian troops have overrun Serbia, and the Bulgarian authorities have sj'^stematically looted that unhappy country, while graver charges of massacre have been made on good evidence. To say that after all this the problem remains the same is to ignore facts as completely as if it were asserted that the European problem as a whole is the same now as four years ago. The cessation of racial hate is a thing to be desired in the Balkans as elsewhere, but that is not a political problem, but an unrealizable ideal in present circumstances. I have alluded more than once to the strange obsession which regards racial feeling as some- thing different in the Balkans to what it is elsewhere, which imagines that a little persuasion, a little diplomatic treatment, and some unexceptionable homilies will assuage those deep and dark human instincts which we do not imagine for a moment will be allayed easily in western Europe. Possibly it may be due to our own success in establishing good relations between different peoples in our own Empire, but reflection will show, though the topic cannot be pursued here, that the conditions are altogether different, both as to the peoples concerned, the nature of the problem, and the means to be employed. It is difficult to understand in what sense the key to the accomplishment of Southern Slav unity is to be found in unjust concessions to Bulgaria, unless it be meant that the latter are to be made a condition precedent for the former, a project of disloyal coercion that has unfortunately not been without 224 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS its upholders in a certain section of our publicists. While regard for the future will avoid imposing upon Bulgaria terms of peace which might seem a vindictive punishment for her past action, on the other hand, as any idea of Serbo-Bulgarian friendliness for many a long year is absolutely Utopian, we cannot impose upon Serbia conditions which have regard to considerations possessing no correspondence to reality. A question of honour is undoubtedly involved. Part, at any rate, of the prestige which we have enjoyed abroad in the past has been due to recognition of the fact that we have stood loyally by our allies. The honour of an English- man and of the English nation, the respect paid to an Enghshman's word, the feeling that an Englishman can always be relied upon, that he will never desert a friend in distress — these are a priceless heritage from the past. It has been very largely by means of such considerations that we have been able to build up our Empire at a cost so comparatively small ; they have stood us in good stead time and again. This honourable prestige is not a thing lightly to be thrown aside or impaired. Already we have gravely compromised our position in the Balkans by action which has appeared to be actuated by other motives. It cannot be denied that the suspicion with which we were regarded in Greece in October 1915 was largely due, not to the action which we were compelled to take upon Greek soil, but to our treatment of Serbia, for the Greeks felt that even alliance with England would not obviate demands opposed to their interests, just as a year's comradeship in arms did not save Serbia from exigences put forward on behalf of a State whose attitude was well known in the Balkans, and apparently to Sir Edward Grey, though not to Lord Crewe. I Such considerations reinforced others of ' " We did not originally assume that Bulgaria was, or need be, hostile to us in the first instance". — Lord Crewe in the House of Lords, October 14, 1915. " The German and Austrian sympathies of the King of the Bulgarians have always been known, and reports of Bulgarian negotiations with Turkey, under German influence, came from various Balkan sources as early as April". — Sir Edward Grey in the House of Commons, November 9, 1915. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 225 a more questionable nature in determining the Greek Government to repudiate its treaty obligations to its ally. The point of honour thus finds contact with considera- tions of policy. It is necessary that we should declare ourselves in unambiguous terms. On April 28, 1916, when Mr. E. M'Neill asked in the House of Commons for an assurance that Bulgaria should not be permitted to acquire territory at the expense of any people who had fought or might hereafter fight on the side of the Allies, Lord Eobert Cecil stated in reply that such a statement made without discussion with our Allies would be contrary to the declara- tion of September 5, 1914, by which each of the Allies was precluded from making a separate peace and from demanding conditions of peace without the consent of each of the others, and he did not think that at present any such discussion would be opportune. In plain English, he refused to give any assurance that Bulgaria would not be permitted to acquire any Serb territory until we had discussed the matter with our Allies, and he did not think that any such discussion would be opportune. At that date, therefore, we had not yet determined whether not to betray the interests of Serbia and refused to initiate a discussion of the matter with our Allies. Discussion with our Allies should certainly have been not merely inopportune but unnecessary, on the ground that as a matter of course we should stand by our friends. So long as the attitude disclosed in Lord Eobert Cecil's answer represents the policy of the British Government it is childish to expect Balkan neutrals to put any confidence in us. All the time, moreover, we fill the world with our contention that Germany is using her Balkan allies as mere pawns in the game and will be ready to sacrifice their interests to her convenience. We are giving great scope to our enemies to point out that their assertion is true that perfidious Albion is always ready to sacrifice those foolish nations who throw in their lot with her; nor, as will be seen, docs our attitude inspire either respect or gratitude in Bulgaria. If we give grounds for the belief that even now we are 15 226 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS prepared to sacrifice Serb interests the effect will be more than unfortunate. In brief, the impression produced would !be that to be allied with the Entente would not protect I national interests even in the case of success, since they /might be sacrificed to a rival and hostile Power, while, on the other hand, openly to join the Central Powers would not preclude the gaining of what is desired at the hands of the Entente itself. In short, to join the latter might bring disappointment in either event, while to side with the former would bring realization. The effect might, of course, be obviated if it were announced that this peculiar privilege is reserved to Bulgaria alone, but even such an announcement might induce undesirable reflection. Our aims should be to encourage our friends by unshakable loyalty, to win the confidence of neutrals by our transparent honesty, and to impress our enemies by the strength of our hostility, rather than to encourage our foes, depress our friends, and give pause to neutrals.^ It remains to consider how far there is any justification for the arguments which are derived from certain alleged tendencies among the Bulgarian people. It is asserted that we must not identify the nation with the policy of King Ferdinand, that a large section of it and of the political leaders are pro-Ententist and have been the objects of coercion, that they are only claiming their co-nationals according to their interpretation (which has been seen in the previous chapter to be in any case without justifica- tion), and that the Bulgarians are not imperialistic. These points can be elucidated with the help of the Bulgarians themselves by means of the notices of articles appearing in the Bulgarian Press, interviews granted by Bulgarian politicians, and signed communications, which in various ways have become known in England. A common assertion is that the Bulgarians are not united in sentiment, and that large sections both of the people and of the politicians are strongly opposed to the course adopted by King Ferdinand, are animated by friendly ' These words were written before the entry of Eoumania into the war. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 227 feelings towards the Entente, and are only awaiting tho first opportunity both to manifest their sentiments openly and to take action upon them. In this connection frequent allusion is made not only to Dr. Danev, the leader of the former Russophil party, but to M. Ge§ov, who is described as Bulgaria's " moderate " statesman and as being strongly pro-Ententist. Every scrap of news, every despatch from a neutral journalist, giving evidence of bad economic con- ditions in the country, is hailed as further proof of the correctness of these opinions and as being a sign that the day is fast approaching when Bulgaria will turn in her tracks, while an immediate response to any such move- ment is demanded by those who have always held by the Bulgarian legend. Conditions, we are told, are fast becoming unbearable, the Bulgarian army and people are deeply dissatisfied, and the end is not far off. That the economic conditions in Bulgaria have approximated to those of their allies is probably true enough, but that the natural dissatisfaction arising therefrom is a proof of change of purpose is pure hypothesis. Economic conditions in Serbia were long bad, but there was no consequent instability of purpose, and it would be foolish to expect anything different from the Bulgars. That Prussian arrogance is distasteful is also likely enough, but the Bulgarian official classes must have made their people so well acquainted with that particular quality that it is unlikely to produce any real revulsion of feeling, and after all it is only in a comparatively few places that it can be in evidence from the nature of things. There is not the slightest proof of any division of feeling among the Bulgarians ; on the contrary, all the evidence points the other way. The Bulgarian papers are full of abuse not only of Russia and the Russian Emperor but of the other two Powers of the Triple Entente as well, and they are equally insistent on the unanimity of Bulgarian feeling. On January 15, 1916, the Sofia Dnevnik gave some messages for the Orthodox New Year from prominent Bulgarian statesmen. Dr. Ge§ov, the " moderate," the 228 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS pro-Ententist, said that they were greeting the New Year with a Te Deum to the war and with praises to the Allliance. Dr. Danev, it is true, speaks of striving in ways commensurate with Bulgarian dignity and vital in- terests to facilitate the conclusion of peace. Dr. Genadiev, who has lately, according to report, been arrested, pleads for one effort more. At a later date Dr. Gegov, in an interview with the German Vossische Zeitung, stated that in Bulgarian home politics there was no opposition. Before the war his party had believed in Russia's strength, but as the opinion of Dr. Radoslavov had proved correct Bulgarian politicians could not do otherwise than acquiesce in the present state of affairs. Before the entry of Bulgaria into the war he had declined office not because he was in favour of joining the Entente Powers, but because he wanted a coalition government in order to preserve neutrality. On January 18 the Mir, which is M. GeSov's organ, remarked that the English and French still believed that the Balkan peoples were ready to go knife in hand against their rulers. They had been expecting a revolution in Bulgaria in the event of mobilization. Events had proved the fallacy of their opinion, and now they were believing the same thing of the Greeks. The Socialist leader, M. Sakazov, at the New Year remarked that Bulgaria's destiny was inseparably bound up with the destiny of the Central Powers. According to the Frank- furter Zeitung of January 3 the Democrat M. LiapSev said that no one would hinder the government, and that what had been undertaken must be successfully finished. The Dnevnik, on January 24, alluded to the report which had appeared in the Daily Telegraph of dissatisfaction with King Ferdinand, and in the Daily Neios of friction between the Bulgarians and the Austro-Germans, and repudiated their accuracy, its own explanation of their appearance being the alleged dissatisfaction in England over the in- troduction of compulsory service, an explanation which perhaps serves to point out the need of caution in accept- ing news of similar character from abroad; probably all THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 229 the belligerents are apt to lay too much stress on reports of bad internal conditions in enemy countries. M. Malinov, who, as well as M. Genadiev, is said to have been arrested, in the debate in the Sobranje on February 28 on the speech from the throne is reported in a Sofia message to the Berliner Tagehlatt to have delivered a speech which was distinctly hostile in its general tenor to the govern- ment, but in which he, nevertheless, alluded to the omis- sion in the royal speech of any allusion to Russia, saying that in his opinion Russia in the bombardment of Varna had acted no less disgracefully than England and France in Salonica. It is needless to add that the members of the Bulgarian ministry and the government organs have been equally emphatic in their assertion of Bulgarian unanimity. The statement frequently made that the Bulgarians are after all merely seeking the satisfaction of legitimate national claims, besides being negatived by the rejection of the offers made by the Entente, which included a large area of territory which the Serbs have always claimed as part of the national heritage, as has been seen above, and to which any claim of definite Bulgarian nationality is not borne out by independent testimony, is further shown to be baseless by the extravagant claims on the score of nationality now put forward by the Bulgarians. Thus on December 27 the Mir, the organ of the moderate Dr. Ge§ov, remarked that the Bulgarians had not joined in the war to conquer foreign territories but to unite their sons of one blood and one faith. At Zajecar and Pirot, at Nis and Leskovac, at Skoplje, Kumanovo, Veles, Prilip, Monastir, Ochrida, Debar, and Ki6evo beat the Bulgarian heart and lived the sons of the Bulgarian people. It is no longer then a question of a Bulgarian Macedonia, but apparently of a Bulgarian Serbia as well ! It is not sur- prising therefore to find the Narodni Prava, Dr. Rado- slavov's organ, taking up the same line of thought in an article published on February 4, and dealing with a debate in the Sobranje on the government bill establishing 230 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Bulgarian schools in the occupied territories. Some members, to their honour, had spoken in deprecation of a policy of denationalization. The paper remarked that even if Bulgaria were anxious to denationalize anybody it had no scope for such a propensity. Whom was the State to denationalize in Macedonia or the Morava Valley? The Bulgars perhaps? If any Serbs were living in Pirot, Vranja, or Zajecar they would not be denationalized by Bulgaria, but only so far as by living in the midst of a compact Bulgarian population they would forget their Serbomania. On the two following days the same paper published letters from a " soldier-schoolmaster ", a certain Dr. D., alluding to the manner in which the inhabitants of Ni§ quickly pick up their old mother-tongue [the two languages are mutually intelligible and a large part of the vocabulary is practically identical], and advocating the estabhshment of schools as the best agency for the propa- gation of the Bulgarian tongue among a population which still believed in the return of the Serb government. When, however, a train was fired on near Sveta Petka, to the north-west of Nis, the paper quickly discovered the presence of Serbs, and alluded to the incident on January 22 as a manifestation of the impotent malevolence of Serb chauvinism in extremis, and it advocated severe measures against the Serb population — which on other occasions does not exist, being replaced by a people with a Bulgarian heart. It demanded less tolerance and more severity ! Decidedly the Bulgarian appetite grows with satisfaction when all eastern Serbia, including the Morava Valley, is claimed as a genuine Bulgarian land. The claim is of interest, however, for other reasons to be alluded to below. In curious contradiction to some of these claims is an article by Dr. Boris Vazov, a member of Dr. GeSov's party, in the Mir of January 16, in which he paid a tribute to the work of the Serb government and scientific and literary societies in the publication of excellent periodicals and of a scientific popular library. The Bulgarians had neglected their language. In Bulgaria not a single serious literary THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 231 publication could last, there was not a Bulgarian grammar [presumably a scientific grammar of the language], nor an adequate dictionary. All this implies a contradiction of the extreme national claims of his countrymen. In spite of all, therefore, a policy of Bulgarization is needed, and Dr. Vazov calls for it. He avowed frankly that the struggle was one between the two languages, and victory for Bulgaria would only be complete when Bulgarian should predominate in the Balkans. In the occupied territories he said that soldiers and officials were struggling to speak Serb with the population [the sons of the Bulgarian people with the Bulgarian heart] , which was a great mistake. In the same style on January 26, Dr. GeSov's paper, the Mir, said in a leading article that the school was the only means of uniting the population of the new territory to that of the old, and the Ministry of Instruction was deserving of praise for its bill for the establishment of schools in the conquered territory. All this sheds a valuable light on Bulgarian claims in Macedonia. We find the Bulgars, in the first place, not less insistent in claiming all eastern Serbia as a true Bulgarian land than they have been in the past in making a similar claim to the former province, a claim which by ceaseless repetition had come largely to be accepted abroad. The worthlessness of the claim in the one case, to say the least casts doubts upon its value in the other quite apart from other considerations, and it ought now to be clear to every one that a Bulgarian claim is not to be regarded as justified merely because Bulgarian chauvinists repeat it ad nauseam. It has been remarked above that originally the population of the Ni§ district of Serbia and of the Sofia district in Bulgaria was of the same indeterminate character as the present population of Macedonia, though now the political boundary has become a genuinely national one. In the pretensions which the Bulgarians are now putting forward we have an undesigned corroboration of the truth of this. It may be agreed that it has been Serb rule and Serb schools which have made the 232 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Nig-Pirot region definitely Serb, but the Bulgarians forget that it has been equally Bulgarian rule and Bulgarian schools which have determined the final character of the Sofia basin. The corollary of the renewal of the Bulgarian claim to Nig would be a revived Serb claim to Sofia and the one is no more absurd and unwarranted than the other. Here at any rate, and this is the second point which emerges from this riotous chauvinism, we have an acknowledgment that the schools have influenced, and definitely crystallized, the national consciousness of the population, though it]|may well be doubted whether, once definitely roused and formulated, that consciousness could ever be induced to flow into another channel. If the Bulgarians grudgingly acknowledge that the Serb schools have had this influence on a population which they seek to claim as Bulgar (with- out any justification whatever, for it was never Bulgar but only amorphous) , and if they even go so far as to imagine that it could be Bulgarized by the establishment of Bulgarian schools, what then becomes of the contention that the population of central Macedonia, which practically every impartial authority regards as being of an intermediate type, is so definitely Bulgarian that it should be assigned to Bulgaria and that it is incapable of being permanently acted upon by Serb influences ? If the Bulgarian con- tentions be taken at their face value, if they really believe, as they affect to believe, that Ni§ can be Bulgarized, as according to them it has been previously Serbized, then a fortiori central Macedonia even if, as they also assert, of Bulgarian character is capable of yielding to Serb assimila- tion. In short, Bulgarian chauvinists in their frenzied eagerness to claim everything for their country have, accepting their own position, knocked the bottom out of Bulgaria's Macedonian claims. The real truth is that whatever may have been the case in the past. Nig is now finally Serb as Sofia is finally Bulgarian, and that the central Macedonians are of an intermediate type which a generation of Serb rule will make as permanently Serb as a generation of Bulgarian rule would make them Bui- THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 233 garian. Finally, we have in the above manifestations of Bulgarian policy abundant evidence of a definite desire and plan to attempt the forcible Bulgarization of a large part of Serbia, v^hich forms an illuminating commentary on the assertion that the Bulgarians value the principle of nationality and are themselves struggling for it. They stand self-confessed as striving for their own racial pre- dominance at the expense of an ancient nationality with a history greater than their own and much more fertile in cultural advancement. Not only do the Bulgarians desire to Bulgarize part of Serbia, but they seek the final and entire destruction of that State. The Berliner Tagehlatt of January 30 gives an interview which its Sofia correspondent had had with Dr. Radoslavov, in the course of which he said that Serbia had played out its role for ever and that Austria-Hungary would of course retain what it needed in order to obviate the dangers by which she had been threatened. In the same way on January 7 the Vossische Zeitung reprinted part of a conversation between Dr. Mom6ilov, the Vice- President of the Sobranje, and the representative of the Hungarian paper Az-Est, in which the former remarked : " Ceterum censeo Serbiam esse delendam ". The Bul- garians who have filled the world with their clamour for the accomplishment of their national unity, as they in- terpret it, are determined so far as they can to prevent the consummation of the unity of the Southern Slavs, and in striving against it they cynically admit their jealousy and anger at the idea that there should be a Balkan State larger, more populous, and more powerful than Bulgaria. In the Westminster Gazette of November 17, 1915, will be found a lengthy extract from an inter- view granted to a German paper by M. Kizov, the Bulgarian Minister in Berlin, in which he asserts that a governing motive for the Bulgarians was to prevent Serbo- Croat unity, since if the Southern Slavs were united they would be more powerful than the Bulgarians. It is thus not national rights that the latter desire but their own pre- 234 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS dominance/ and as they are not numerous enough to achieve that predominance if others are given the liberty of full development, they must be thv^arted, divided, left weak, and have their territory partitioned in order that Bulgaria may realize her ambition of being the mistress of the Balkans ; it is the Prussian spirit exactly reproduced in this people which its admirers are always telling us is a peaceful, non-imperialist, peasant democracy. The idea has been expressed with characteristic coarseness and brutality by the Narodni Prava, the government organ, on October 17, 1915, within a week of the declaration of war. In the course of an article on Bulgarian aims it underlined a passage in which it was asserted that the Serbs had taken the lives of the Austrian heir and heiress in order to realize their impracticable chauvinist designs. The foolish Serb government, said the article, expected to unite to Serbia fifteen millions of Slavs, and the Bulgarians did not admit the idea that Serbia should be united to those Serbs, therefore the Southern Slav slaves must be joined by the Serbs from the free kingdom of Serbia in the Austro-Hungarian cage. On May 19, 1916, the same paper published a leading article under the title ** Generosity at the Conclusion of Peace", in which it says : — "Very soon the Bulgarian diplomats will have to speak at the general peace conference, which will bring about the liquidation of the present war. They will have to demon- strate and theoretically prove the Bulgarian claims which have already been fully established by the force of our arms. The question of Serbia's future and our relations with the neighbouring States, etc., will all have to be discussed and definitely formulated. In these matters, especially in regarded to the question of the future of our real enemy — ' Bulgarian publicists have never made any secret of the fact that the aim of Bulgaria is to establish a Bulgarian hegemony in the Balkans. The other main motive avowed during the last two years is opposition to the establishment of Russia in Constantinople. The two motives are of course correlative. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 235 Serbia — our diplomats will have to be circumspect, and most important of all they will have to be strictly in- exorable. In this question our diplomats will have to lay aside all sentiment, all humane consideration and feeling. The continued existence of Serbia, no matter in what form, means the subversion of all peace in the Balkans, constant quarrels, and conflicts between Bulgaria and other nations, and a permanent obstacle to the prosperity and peaceful development of Europe. That State, which since the beginning ot its independent existence has been a breeding-place of dissension and strife, must be wiped from off the face of the earth, in order to establish an understanding for peaceable cultural work in other nations of Europe and the Balkans. This is neither malice nor barbarity on our part. It is one of the main necessities for the future of humanity, and principally for ourselves and our neighbours. To this question it is most suitable to apply the words of the German political genius, Bismarck, spoken by him on the night from the 1st to the 2nd of September, when the conditions for the sur- render at Sedan and the rounding-up of the French army there were being discussed. Only the brutality of the Iron Chancellor in face of the entreaties of the French secured peace and prosperity to Germany for forty-three years. The relations between Germany and her western neighbour are similar to those between Bul- garia and Serbia. That is why it is the bounden duty of our diplomats to take to heart Bismarck's motto : ' No generosity at the conclusion of peace'". This is the people for whom there are still to be found intriguers in our midst, a people which has never as a nation evinced gratitude for the benefits it has received, and is now actuated by a deadly malice against its neighbour. It is no wonder that the campaign has been waged by the Bulgarians with such ferocity, if such be the ideas by which they are animated. We find here an ex- planation of the systematic looting of the Serb libraries, of the carrying off to Bulgaria all the movable property 236 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS which is desired by the government for utilization in its own country, of the theft of agricultural machinery supplied to the Serb peasantry in the manner described in a previous chapter, of, worse than all, the massacres, of which there can be little doubt that they have been guilty. I well remember how in October 1915 a young Serb diplomatist, in conversation with me, with difficulty restrained his emotion as he said, " What we fear is that the Bulgarians will exterminate the population in the districts they enter". On the evidence of German wit- nesses, officers, pastors, and women, backed by documents and photographs, Professor Schiemann had branded Bul- garia's methods of war in 1912-13 as " a disgrace to humanity ", and it is hardly likely with Germany's example before them, and against the Serbs, that the methods of the Bulgarians have become more humane even though they might now obtain a more lenient judgment from the Germans. The Bulgarians do not evince that gratitude towards those in England who have upheld their cause which might have been expected. Sir Edward Grey's efforts on their behalf, and the manner in which during 1915 our Foreign Office subordinated the interests of Serbia to the exigences of Bulgaria and her demand for blackmail, should have earned for him at any rate a measure of appreciation. Those, however, who sacrifice their friends to their enemies while they shake the confidence of the former rarely earn the gratitude, still less the respect, of the latter, who are apt to despise those whom they dupe and of whom they make use. On December 5, 1915, for example, iheNarodni Prava published a derisive article, " The bargainings of the bankrupts," directed against the British Premier and Foreign Secretary. England is represented as partition- ing the territories of others in order to bring in the neutrals, as increasing her offers when they prove unsuc- cessful, and when even the increased offers prove to be of no avail, as reducing them to a minimum again. It can hardly be denied that there is a certain painful accuracy THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 237 in this summing up of one aspect of our Balkan policy, and it is exemplified in our dealings with Bulgaria and Greece. The article deals with special severity with the famous promise of aid given, as all the world believed at the time, to Serbia, but afterwards explained away as a promise to Greece if she fulfilled her treaty, and with the Foreign Secretary's explanation that his words " without reserve and without qualification " were a " political " promise, and meant merely that Serbia and Greece would not be required to yield territory to Bulgaria — if the latter attacked them ! ' The Narodni Prava represents the Ministers as losing their heads, as making declarations only to deny them, of declaring to-day that they will help Serbia and to-morrow hastening to explain that it was only a " political " promise ; they have become, it says, ' The pertinent passages are as follows : " Not only is there no hostility in this country to Bulgaria, but there is traditionally a warm feeling of sympathy for the Bulgarian people. ... If, on the other hand, the Bulgarian mobilization were to result in Bulgaria assuming an aggressive attitude on the side of our enemies we are prepared to give our friends in the Balkans all the support in our power in the manner that would be most welcome to them, in concert with our Allies without reserve and without qualification ". — Sir Edward Grey, in the House of Commons, September 28, 1915. This promise seemed as explicit and categorical as it well could be, but it was subsequently evacuated of all intelligible meaning. " On September 24, when I first informed the Serbian government, in answer to an appeal for help, of the despatch of troops, I did so in the words that ' we were offering to Greece to send forces to Salonica to help her to fulfil her obligations towards Serbia ', I said nothing as to what we could, or could not, do in the contingency of Greece refusing to help Serbia. ... As regards the last part of the question, I do not understand how the words ' without qualification and without reserve ' could have any other construction than the political one I have placed on them, viz. that promises and concessions previously suggested to Bulgaria were at an end, and that our troops would be used solely to help our friends and fight our and their enemies ".—Sir Edward Grey, in the House of Commons, November 9, 1915, in answer to Mr. Ronald M'Neill. It surely hardly needed a formal undertaking for people to understand that our troops would only help our friends and fight our enemies I Even so the British ministry endeavoured to get out of its undertaking, and the troops at first were forbidden to cross the Serb frontier. 238 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS a mock with their theories on political and non-political promises. From Bulgaria that is indeed black ingratitude, however appropriate such words might seem in the mouth of an Englishman, not to say a Serb. It is, after all, only another exemplification of the old truth that to stand firm by your friends is the only way by which to gain the respect even of enemies. That Bulgaria in certain eventualities would be willing to cut her losses by abandoning her present allies is highly probable. Her past policy shows that she would not be deterred by any scruples of honour or plain dealing, and it is fairly evident that the possibility of another act of betrayal has by no means been lost sight of by her rulers. Just as the Hungarians have endeavoured to make use of the English Press, ^ so from Bulgaria there has been in the past the pretence of an existence of a pro-Entente party, so that if ever a change become advisable the plea might be put forward that the Bulgarian nation was not behind King Ferdinand's betrayal of the Slav cause and should not be punished for his mistakes. As has been seen above, that is no more than a pretence in view of the expressed opinions of the so-called pro-Entente leaders. It is very noteworthy that in the discussions which were alleged to have taken place between the Bulgarian and German authorities the former were stated to have pointed out that they have gained their end in the war, and that if further efforts were required further rewards must be promised. What is the assumption underlying this ' Letters from Hungary, if genuine, pass the Hungarian censor in spite of the fact that they are full of diatribes against Count Tisza. Cui bono ? To whose advantage was it that the combined attack upon Serbia was described as bluff up to the last moment ? To whose advantage that the old fallacy of regarding all "Hungarians" as Magyars should still be maintained ? To whose advantage that it should be set forth week by week that the heart of the Magyars is not in the war ? It has been the frenzied chauvinism of the Magyars and their gross misgovernment that has been largely responsible for years for some of the most sinister aspects of the Near Eastern problem. The only reasonable explanation is that the Hungarian government wishes not to be without sympathizers in the Entente camp. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 239 attitude? Prima facie it would seem that Bulgaria's Macedonian ends cannot be considered as attained until the final victory of the Central Powers, and that Bulgaria must go on on pain of losing what she has so far won. The underlying assumption is obviously this, that it is open to Bulgaria at any time to make her peace with the Entente on terms that she should be allowed to retain Macedonia, for only on that assumption could Bulgaria maintain that her ends have been secured and that fresh efforts cannot be required of her. This idea has been fostered in England by those who always stand by Bulgaria. In certain sections of our Press it was frequently pointed out last winter that Bulgaria had won what she was fighting for, and would probably be henceforth lukewarm in the Germanic cause. Again, the assumption is a bargain by which Bulgaria should be allowed to keep at any rate her Macedonian conquests, a bargain which would be dis- honouring in the last degree to any statesman of the Entente who should entertain the idea of entering into it — more dishonouring to him than to the Bulgarian states- man who after betraying one side (by dishonest negotiation) should afterwards betray the other. It is inconceivable after all that has happened — or it should be inconceivable — that such a bargain should be struck. Encouragement was unfortunately given to such ideas in the mind of the Bulgarians by a passage in the interview accorded by M. Sazanov to M. Naudeau, the special correspondent of the Paris Journal, which was telegraphed to England on October 5, 1915 : " That people, the Bulgarian people, Eussia created it and cared for it in its trouble. Further, however great msbj be its errors, maternal Russia will never cast off its child ; she will always be ready to open her arms to it." These words were a direct encouragement to the Bulgarians to hold fast by the idea that whatever they may do, however grievously they may sin against their benefactors, however great their treachery, they have only in the event of the failure of their plans to cry peccavimus to be received again into the arms of Russia and to escape 240 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS the consequences of their deeds, or even to receive as a reward for their penitence what they had sought by their wrong-doing. It is fairly certain that they are reckoning on the sentimentaHty of the AlHes. There is a story, the authenticity of which is guaranteed by those from whom it emanates, that a Sofia soHcitor, one Ivan Dimitrov, had been staying for some time till the early part of last year in Geneva, and represented himself as an ex-secretary in the Sofia Ministry of the Interior and a personal friend of King Ferdinand. A Belgrade merchant, also staying in Geneva, reproached him for the fact that Bulgaria had attacked Serbia at the moment when Serbia had yielded to her demands. After saying that Bulgaria was bound to join the Central Powers in order to prevent Russia coming to the Dardanelles and to prevent Serbia from becoming larger, which two things the Bulgars must im- peratively hinder, he replied to a question as to what the Bulgars would do in the event of the Allies winning the war, "We will cut off the heads of Ferdinand and Eado- slavov, and afterwards we will go to Petrograd, and fall on our knees in front of the Tsar asking his mercy. Russia will be moved with compassion, and nothing will happen to us ".I Without demanding that anything special should " happen to " the Bulgars, at the very least we should see to it that they should not be allowed to retain their spoils of war.2 We have to remember what would be the position of Serbia if the statement made by the Allies just previous to ' The new Russian Foreign Minister, M. Miljukov, was at one time a professor in Sofia, and is a very strong Bulgarophil. His expression of Bulgarophil feelings in the French Press during his visit to France and Switzerland last autumn gave rise to some feeling in Southern Slav circles. — Vide La Serbie, September 17, 1916. It is to be hoped that this obsession will find no place in his oflBcial policy : we have suffered more than sufficient losses owing to our persistent Bulgarophilism. ' The manner in which the Bulgars have fought against the Russians ought surely to have destroyed the last illusions on the subject of this people, which demonstratively denies its Slav character, and claims, with justice, to be of Turanian stock and congeners of the Turks and Magyars. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 241 the Bulgarian attack that the offers previously made to Bulgaria had lapsed were to be treated as a scrap of paper and if those offers were to be renewed. The result of the Dalmatian agreement is that Salonica remains for Serbia of practically undiminished importance as giving her a commercial backdoor free of Italian domination, a point the importance of which has been brought out by the analysis given above of the effect of that agreement upon Serbia's future maritime position. The line of the Vardar, which connects her with Salonica, will assume an even greater importance if certain canalization schemes mature. English engineers are already studying the project of making the Vardar and Morava rivers navigable and connecting them by a canal through the relatively easy waterparting which divides their head-streams. Such a canal system would unite Salonica by water-carriage with the Danube and the central European canals connected with it. The great importance of such a project is obvious. If central Macedonia be given to Bulgaria, then the latter will march with the frontier of Albania, which is apparently destined to become an Italian protectorate, and in any case will be in close contact with the district of Valona. As has been seen, on the Adriatic a small stretch of coast from Dubrovnik downwards will be in Serb possession, but above that the coast will be commanded by the Italian islands till at Trogir commences Italian Dalmatia. Northward, again, the Croatian coasts will be commanded by the Italian islands in the Quarnero, which link Italian Dalmatia to Istria. It is obvious, therefore, that Serbia would be entirely cut off from Greece, and could be held tight in an Italo-Bulgarian vice which would render her inde- pendence precarious unless she relied upon some stronger Power. The Powers of the Triple Entente would be even more badly circumstanced from the point of view of render- ing aid than they are at present, for the lines from Salonica to Skoplje and to Monastir would pass through Bulgarian territory ; in fact, they could render no direct assistance of any description. North of the Drave, again, would be 16 242 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS Hungary, which for some time, at any rate, would be sore at the losses sustained in an unfavourable issue of the war, and only by two narrow necks of land, north-eastward through Roumania and north-westward through German Austria, could Serbia communicate with the rest of Europe. It would, in fact, be difficult to devise any means more calculated to throw Serbia into the arms of Germany, as the only Power which could render direct assistance to her if assailed by a hostile coaHtion, than the surrender of central Macedonia to Bulgaria, apart altogether from the sentimental and psychological reaction of such a loss. The position of the Southern Slavs will in any case be difficult, as they will be almost surrounded by States which have either lost territory as the result of Southern Slav uni- fication, or are jealous at the prospect of the rise of an important Jugoslav State, and if they are to be altogether cut off from the outside world save through Roumania and Germany, the effect may be such as largely to nullify some of the gains to Europe of a successful result of the war. It is not a mere question of pique or of cutting off the nose to spite the face, but a question of the political results which may follow from the hard facts of political geography. To go to war in order, inter alia, that the Germanic Powers should not completely absorb the Southern Slavs, and to impose terms of peace which might force the latter into the arms of Germany, would indeed be an act of supreme folly. At the moment of writing it is of immediate importance that an unequivocal assurance should be given to the Serbs. Is it really seriously proposed that the Serbs should be asked in conjunction with the Allies to conquer Macedonia, already twice acquired by them at the cost of great bloodshed, only in order that when conquered again it should be handed over to Bulgaria? Doubtless these questions have been asked at the recent conferences by the statesmen of Serbia, who would hardly receive with equanimity any suggestion that they should act as a catspaw to pull the chestnuts out of the fire for Bulgaria. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 243 The various phases of the problem of Macedonia and the settlement with Bulgaria have now been passed in review, and the conclusions to be drawn from this study are obvious enough. There is no evidence that the Bulgarians are not in substantial accord on the policy that has been pursued by their government ; it has been seen that the so-called pro-Ententist M. Gesov has him- self proclaimed this accord and acclaimed the alliance with the Central Powers. So far are the Bulgarians from fighting merely for the claims of nationality that we find them extending these claims to a large area of the old territory of the modern kingdom of Serbia, and again it has been seen that M. GeSov endorses these claims. We find that the Bulgars are pursuing a policy of aggressive imperialism, and are entering upon a campaign of forcible Bulgarization directed against undubitable Serbs. We find the open avowal that they will not permit the union of the Southern Slavs if they can help it, that they are aiming at the complete and permanent destruction of Serbia, that they assert the necessity of Bulgarian predominance in the Balkans, and that it is in fact for the hegemony of the peninsula for which they are struggling. No plea can, therefore, be made out for a special treament of Bulgaria on any of the grounds which have been brought forward by their special friends in this country, or for sharply differentiating their case from that of our other enemies. On every ground alike of honour and policy we are bound to stand by Serbia, our Balkan ally. Though the Balkan crisis was the occasion and not the cause of the war, yet the advance of the Germanic Powers in the Balkans was one of the prime gains which those Powers sought to harvest as the result of the war. Indeed, supposing it to be conceivable that a peace should be patched up by which the Central Empires should be forced to relinquish their gains in the east and west, and to retain their present position in the Near East, their statesmen would probably consider that the war had been well worth while. The 244 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS cause of Serbia, therefore, forms an integral part of the general cause of the Allies, and interest no less than mihtary and poHtical honour demands that that cause should enjoy our full support. No State, not even Belgium, has suffered more in the general struggle, and it is known now, though not at the commencement of hostilities, that the aggres- sion upon Serbia was as deliberate and unprovoked as the attack upon Belgium : this has been determined definitely apart from all arguments drawn from pohtical study by the revelation of Signer Giolitti. That war has been loyally waged by Serbia, which has refused to accept a separate peace even at the time when she was being left to face alone the great attack which was to break down her resistance in the field. It cannot candidly be said that she has during the war received that support and recognition, or even at times sympathy, which as a faithful ally she had a right to expect, apart from the fact that her cause, as will be seen later, is in every sense the cause of England as of France and Russia. It is now coming to be recognized, though even yet only slowly, that a well-nigh fatal mistake was made when she was left to face the double attack alone. It was the Serb army which was acting as a flank guard to our Gallipoli enterprise, and which was, in effect, shield- ing Egypt. This became apparent when that army was forced to yield its ground and to evacuate its territory ; the Gallipoli expedition had to be withdrawn, the Turks in Mesopotamia, with renewed supplies, were able to make head against our army,^ and Egypt was so far in a position to be threatened that large forces were concentrated there for its defence— in short, the whole aspect of the eastern campaign was altered. The debt which we owe the Serbs and our own interests cannot allow us now to play them false and to make a corrupt bargain with their ' The fall of Kut was a logical result of the fall of Belgrade and Nis, for without German supplies and German officers it is doubtful how far the Turks could successfully have withstood the advance of the relieving force. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 245 implacable enemies at their expense. I cannot imagine that, in any other circumstances, or with any other pro- tagonists, any such course would be advocated for a moment, but some malign influence seems for years to have manifested itself in our Balkan policy, probably the influ- ences of ignorance, in part, and the sheer indifference to which a British diplomatist alluded some years ago when he said that "England does not care a damn about the Balkans." Added to this has been the curious infatuation which has caused the greater part of our Press and of our publicists to regard Bulgaria as the only Balkan State whose wishes were ever to be considered. It is time to be done with such ignorance and folly. Any sacrifice of Serbia's interests to Bulgarian perfidy now would finally seal our Balkan policy as untrustworthy to those who fight with us, and as plainly lacking in the old British staunchness and sense of honourable obligation. The effect of such a betrayal upon Roumania might be dis- astrous. There is no need to be vindictive in the terms of peace to be imposed upon Bulgaria, not because she has done any- thing to deserve leniency of treatment, but in the future interests of the Balkans. One thing is certain, that Ferdi- nand should have to go as the condition precedent to the granting of any terms of accommodation. Throughout hi? long reign he has lived in an atmosphere of deceit, lov cunning, and chicanery, and he has exaggerated rather than modified favourably precisely those servile vices to which his recently emancipated politicians were already too prone. He has tricked and duped all with whom he has had any dealings, and his retention of power would in itself con- stitute an absolutely unconditional condemnation of the schemes to which reference has been made. There can be no question of any concessions to Bulgaria, in any event in central Macedonia, for the reasons already given. Nor, indeed, if Bulgaria is to be treated like any other enemy can there be any question of territorial gains at all at the expense of Serbia. It cannot be too often repeated that 2i6 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS neither before 1912 did Serbia recognize the justice of Bulgaria's Macedonian claims, nor did the deHmitation clauses of the 1912 Treaty constitute any such recognition, nor still less did the concessions acquiesced in by Serbia on September 1, 1915, which latter were nothing more than blackmail extorted from her by the military necessi- ties of the moment and the importunity of her aUies. Neither in honour nor in policy can there be any reopening of negotiations with Bulgaria. Such negotiations have already cost us dear. It is true that Greece was bound by the terms of her treaty with Serbia to come to the aid of the latter, but it must not he forgotten that, when from the necessities of Serbia her allies wrung such great con- cessions for her enemy, we at the same time destroyed the raison d'etre of the treaty from the point of view of Greece. The treaty was designed to prevent such an aggrandizement of Bulgaria as might lead to the estab- lishment of a Bulgarian hegemony, and to secure a common Serbo-Greek frontier — objects which were frustrated largely or completely by the concessions in question. The con- cessions, it is true, were withdrawn, but it is not altogether surprising if the Greeks were unable to keep pace with those sudden and pitiably undignified reversals of policy so trenchantly satirized by the Bulgarian oflBcial organ already quoted. 'f What would be the effect produced if that with- drawal were itself withdrawn ? What little credit for states- manship, for stability of purpose, for understanding of the Balkan position which still remains to us would be entirely lost, and we should be left with a reputation for naked perfidy. As Bulgaria has elected to throw in her lot with the Central Empires, she must abide the result. As for any genuine movement of Bulgarian opinion in a direction hostile to King Ferdinand and favourable to the Allies, it has already been seen that there is no ground whatever for such an assumption. That when an advance is made by ' It is true that the later policy of Greece has been moulded by the personal will of the King, but it is undeniable that the position of M. Venizelos was badly shaken by the course of the Allied diplomacy. THE SETTLEMENT WITH BULGARIA 247 the Allies, and the plotters of Sofia see that the game is up, there will be the pretence of such a movement is more than likely, as also that it will meet with a response in certain quarters of England ; but if we would be true to ourselves and to our friends, such a feigned repentance should not modify the Macedonian settlement. When Bulgaria declared war one or two writers, not hitherto conspicuous for their support of Serbia's cause, in the first flush of anger, characterized by a passage from one extreme to the other, spoke wildly of a possible dis- appearance of Bulgaria, and one of them concluded a paragraph with the words ''finis Bulgariae ". There can be no end of a nation short of extermination ; and while the Bulgarians have no claim on our regard, it would be foolish and detrimental to the interests of all concerned to partition the territory of Old Bulgaria,^ it would be a mere copying of the action which has brought Bulgaria into disrepute. That Ferdinand should be dethroned and that Bulgaria should be confined roughly to the fimits of the Treaty of Bucharest, together with the loss of all hopes of Balkan hegemony will be punishment sufficient. Placed under the rule of a Slav prince with a thorough purge of those political elements which have dragged her down there is still a chance that Bulgaria may settle down to a peaceful and orderly development undisturbed by the mirage of a Balkan empire. She would still retain all the lands (excepting indeed the southern Dobrudza) which are indubitably Bulgarian, and would therefore lack the incentive to an adventurous policy which would be furnished by the grievance of a partition of the genuinely national territory; and while, as I have said, the idea of an approximate Serbo-Bulgarian friendship is Utopian, and any policy based upon such an idea foolish, yet no • Minor rectifications apart. In Macedonia the Serbs should be given Strumica as a safeguard for the Salonica railway, which at this point the present frontier closely approaches. The Bulgars in December 1914 utilized this salient to cut the railway at a critical juncture when Serbia was short of munitions. 248 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS unnecessary hindrance should be placed in the way of an eventual rapprochement between the two States. We stand pledged, moreover, to the principle of nationality, and our sincerity should be proved in the case of Bulgaria, perfidious enemy though she has been. Upon a review, then, of all the factors in the problem, the past history of Macedonia, its ethnographic charac- teristics, the Treaty of 1912, Bulgaria's two attacks upon Serbia, our obligations in honour to a sorely tried ally, the fact that Bulgaria is fighting for predominance and the complete extinction of her hated rival, the unanimity in this course which characterizes Bulgarian statesmen and the Sobranje, and their support of King Ferdinand, such should be the nature of the settlement with Bul- garia — restriction to the boundaries of the Treaty of Bucharest. We must have an end of the pro-Bulgar sentimentalism which, exhibited in the greater part of the Press and by almost all our publicists, has tended to obscure counsel, and to dismay our friends and allies by a display of weakness without excuse ; we must have done with the folly which to all that has gone before would add this last, that Serbia should even now be sacrificed and Bulgaria should gain by her stab in the back what she sought. We have one good and loyal friend in the Balkans, and that is the Serb people, and it is the Serbs and their interests which must form the pivot of our Balkan policy. CHAPTEE VIII THE FUTURE SOUTHERN SLAV STATE It cannot be said that the proposals set forth in the foregoing chapters are conceived in a spirit of blind adherence to the most extreme Southern Slav opinion, for in several directions, as has been said, they fall consider- ably short, for the reasons given, of what has been claimed by some, at any rate, of their spokesmen. On the other hand, stress has been laid on those claims which are in- dubitably justified, though in some directions they have been notably infringed by the diplomacy of the Entente, a circumstance which has vastly enhanced the difficulty of making moderate proposals in other directions and of avoiding the appearance of consistently loading the dice against the Southern Slavs. A brief conspectus of the elements of the new Southern Slavdom as above outlined may be of use. The State would be, considered as a whole, remarkably homogeneous, since only in the north-east and south-west would there be any appreciable admixture of alien elements. The vast bulk of the population would be composed of Southern Slavs. Of these the Slovenes inhabit the area to the west of the present Croatian frontier with a large majority of Croats in eastern Istria. It has already been pointed out that though they have been for centuries under the Habsburg sway, and were formerly noted for their loyalty— they are said to have given as their reason 249 250 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS for not rising in 1848 that they had not been ordered to do so by the Emperor — they have now become fully possessed of the consciousness of their race brotherhood with their Serbo-Croat neighbours, with whom they pro- claim their essential solidarity and unity. The total number of the Slovenes is about 1,400,000. Next to them come the Serbo-Croats, the term used as a common designation for these two branches of the race. The Serbs and Croats are ethnologically one people, speaking one language, with but slight tribal differences. By race the inhabitants of Croatia, a great part of Slavonia with the exception of Syrmia or Srem, and northern Dalmatia are Croat, while the inhabitants of Syrmia, the Serb Vojvodina of Hungary, southern Dalmatia, Bosnia, the Hercegovina, Montenegro, and Serbia belong to the Serb stock. Politically, however, the real division is by religion, Orthodox Croats considering themselves Serbs, and Catholic Serbs considering themselves Croats, and in that sense the terms will be used in this section. It is, however, to be noted that there is a certain misuse of terms in speaking of the Hercegovinian Catholics — among the purest Serbs — as Croats, and on the other hand that the Dalmatians in recent years have become among the warmest partizans of a greater Serbia. The Serbs, including Orthodox Croats, use the national phonetic alphabet known as the Cyrillic, akin to the Russian, and ultimately derived from the Greek. It has discarded useless letters such as c (which is either k or s) and has added others, its phonetic quality greatly aiding the work of education. The Croats use the Latin alphabet, but with various diacritic marks in order to render the sounds of the language: this is the only "correct" way of spelling Serb words in our alphabet, and it is a pity that it is not generally followed. In the Austrian crown-lands the Croats number some 700,000, of whom 168,184 are to be found in Istria, and the remainder in Dalmatia, where the river Cetina marks the old boundary between Croat and Serb. In the Hungarian crown-lands, the kingdom of Croatia- Slavonia has a population of over THE FUTURE SOUTHERN SLAV STATE 251 2,621,954, of whom 1,638,354 are Croats, and 644,955 Serbs. There are some 300,000 Croats and Slovenes in the south-west of Hungary between the Mur and the Drave and in the adjacent region. Next in geographical order come the Serbs. " In Bosnia there are three religions but only one nationality — the Serb ". So wrote Baron von Kallay in that history of the Serbs which, as he used to relate, was the first book he put on the Index when, after the occupation of Bosnia, he became governor. Using the two terms " Serb " and " Croat ", however, in their political sense, we find in Bosnia some 856,158 Serbs, 451,686 Croats, and 626,649 Serb Moslems. The last-named include the old nobility of Bosnia, who became renegade on the conquest in order to preserve their position. The " Croats " here are entirely Serb by race, as can be seen by their geographical distri- bution in the following table, where it will be noticed that the Orthodox are strongest in north-west Bosnia, nearest Croatia, while the Catholics are strongest in the centre and south-east. The figures are those of the census of 1895, as I have not been able to find the figures of any later census given in the same manner. They serve to indicate, however, the distribution of creeds in Bosnia and the Hercegovina. Orthodox. Mohammedan. Catholic. Bosnia — Sarajevo 72,904 111,984 88,096 Banjaluka 195,039 73,016 59,493 Bihac ... 101,152 81,777 8,726 Dolnja Tuzla ... 150,814 155,780 49,080 Travnik 78,448 69,940 90,559 Hercegovina — Mostar 74,889 56,135 88,188 673,246 548,632 834,142 43 per cent. 35 per cent. 21 per cent. The areas are those of the six " circles " into which the country was divided by the Austrians. The Krajina 252 THE FUTURE OF THE SOUTHERN SLAVS t- o o C3 o ■^ C3 o o o »n tH i-H rH (N o o Q o U5 O o o lO lO tH o O CO o o ^ o^ Cft Q o o C5 00 -* t- Ol 73 cT o" 8 O o i-T o Ci o >o ■* {N T-t CD (N s CO ira cq C5 -«*< GO ^ CO CO T-t CO o kO ■^ iH CO^ CO CO C» o> CO ti cf i-T (N iH m -* 00 05 , a t- o (N S cS , , , , 1 , 1 1 1 co 1 CO "* 1 ^1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 i 1 1 1 1 1 cjT 1 of 1 tH « a T-t d m g 00 »o T-t 00 •^ g T-t t- 3 •>* T-t tH >o ea 1 1 1 1 o> Q t I-H tH CI 1 1 1 1 C-. 1 1 1 1 »o t- 1 c:j" CO t-f 1 d o -o w S cq 00 Q (-5 O o (N 95 t- g o 'J* o 05 o O o O T-t 1 1 1 1 1 1 (S o o o o »o 1 1 1 1 CO 1 1 > 05 00 o 00 o o O CD o -* c8 5^,S; CO o o « 05 "*. CO 1 CO o o t-^ CO^ o» © 3-F^ 1 ^^a eo" CO to of •^ c^ 00 iO T-t T-t T-t T-t ' • t .^ t z z 1 t ■ ■ ' ■ M C3 _ c3 P4 •t^ M ^-^ f^ XL c3 • & t^ S ,,_^ © • ^* '^ • • • l-l e3 I a M Ut to ¥ 2 .s c3 c3 ■Si .2 o o o ■Si .2 .2 e3 O cS c3 ■Bi c3 M e3 ■Si sa c3 .2 1 o CS CD w o OQ O M o f^ « m w Q fp OQ .^•f THE FUTURE SOUTHERN SLAV STATE 253 o o t-n-,a cp^ g o °£i^ 00 CI "S 05 0) 1 03 O t- 00 o tH P- 03 -»' ■* ^ CO t-i o "* , 241, 242 Bulgaria — Bulgarizing policy of, in occupied territory, 229-31 Desire for destruction of Serbia, 233, 235 Looting in Serbia, 235, 236 Macedonia and, see Macedonia Medieval history of, 31, 34, 40, 41, 42, 202, 203 Mutual antipathy of Serbs and Bulgars, 34 PoUcy of, in 1915, 19 sq Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty of 1912, 209 sq. Settlement with, Chapter VII passim Bulgarian Exarchate, 207 Bulgarian Press on Sir E. Grey, 236-8 Bulgarophils, English, 20 sg., 222 sq. Bulgars — Reliance of, on sentimentality of Entente, 239, 240 Tartar origin of, 31 United in war policy, 226 sq. Cantacuzene, John, 41, 43 Carinthia, 169 Cattaro, see Kotor Ceslav, Grand Zupan of Serbia, 35 Cippico, Sig., 120 Conversion of Southern Slavs to Christianity, 33 Co-operation in Serbia, 100, 101 Croatia, 80 »?., 250 Future of, 179 sq. Land question in, 281-3 Placed under Magyar domina- tion, 84 Statistics of population, 252-3 Croatian orthography, 8, 9, 82, 250, 302 Croats in favour of Southern Slav unity, 179, 182 Cyril and Methodius SS., 33 Cyrillic alphabet, 8, 33, 250, 302 Dalmatia, 80, Chapter IV "passim Ethnology of, 128-36 Geographical claims of Italy 120, 121 Stronghold of Southern Slav unity, 90, 135 Statistics of population, 128, 252, 253 Venetian Dominion, 121-8 Character of, 123-6 Dalmatian, Agreement between Italy and the Entente, 161 sq., 173 Danev, Dr., 211 sq., 228 Danube-Adriatic line, 154, 315, 316 Debar (Dibra), 199 Decani, Monastery of, 39 and note INDEX 323 Dicey, Professor A. V., cited 259, 260, 262 Djakovica, 198 Dragutin, see Stephen Dragutin Drang nacli Osten, 307, 308, 314, 315, 317, 318 Drave, R., 178 Dualism as form of Southern Slav State, 263-5 Dubrovnik (Ragusa), 43, 47, 124, 126, 131, 154, 165, 195, 316 See also Gru2 Dusan, see Stephen Dusan Eastern Empire, Chapter II passim Attacked by Milutin, 38 Conquests of Dusan, 41 Final attack of Dusan, 44 Invaded by the Slavs, 29 Macedonia and, 202, 203 Victorious over Stephen Nemanja, 36 English opinion and Serbia, 17 Exarchate, Bulgarian, 207 Federalism and the Southern Slav provinces, 256 sg. Ferdinand, King of Bulgaria, 227, 247 Finances of Serbia, 98 sq. Financial conditions in future Southern Slav State, 283- 99 Fiume, see Rijeka Fleet, Future Serb, 143 sq. Francis Ferdinand, policy of Archduke, 91 French opinion on future of Austria, 176, 177 Friedjung, Professor, 93 Gauvain, M., 177 Genediev, M., 229 sq. German colonists in Southern Slav lands, 269-72 German Drang nach Osten, 307, 308, 314, 315, 317, 318 Germany and Trieste, 156 sq. Germany, Italy, and Serbia, 156 sq. Gesov, M., 227 sq. Gorica-Gradiska, 169, 172 sq. " Greater Austria," 91 Greece and the Entente, 224, 225 Greek Empire, see Eastern Empire Grey, Policy of Sir E., 224 sq. Gruz (Gravosa), 153, 316 Habsburgs, failure of, 92 Helena, wife of Stejihen the Great of Serbia, 38 Hercegovina — Early history of, see Zahumlija Erected into a duchy (Herce- govina), 58 Hilindav, Monastery of, 36, 39 Hungary — Future of, 177 sq. Medieval relations with Serb lands, 32, 37, 38, 40, 43, 52 See also Austria and Magyar Industrial conditions in future Southern Slav State 283-299 Istria, 169, 172 sq. Isvolski, M., 214 sq. Italo-Slav accord, Necessity of, 159, 160 Italy — and the Adriatic, Chapter IV passim and Albania, 107, 108 and Dodekancsc, 109 Balkan policy under Marquis di San Giuliano, 110 Growth of Italian claims. 111 Imperialism of, 109 Negotiations with Austria, 111 Policy towards Serbia, 109 Press accusations against Southern Slav Committee, 116, 117 324 INDEX Italy — continued Press anti-Serb campaign, 112 sq. Press attempts to dissociate Serbs and Croats, 118 sg. Secret Treaty with Entente, 161 sg., 173 Jelacid, Ban of Croatia, 83 Jesuits, 303 John Asen II, Bulgarian Tsar, 37 John Vladimir, Grand Zupan of Serbia, 35 John Vladislav, Bulgarian Tsar, 35 Karadzid, Vuk, 81 sq. Kara George, 65 sq. Karagjorgjevid, Alexander, Prince of Serbia, 71 Karagjorgjevic, Peter, elected King of Serbia, 78 Domestic policy of, 97, 98 Karlovci (Karlowitz), Patriarchate established at, 62 Kmet or Merop, 48 sq. Kosovo, Battle of, 54 sq. Kotor (Cattaro), 43, 106, 126, 144, 145, 165 Kranjska, 169, 172 sq. Statistics of population, 169, 252, 253 Krusevac, 301, 302 Kutromanid, Ban of Bosnia, 40 Kutzo-Vlachs, 32 Land question — in Bosnia, 280, 281 in Croatia, 281-3 Lazar, Tsar, 53, sq. Lissa, see Vis Ljubljana (Laibach), 173, 311, 812 Losinj (Lussin), 152 Louis the Great, King of Hungary, Macedonia, 193, Chapter VI passiyn Bulgarian occupation of, in Middle Ages, 202 Bulgarian propaganda, 206-8 Medieval history of, 201 sq. Bacial characteristics, 204-6, 231, 232 Serb occupation of, in Mfddle Ages, 203 Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty of 1912, 209 sq. Macedonian Committee, 206-8 Macva, 38, 39 Magyar — Atrocities in Serbia, 303 note Colonists in Southern Slav lands, 269-72 Intrigues in England, 238 note Opposition to Serbs, 63 Oppression of Croatia, 84 Oppression of nationalities, 83 See also Austria, and Hungary Manuel Comnenus, Emperor of the East, 36 Marica, battle of, 53 Marko Kraljevid, 53 Markovid, Professor L., Italian accusations against, 117 Mazzini, 133 Medieval conditions of Serbia, 46 sy. Merop or kmet, 48 sq. Michael, Grand Zupan of Serbia, 35 Michael Obrenovid, Prince of Serbia, see Obrenovid Milan Obrenovid, King, see Obrenovid Milutin, King of Serbia, see Stephen Milutin Mirko of Montenegro, Prince, 197 Mohammedarj Begs of Bosnia, 281 INDEX 325 Montenegro — I Desire for Southern Slav unity, 195 Future of, 193 sq. Medieval history of, see Zeta Statistics of population, 252, 253 Morava valley, Importance of, 311-14 Muntimir, Grand Zupan of Serbia, 34 Nemanja dynasty, 35 sq. Nicholas, liing of Montenegro, 194 sq. Ni§, 36, 206, 229, 230, 231, 311, 312, 313 Novisad (Neusatz), 185, 186 Obradovid, Dositije, 81 sq. Obrenovid, Alexander, King of Serbia, 74— Domestic policy of, 74-7. Murder of, 77 Obrenovid, Michael, Prince, 70 sq. Foreign policy of, 72 Obrenovic, Milan, King, 73, 74 Obrenovic, Milos, Prince, 66 sq. Ochrida, 42, 201 Old Serbia, 17 and note, 30, 309, 310 Oriental line, new, 312 Oriental Eailway, 274, 275, 312 Otrok, 49 Overland route, 313 PaSic, Dr. Nikola, 76, 78 Pec, See of, 39 Pec, Patriarch Arsen III, 62 Pe6, Patriarchate of, 41, 59, 60 Place names, Serbo-Croat, 9 Pola, 106, 151 Prezzolini, Professor, quoted Chap- ter IV passim Primorija, see Zahumlija and Hercegovina Prizren, 198 J>utnik^ Fifild-Marshal, 95 Badoslav, Grand ^upan, 33 Radoslavov, M., 228 sq. Railways, Serb, 102 Raska, 36 sq. Renascence of Serbia under King Peter, 95 sq. Rijeka (Fiume), 153, 182 Resolutions of, 90 Roumanians, 273 See Banat Russia and Bulgaria, 239, 240 Second Balkan war, 213 sq. S. Sava, 37 Salandra, Sig., 113 Salonica, 241, 311, 313 Salvemini, Professor, 119, 143, 160 Samuel, Bulgarian Tsar, 35 San Stefano, Treaty of, 73 Sarajevo, 311 Sebar, 47 sq. Sebenico, see Sibenik Serbia — Claims on the Entente, 243 sq. Concessions to Bulgaria in 1915, 21, 246 Social conditions in medieval, 46 sq. Statistics of population, 252, 253 Serbo-Bulgarian enmity, 34 Treaty of 1912, 209 sq. War of 1885, 74 Serbo-Croat Coalition, 91 sq. Serbs — Distribution of, 25 of Hungary, 61 sq., 83, 182 sq. gibenik (Selenico), 131, 134 Simeon, Bulgarian Tsar, 35 Sisman, Bulgarian Tsar, 35 Slovene original appellation of Southern Slavs, 29 Slovenes, 169-73, 249, 250 Statistics of, 169, 252, 253 Sofia, 206, 231 Sokolovid, Mehemet, 59 Sonnino, Baron, 114 326 INDEX Southern Slav Committee — I Funds of, 117, 118 | Italian accusations against, ! 116, 117 Southern Slav State — I Barrier to German advance, 307, 308, 314, 315, 317, 318 Future form of, 256 sq. Intei'nal problems of, Chapter IX passim Statistics of population, 252, 253, 255 Strategical importance of. Chapter X passim Southern Slav Unity, idea of, 81 sq., 90, 135, 179, 182, 195 Spljet (Spalato), 106, 131, 153, 154, 164, 316 Statistical Tables — Agx'icultural holdings in Serbia, 100 Finances of Serbia, 98, 99 Population of the Banat, 191 Population of Bosnia (rehgious distribution), 251 Population of Dalmatia, 128 Population of Istria, Kranjska (Carniola), etc., 169 Population of the Southern Slav State, (all provinces), 252, 253, 255 Stephen, Nemanja, 36 Stephen II, Prvovencani, 37 Stephen III, (Rodoslav), 37 Stephen IV, (the Great), 38 Stephen V, Dragutin, 38 Stephen VI, Milutin, 38 Stephen VII, Decanski, 40, 41 Stephen VIII, Dusan, Tsar, 41-4 Stephen Lazarevic, "Despot" of Serbia, 55 Stephen Voislav, Grand Zupan, 35 Stephen Vukcic, 58 Strategical position in Adriatic, 104 sq., 136-50 Strategical importance of Southern Slav lands, Chapter ^passim Strumica, 193 note, 247 Syrmia or Srem, 37, 38 Tommaseo, 133 Trialism, 91 Trieste, 106, 151, 169, 171, 172 Trogir, 131, 132 Turks, advance of, 39, 53 Tvrtko, Stephen, Ban of Bosnia, 53, 57 Unitary State as form of Southern Slav State, 265 Unitary State compared with federal, 262, 265, 266 Unity, idea of Southern Slav, 81 sq., 90, 135, 179, 182, 195 UroS, see Stephen Uro5 V (Tsar Uros), 52 Valona, 106, 110, 150, 151, 153 Velbuzd, Battle of, 40 Vladislav, King of Serbia, 37 Vlastela, 46 Vlastimir, Grand Zupan, 34 Voislav, Grand Zupan, 33 Vojvode, Serb, in Hungary, 62 Vojvodina, 62, 63, 83 Vidin, 36, 37, 38 Vis (Lissa), 106, 153, 161 Vukasin, 52, 53 Zadar, 129, 131 Eesolutions of, 91 Zadruga, 102 Zagorija, 36 Zagreb (Agram), 311, 312 Zahumlija, (Primorija, Herce- govina), 36, 40, 43, 53, 57 See also Hercegovina Zakonik of Stephen Dusan, 42, 46 sq., 126 Zara, see Zadar Zeta (Montenegro), 36, 53 See also Montenegro Frintcd in Great. 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