Cross the Bosniac Frontier.--Gipsy Encampment.--Novibazar
described.--Rough Reception.--Precipitate Departure.--Fanaticism.
Next day we were all afoot at an early hour, in order to pay a visit
to Novibazar. In order to obviate the performance of quarantine on our
return, I took an officer of the establishment, and a couple of men,
with me, who in the Levant are called Guardiani; but here the German
word Ueber-reiter, or over-rider, was adopted.
We continued along the river Raska for about an hour, and then
descried a line of wooden palings going up hill and down dale, at
right angles with the course we were holding. This was the frontier of
the principality of Servia, and here began the direct rule of the
Sultan and the Pashalic of Bosnia. At the guard-house half a dozen
Momkes, with old fashioned Albanian guns, presented arms.
After half an hour's riding, the valley became wider, and we passed
through meadow lands, cultivated by Moslem Bosniacs in their white
turbans; and two hours further, entered a fertile circular plain,
about a mile and a half in diameter, surrounded by low hills, which
had a chalky look, in the midst of which rose the minarets and
bastions of the town and castle of Novibazar. Numerous gipsy tents
covered the plain, and at one of them, a withered old gipsy woman,
with white dishevelled hair hanging down on each side of her burnt
umber face, cried out in a rage, "See how the Royal Servian people
now-a-days have the audacity to enter Novibazar on horseback,"
alluding to the ancient custom of Christians not being permitted to
ride on horseback in a town.[12]
On entering, I perceived the houses to be of a most forbidding
aspect, being built of mud, with only a base of bricks, extending
about three feet from the ground. None of the windows were glazed;
this being the first town of this part of Turkey in Europe that I had
seen in such a plight. The over-rider stopped at a large
stable-looking building, which was the khan of the place. Near the
door were some bare wooden benches, on which some Moslems, including
the khan-keeper, were reposing. The horses were foddered at the other
extremity, and a fire burned in the middle of the floor, the smoke
escaping by the doors. We now sent our letter to Youssouf Bey, the
governor, but word was brought back that he was in the harem.
We now sallied forth to view the town. The castle, which occupies the
centre, is on a slight eminence, and flanked with eight bastions; it
contains no regular troops, but merely some _redif_, or militia.
Besides one small well-built stone mosque, there is nothing else to
remark in the place. Some of the bazaar shops seemed tolerably well
furnished; but the place is, on the whole, miserable and filthy in
the extreme. The total number of mosques is seventeen.
The afternoon being now advanced, I went to call upon the Mutsellim.
His konak was situated in a solitary street, close to the fields.
Going through an archway, we found ourselves in the court of a house
of two stories. The ground-floor was the prison, with small windows
and grated wooden bars. Above was an open corridor, on which the
apartments of the Bey opened. Two rusty, old fashioned cannons were in
the middle of the court. Two wretched-looking men, and a woman,
detained for theft, occupied one of the cells. They asked us if we
knew where somebody, with an unpronounceable name, had gone. But not
having had the honour of knowing any body of the light-fingered
profession, we could give no satisfactory information on the subject.
The Momke, whom we had asked after the governor, now re-descended the
rickety steps, and announced that the Bey was still asleep; so I
walked out, but in the course of our ramble learned that he was
afraid to see us, on account of the fanatics in the town: for, from
the immediate vicinity of this place to Servia, the inhabitants
entertain a stronger hatred of Christians than is usual in the other
parts of Turkey, where commerce, and the presence of Frank influences,
cause appearances to be respected. But the people here recollected
only of one party of Franks ever visiting the town.[13]
We now sauntered into the fields; and seeing the cemetery, which
promised from its elevation to afford a good general view of the town,
we ascended, and were sorry to see so really pleasing a situation
abused by filth, indolence, and barbarism.
The castle was on the elevated centre of the town; and the town
sloping on all aides down to the gardens, was as nearly as possible in
the centre of the plain. When we had sufficiently examined the carved
stone kaouks and turbans on the tomb stones, we re-descended towards
the town. A savage-looking Bosniac now started up from behind a low
outhouse, and trembling with rage and fanaticism began to abuse us:
"Giaours, kafirs, spies! I know what you have come for. Do you expect
to see your cross planted some day on the castle?"
The old story, thought I to myself; the fellow takes me for a military
engineer, exhausting the resources of my art in a plan for the
reduction of the redoubtable fortress and city of Novibazar.
"Take care how you insult an honourable gentleman," said the
over-rider; "we will complain to the Bey."
"What do we care for the Bey?" said the fellow, laughing in the
exuberance of his impudence. I now stopped, looked him full in the
face, and asked him coolly what he wanted.
"I will show you that when you get into the bazaar," and then he
suddenly bolted down a lane out of sight.
A Christian, who had been hanging on at a short distance, came up and
said--
"I advise you to take yourself out of the dust as quickly as possible.
The whole town is in a state of alarm; and unless you are prepared for
resistance, something serious may happen: for the fellows here are
all wild Arnaouts, and do not understand travelling Franks."
"Your advice is a good one; I am obliged to you for the hint, and I
will attend to it."
Had there been a Pasha or consul in the place, I would have got the
fellow punished for his insolence: but knowing that our small party
was no match for armed fanatics, and that there was nothing more to be
seen in the place, we avoided the bazaar, and went round by a side
street, paid our khan bill,[14] and, mounting our horses, trotted
rapidly out of the town, for fear of a stray shot; but the over-rider
on getting clear of the suburbs instead of relaxing got into a gallop.
"Halt," cried I, "we are clear of the rascals, and fairly out of
town;" and coming up to the eminence crowned with the Giurgeve
Stupovi, on which was a church, said to have been built by Stephen
Dushan the Powerful, I resolved to ascend, and got the over-rider to
go so far; but some Bosniacs in a field warned us off with menacing
gestures. The over-rider said, "For God's sake let us go straight
home. If I go back to Novibazar my life may be taken."
Not wishing to bring the poor fellow into trouble, I gave up the
project, and returned to the quarantine.
Novibazar, which is about ten hours distant from the territory of
Montenegro, and thrice that distance from Scutari, is, politically
speaking, in the Pashalic of Bosnia. The Servian or Bosniac language
here ceases to be the preponderating language, and the Albanian begins
and stretches southward to Epirus. But through all the Pashalic of
Scutari, Servian is much spoken.
Colonel Hodges, her Britannic Majesty's first consul-general in
Servia, a gentleman of great activity and intelligence, from the
laudable desire to procure the establishment of an entre-pot for
British manufactures in the interior, got a certain chieftain of a
clan Vassoevitch, named British vice-consul at Novibazar. From this
man's influence, there can be no doubt that had he stuck to trade he
might have proved useful; but, inflated with vanity, he irritated the
fanaticism of the Bosniacs, by setting himself up as a little
Christian potentate. As a necessary consequence, he was obliged to fly
for his life, and his house was burned to the ground. The Vassoevitch
clan have from time immemorial occupied certain mountains near
Novibazar, and pretend, or pretended, to complete independence of the
Porte, like the Montenegrines.
While I returned to the quarantine, and dismounted, the Director, to
whom the over-rider related our adventure, came up laughing, and said,
"What do you think of the rites of Novibazar hospitality?"
_Author_. "More honoured in the breach than in the observance, as our
national poet would have said."
_Director_. "I know well enough what you mean."
_By-stander_. "The cause of the hatred of these fellows to you is,
that they fear that some fine day they will be under Christian rule.
We are pleased to see the like of you here. Our brethren on the other
side may derive a glimmering hope of liberation from the
circumstance."
_Author_. "My government is at present on the best terms with the
Porte: the readiness with which such hopes arise in the minds of the
people, is my motive for avoiding political conversations with Rayahs
on those dangerous topics."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 12: Most of the gipsies here profess Islamism.]
[Footnote 13: I presume Messrs. Boue and party.]
[Footnote 14: The Austrian zwanziger goes here for only three piastres;
in Servia it goes for five.]