Ascent of the Kopaunik.--Grand Prospect.--Descent of the
Kopaunik.--Bruss.--Involuntary Bigamy.--Conversation on the Servian
character.--Krushevatz.--Relics of the Servian monarchy.
A middle-aged, showily dressed man, presented himself as the captain
who was to conduct me to the top of the Kopaunik. His clerk was a fat,
knock-kneed, lubberly-looking fellow, with a red face, a short neck, a
low forehead, and bushy eyebrows and mustachios, as fair as those of a
Norwegian; to add to his droll appearance, one of his eyes was
bandaged up.
"As sure as I am alive, that fellow will go off in an apoplexy. What a
figure! I would give something to see that fellow climbing up the
ladder of a steamer from a boat on a blowy day."
"Or dancing to the bagpipe," said Paul.
The sky was cloudy, and the captain seemed irresolute, whether to
advise me to make the ascent or proceed to Banya. The plethoric
one-eyed clerk, with more regard to his own comfort than my pleasure,
was secretly persuading the captain that the expedition would end in a
ducking to the skin, and, turning to me, said, "You, surely, do not
intend to go up to day, Sir? Take the advice of those who know the
country?"
"Nonsense," said I, "this is mere fog, which will clear away in an
hour. If I do not ascend the Kopaunik now, I can never do so again."
Plethora then went away to get the director to lend his advice on the
same side; and after much whispering he came back, and announced that
my horse was unshod, and could not ascend the rocks. The director was
amused with the clumsy bustle of this fellow to save himself a little
exercise. I, at length, said to the doubting captain, "My good friend,
an Englishman is like a Servian, when he takes a resolution he does
not change it. Pray order the horses."
We now crossed the Ybar, and ascending for hours through open pasture
lands, arrived at some rocks interspersed with stunted ilex, where a
lamb was roasting for our dinner. The meridian sun had long ere this
pierced the clouds that overhung our departure, and the sight of the
lamb completely irradiated the rubicund visage of the plethoric clerk.
A low round table was set down on the grass, under the shade of a
large boulder stone. An ilex growing from its interstices seemed to
live on its wits, for not an ounce of soil was visible for its
subsistence. Our ride gave us a sharp appetite, and we did due
execution on the lamb. The clerk, fixing his eyes steadily on the
piece he had singled out, tucked up his sleeves, as for a surgical
operation, and bone after bone was picked, and thrown over the rock;
and when all were satisfied, the clerk was evidently at the
climacteric of his powers of mastication. After reposing a little, we
again mounted horse.
A gentle wind skimmed the white straggling clouds from the blue sky.
Warmer and warmer grew the sunlit valleys; wider and wider grew the
prospect as we ascended. Balkan after Balkan rose on the distant
horizon. Ever and anon I paused and looked round with delight; but
before reaching the summit I tantalized myself with a few hundred
yards of ascent, to treasure the glories in store for the pause, the
turn, and the view. When, at length, I stood on the highest peak; the
prospect was literally gorgeous. Servia lay rolled out at my feet.
There was the field of Kossovo, where Amurath defeated Lasar and
entombed the ancient empire of Servia. I mused an instant on this
great landmark of European history, and following the finger of an old
peasant, who accompanied us, I looked eastwards, and saw Deligrad--the
scene of one of the bloodiest fights that preceded the resurrection of
Servia as a principality. The Morava glistened in its wide valley like
a silver thread in a carpet of green, beyond which the dark mountains
of Rudnik rose to the north, while the frontiers of Bosnia, Albania,
Macedonia, and Bulgaria walled in the prospect.
"_Nogo Svet_.--This is the whole world," said the peasant, who stood
by me.
I myself thought, that if an artist wished for a landscape as the
scene of Satan taking up our Saviour into a high mountain, he could
find none more appropriate than this. The Kopaunik is not lofty; not
much above six thousand English feet above the level of the sea. But
it is so placed in the Servian basin, that the eye embraces the whole
breadth from Bosnia to Bulgaria, and very nearly the whole length from
Macedonia to Hungary.
I now thanked the captain for his trouble, bade him adieu, and, with a
guide, descended the north eastern slope of the mountain. The
declivity was rapid, but thick turf assured us a safe footing. Towards
night-fall we entered a region interspersed with trees, and came to a
miserable hamlet of shepherds, where we were fain to put up in a hut.
This was the humblest habitation we had entered in Servia. It was
built of logs of wood and wattling. A fire burned in the middle of the
floor, the smoke of which, finding no vent but the door, tried our
eyes severely, and had covered the roof with a brilliant jet.
Hay being laid in a corner, my carpet and pillow were spread out on
it; but sleep was impossible from the fleas. At length, the sheer
fatigue of combating them threw me towards morning into a slumber; and
on awaking, I looked up, and saw a couple of armed men crouching over
the glowing embers of the fire. These were the Bolouk Bashi and
Pandour, sent by the Natchalnik of Krushevatz, to conduct us to that
town.
I now rose, and breakfasted on new milk, mingled with brandy and
sugar, no bad substitute for better fare, and mounted horse.
We now descended the Grashevatzka river to Bruss, with low hills on
each side, covered with grass, and partly wooded. Bruss is prettily
situated on a rising ground, at the confluence of two tributaries of
the Morava. It has a little bazaar opening on a lawn, where the
captain of Zhupa had come to meet me. After coffee, we again mounted,
and proceeded to Zhupa. Here the aspect of the country changed; the
verdant hills became chalky, and covered with vineyards, which,
before the fall of the empire, were celebrated. To this day tradition
points out a cedar and some vines, planted by Militza, the consort of
Lasar.
The vine-dressers all stood in a row to receive us. A carpet had been
placed under an oak, by the side of the river, and a round low table
in the middle of it was soon covered with soup, sheeps' kidneys, and a
fat capon, roasted to a minute, preceded by onions and cheese, as a
rinfresco, and followed by choice grapes and clotted cream, as a
dessert.
"I think," said I to the entertainer, as I shook the crumbs out of my
napkin, and took the first whiff of my chibouque, "that if Stephan
Dushan's chief cook were to rise from the grave, he could not give us
better fare."
_Captain_. "God sends us good provender, good pasture, good flocks and
herds, good corn and fruits, and wood and water. The land is rich; the
climate is excellent; but we are often in political troubles."
_Author_. "These recent affairs are trifles, and you are too young to
recollect the revolution of Kara Georg."
_Captain_. "Yes, I am; but do you see that Bolouk Bashi who
accompanied you hither; his history is a droll illustration of past
times. Simo Slivovats is a brave soldier, but, although a Servian, has
two wives."
_Author_. "Is he a Moslem?"
_Captain_. "Not at all. In the time of Kara Georg he was an active
guerilla fighter, and took prisoner a Turk called Sidi Mengia, whose
life he spared. In the year 1813, when Servia was temporarily
re-conquered by the Turks, the same Sidi Mengia returned to Zhupa, and
said, 'Where is the brave Servian who saved my life?' The Bolouk Bashi
being found, he said to him, 'My friend, you deserve another wife for
your generosity.' 'I cannot marry two wives,' said Simo; 'my religion
forbids it.' But the handsomest woman in the country being sought out,
Sidi Mengia sent a message to the priest of the place, ordering him to
marry Simo to the young woman. The priest refused; but Sidi Mengia
sent a second threatening message; so the priest married the couple.
The two wives live together to this day in the house of Simo at
Zhupa. The archbishop, since the departure of the Turks, has
repeatedly called on Simo to repudiate his second wife; but the
principal obstacle is the first wife, who looks upon the second as a
sort of sister: under these anomalous circumstances, Simo was under a
sort of excommunication, until he made a fashion of repudiating the
second wife, by the first adopting her as a sister."
The captain, who was an intelligent modest man, would fain have kept
me till next day; but I felt anxious to get to Alexinatz; and on
arrival at a hill called Vrbnitzkobrdo, the vale of the Morava again
opened upon us in all its beauty and fertility, in the midst of which
lay Krushevatz, which was the last metropolis of the Servian empire;
and even now scarce can fancy picture to itself a nobler site for an
internal capital. Situated half-way between the source and the mouth
of the Morava, the plain has breadth enough for swelling zones of
suburbs, suburban villas, gardens, fields, and villages.
It was far in the night when we arrived at Krushevatz. The Natchalnik
was waiting with lanterns, and gave us a hearty welcome. As I went
upstairs his wife kissed my hand, and I in sport wished to kiss her's;
but the Natchalnik said, "We still hold to the old national custom,
that the wife kisses the hand of a stranger." Our host was a
fair-haired man, with small features and person, a brisk manner and
sharp intelligence, but tempered by a slight spice of vanity. The
_tout ensemble_ reminded me of the Berlin character.
_Natchalnik_. "I am afraid that, happy as we are to receive such
strangers as you, we are not sufficiently acquainted with the proper
ceremonies to be used on the occasion."
_Author_. "The stranger must conform to the usage of the country, not
the country to the standard of the stranger. I came here to see the
Servians as they are in their own nature, and not in their imitations
of Europe. In the East there is more ceremony than in the West; and if
you go to Europe you will be surprised at the absence of ceremonious
compliments there."
_Natchalnik_. "The people in the interior are a simple and uncorrupted
race; their only monitor is nature."
_Author_. "That is true: the European who judges of the Servians by
the intrigues of Belgrade, will form an unfavourable opinion of them;
the mass of the nation, in spite of its faults, is sound. Many of the
men at the head of affairs, such as Simitch, Garashanin, &c., are men
of integrity; but in the second class at Belgrade, there is a great
mixture of rogues."
_Natchalnik_. "I know the common people well: they are laborious,
grateful, and obedient; they bear ill-usage for a time, but in the end
get impatient, and are with difficulty appeased. When I or any other
governor say to one of the people, 'Brother, this or that must be
done,' he crosses his hands on his breast, and says, 'It shall be
done;' but he takes particular notice of what I do, and whether I
perform what is due on my part. If I fail, woe betide me. The
Obrenovitch party forgot this; hence their fall."
Next day we went to look at the remains of Servian royalty. A
shattered gateway and ruined walls, are all that now remain of the
once extensive palace of Knes Lasar Czar Serbski; but the chapel is as
perfect as it was when it occupied the centre of the imperial
quadrangle. It is a curious monument of the period, in a Byzantine
sort of style; but not for a moment to be compared in beauty to the
church of Studenitza. Above one of the doors is carved the double
eagle, the insignium of empire. The great solidity of this edifice
recommended it to the Turks as an arsenal; hence its careful
preservation. The late Servian governor had the Vandalism to whitewash
the exterior, so that at a distance it looks like a vulgar parish
church. Within is a great deal of gilding and bad painting; pity that
the late governor did not whitewash the inside instead of the out. The
Natchalnik told me, that under the whitewash fine bricks were disposed
in diamond figures between the stones. This antique principle of
tesselation applied by the Byzantines to perpendicular walls, and
occasionally adopted and varied _ad infinitum_ by the Saracens, is
magnificently illustrated in the upper exterior of the ducal palace of
Venice.