is Macedonia. It must have been once a charming country worthy of the
great men like Philip and Alexander, worthy of Saint Paul's mission to
it, worthy of Byzantium's effort to save it from the Slavs, worthy of
all the Turkish sacrifices to conquer it, worthy of several Serbian
kings who gave their lives defending it. It was a rich and beautiful
spot on this earth. It was the centre of the Serbian mediaeval state and
power, the very heart of the Serbian glory from the time when the Serbs
became Christians till the tragedy of Kossovo, and after this tragedy
till the death of King Marko of Prilep in the beginning of the fifteenth
century. Even during the time of slavery under the Turks, Macedonia was
the source of all the spiritual and moral inspirations and supports of
the enslaved nation. It happened only accidentally that the northern
part of Serbia, was liberated a hundred years ago while Macedonia
remained still in chains. In the north, in the dense forests and the
mountains around Belgrade and Kraguievaz, the guerilla war started a
great insurrection which succeeded.
This guerilla war meant a gradual destruction of the Turkish dominions
in the whole northern part: in Shumadija, Bosnia, Croatia and Dalmatia.
But I say the guerilla war in Shumadija, around Belgrade and Kraguievaz,
was a success. Karageorge liberated a part of the Serbian country in the
north, and this part was finally recognised by the great powers of
Europe and called _Serbia_. But neither Karageorge nor anybody in Serbia
has forgotten Macedonia. Macedonia was not only a part of our history,
but it has become a part of our soul. The principal and the greater part
of our national poetry, which means our Shakespeare and which meant our
Bible, describes Serbian Macedonia, her heroes, her historic events, her
struggle with the Turks, her slavery, and her customs and hopes. Serbian
children know the names of the towns like Skoplje, Prilep, Ochrida, and
the heroes' names, Urosh, Stephen, Milutin, Dushan, Marko and Ugljesha,
before they learn in the school to write these names. Our national
poetry is our national education, our education is our soul. Macedonia
represents a great part of our poetry, which means that she forms a
great part of our soul. To say Macedonia does not belong to Serbia means
the same as to say, the Serbian soul does not belong to the Serbians.
Could you imagine England without Stratford, the birthplace of
Shakespeare? I don't think you could. So we cannot imagine a Serbia
without Prilep, the source, yea, the birthplace of our national poetry.
Every people must have some sacred soil in their country, a part more
sacred than other parts, which binds them more to their fatherland,
which excites their enthusiasm, and which obliges them to defend and to
die for it. I was born in Northern Serbia, in a town which has been very
important in our modern history. But I must tell you that it was not
Valve, my birthplace, which inspired me to be a Serb in soul, but rather
Prilep, Skoplje and Ochrida, the places where our spirit and our virtues
of old flourished, together with Kossovo, where our national body was
destroyed. Valevo has been very little mentioned in our national poetry,
Valevo and even Belgrade, in comparison with Macedonia. Northern Serbia
has been in our Middle Ages more a part of our body than of our soul.
But Macedonia.... A Bulgarian diplomat formerly in Rome once ironically
told a Serbian sculptor in a discussion about Macedonia: 'We Bulgars
know that King Marko of Prilep is a Serbian. Well, give us Prilep, that
is what we want, and keep King Marko for yourselves!' That is the true
Bulgarian spirit. The Greeks have understood us better. They have many
brothers of their own in Monastir and Ochrida, and still they recognised
the Serbian rights in the central and northern parts of Macedonia,
claiming for themselves only the southern part, and giving to the
Bulgars the eastern part of it. Yet they could claim Macedonia not with
less rights than the Bulgars did. Why? Because Macedonia never was the
centre of a Greek Empire, as it never was the centre of a Bulgarian
Empire. It was a provincial country of the old Byzantine Empire. It was
a country temporarily conquered by the Bulgars, the centre of the
Bulgarian kingdom being Tirnovo and its neighbourhood. But it was quite
a centre of all the best things that we Serbs created and possessed in
our past. Our national soul cannot live without this part of our
national body. I remember a conversation in Nish between a French sailor
and a Serbian writer. The French sailor said: "But you will perish if
you do not give Macedonia to the Bulgars?" The Serbian writer replied
quietly: "Let us perish for the sake of our soul!" An English gentleman
asked me the other day: "Why have you been obstinate in not yielding
Macedonia to the Bulgars, while we even are ready to yield to the
Greeks, offering them Cyprus?" "Yes," I said, "we can well appreciate
your sacrifice, but still Prilep for us is rather what Stratford--and
not Cyprus--is for you. And even I, not being an Englishman, could never
agree that you should offer Shakespeare's birthplace to anybody in the
world."
Perhaps the Bulgars would not have attacked us in this war if we had
given Macedonia to them, although it is not certain, because the
frontiers of their ambitions are in Constantinople, Salonica and on the
Adriatic. Still Serbia could not barter her soul like Faust with
Mephistopheles. Five hundred years ago the Serbs and Greeks defended
Macedonia from the Turkish invasion. In 1912 it was Serbia with Greece
again who liberated Macedonia from the Turkish yoke. Bulgaria never
defended Macedonia from the Turks. Her first fighting for Macedonia was
in 1913 against Serbs, Greeks and Roumanians. And Serbia sacrificed not
only many things and many lives for Macedonia, but twice even her
independence--once five hundred years ago, and for the second time at
the present moment. _Yes, Serbia is now killed because of Macedonia._
Indeed, all Serbia's fighting and suffering have been because of
Macedonia. She fought against the Turks because of Macedonia. She fought
against the Bulgars because of Macedonia. And she now is losing her
independence because of Macedonia. Because she could not give Macedonia,
which means her glory, her history, her poetry, her soul, she is now
trodden down and killed. Serbia could not live without Macedonia. Serbia
did what she could--she died for Macedonia. And if one day, God willing,
from this blessed island should sound the trumpet for the Resurrection
for all the dead, killed by the German sword, I hope Serbia will rise
from her grave together with Macedonia, as one body and one soul.
Serbia and the World-War.
In three years Serbia got three decisive victories which attracted
attention to her in both hemispheres. She got a decisive victory at
Kumanovo, against the Turks, in 1912. She got the second decisive
victory on the Bregalniza, against the Bulgars, in 1913. She got a third
decisive victory at Rudnik, against the Austrians and Magyars, in 1914.
But finally she perished, in 1915, under the blow of the allied Turks,
Bulgars, Austrians and Magyars with their common lord and leader against
Serbia, the Germans.
Why?
"Because she caused this world-war. That is a just punishment which she
well deserves," so say the Germans and their dupes. And saying so, they
think of the assassination in Sarajevo. A Serbian boy killed the Crown
Prince of Austria. Therefore Austria pretended to think that Serbia must
lose her independence. To punish Serbia for the crime in Sarajevo,
Austria sent the famous ultimatum to Serbia in the summer of 1914,
asking nothing less than what Shylock asked from Antonio--his life. To
punish Serbia, Germany made an alliance with the Bulgars, and sent her
troops and her iron--the best product of their culture--to destroy the
Serbian state, to devastate the Serbian country, and to take more than a
million of human lives for the life of the Austrian Crown Prince. And
this has been done with an unprecedented perfection. And this
destructive deed has been praised with eloquent words in all the
parliaments, churches, schools and papers all over Central Europe.
We could reply to this German accusation: "Did not your greatest
national poet, Schiller, glorify William Tell, who killed Gesler, the
Austrian tyrannous ruler in Switzerland? Why do you, who adore Schiller,
and who praise William Tell's deed, blame the Serbian boy, Princip, who
did the same thing in killing Franz Ferdinand, the tyrant of Bosnia, his
fatherland? And after all, shall a whole nation, which was as surprised
by the affair in Sarajevo as anyone in the world, be crushed because of
the crime of one man? Is that the principle of Frederick the Great, or
Leasing, or Kant and Schiller?"
The Magyars said through their leading men: "Serbia must be punished not
because of the affair in Sarajevo, but because she is making a
propaganda to liberate and unite all the Southern Slav people, which
means a great blow for the Magyar interests and for the crown of Saint
Stephen." Therefore the Magyars, rushing into Serbia in the first
invasion, in August 1914, devastated a northern district of Serbia, the
district of Drina, in such a way that only the Bulgars could compete
with them. Henri Barby, the French publicist, has visited this district
after the invasion. His description of the Magyar atrocities and the
original pictures taken on the spot of the crimes committed make one
ashamed to be the contemporary of such a nation.
We could reply to the Magyar accusations: Not so much is it that Serbia
has been making a propaganda to liberate her brothers from your yoke, as
that they themselves have made this propaganda. Before the Crown Prince
was killed in Sarajevo there were several outbursts in Agram on the Bans
of Croatia, who were Magyar agents and tyrants just as Gesler was in
Switzerland many hundred years ago. All the outbursts and all the
tragi-comic high trials in Croatia, Bosnia and Dalmatia, all the
successes of the Hapsburg Monarchy in the south and all the protests
prove two things:
First, that the Southern Slavs, Serbia's brothers, have suffered and
have been abased very much by the Magyar's brutal rule, and;
Second, that they have grown to be free and to live independently from a
nation which showed itself very inferior in many respects to the nation
ruled by it.
The Bulgars even mocked the Serbs for allying themselves with the
"degenerate" French, with the "faithless traders," the English, and with
the "barbarians," the Russians. They mocked us that we have not been
"real" politicians, that we have been stupid and could not foresee the
German victory. They accused us even in their declaration of war of
being "the felons" who caused the "world's conflagration." And they
regarded as their mission to rise "in the name of civilisation" to
punish "a criminal nation."
We Serbs have nothing to reply to this Bulgar mockery, since they
distinctly claimed that they are not Slavs but Mongols; since they
condemned the English, French and Russian civilisations, and declared
themselves to be the champions of the true civilisation. I will tell you
only how they fulfilled their "mission" in defending the human
civilisation from the Serbs. I will not speak myself, but I will repeat
what a well-known English gentleman reported from Salonica:
"About five o'clock in the afternoon, while we still waited for orders
where to take our guns, we saw coming out of the town towards us a long,
straggling procession of Serbian soldier prisoners, about 300,
surrounded by a strong escort of infantry. They were of all ages, some
young boys of 15, some old men, bowed of back, with grey in their
beards, hungry-looking, ragged, bearing the marks of their long fight in
the pass. They shambled along, evidently without any idea as to what
their fate was to be, till they came close to where this newly-dug pit
lay open. There the command to halt was given, and they stood or sat,
surrounded by their guards, for about an hour.
"At the end of that time another body of men could be seen coming out of
the town. They were Bulgarian cavalry, about eighty of them, with a
captain in command. At a deliberate walk they came on towards the throng
of prisoners and guards at the pit-side. When they were still several
hundred yards away, a young Serbian soldier evidently grasped what was
preparing. Making a sudden dart, he sprang through the cordon of guards,
and was off, running at a surprising speed. The guards shouted, but
their rifles, though with bayonets fixed, were not loaded, and it
looked for the moment as if he might get clear away. Then the captain of
the cavalry troop caught sight of him, turned round in the saddle, and
shouted an order to his men. Half a dozen spurred their horses, and left
the ranks at a gallop. It was a short chase. Hearing the thud of the
horses' hoofs behind him, the young Serbian turned his head for an
instant, then ran on faster than before. The galloping cavalry were soon
close up with him. As the first man, with a shout, raised his sword, the
fugitive doubled like a hare, and was away at right angles. Two more
horsemen were close behind, though. The first rode him down; the second
leaned out of his saddle and pierced him through, as he scrambled to
regain his feet. By this time the guards with the rest of the Serbians
had loaded their rifles, and stood round them in a ring, with levelled
bayonets, while, huddled together, their prisoners embraced each other
or sank in apathy to the ground.
"The cavalry captain rode up to the miserable throng. 'Each man will
bind the eyes of his neighbour,' he shouted in Serbian. They did so. It
took a long time, and was a pitiable sight. Some young boys were crying.
Many of the men shouted defiance at the guards, who looked expectantly
on, and at the cavalry, whose swords were drawn ready for the butchery.
They blindfolded each other with strips torn from their waistcloths, or
whatever else they had. 'Now kneel down,' came the harsh order, and one
by one the victims crouched on the ground. The captain turned again to
his troopers. 'Start work,' was the order he gave. The infantry guards,
still keeping a circle to drive back any who might try to flee, drew off
a little to give more room, and passing through the intervals of their
line, the Bulgar cavalry rode in among the kneeling throng of prisoners
at a canter. With yells of cruel delight they pushed to and fro,
slashing and thrusting at the unarmed victims. Some of the Serbians
tried to seize the dripping sabre blades in their hands. An arm slashed
off at the shoulder would fall from their bodies. Others, tearing off
the bandages that blindfolded them, attempted to unhorse their
executioners, gripping them by the boot to throw them out of the saddle.
But even the 300, though brave, could do nothing against eighty armed
men.
"I could see the living trying to save themselves, crawling under the
little heaps of dead. Others rushed towards the line of infantry,
surrounding them, as if to break through to safety, but the foot
soldiers, intoxicated by the sight of the deliberate bloodshed going on
before their eyes, ran to meet them with their bayonets, and thrust
them through and through again with savage cries. 'We are doing this in
charity,' shouted some of the Bulgarians. 'We have no bread to feed you,
so if we spared you it would be to die of hunger.' The massacre went on
for half an hour. At the end of that time there was little left to kill,
and the troopers were tired of cutting and thrusting. A few of them
dismounted, and, sword in hand, walked here and there among the bleeding
groups of dead, pricking them to see if any still lived. Some, though
badly wounded, were still alive, but the Bulgarian captain did not give
time for them all to be finished off, and at his orders the whole pile
of murdered prisoners, whether breathing or extinct, were pushed by the
infantry into the grave dug earlier in the afternoon, and earth
shovelled at once on top of them." [4]
"England betrayed the White Race!" So exclaimed the other day Herr
Dernburg, the former German minister for the colonies. Why? Because
England mobilised all the races, including the black and yellow,
Negroes, Indians, Maoris and Japanese, against the Germans. Herr
Dernburg thinks that England has very much damaged European civilisation
by so doing. That is a very curious conception of the present world
situation. I could reply to Herr Dernburg's objection:
First, the history of mankind does not report that the Negroes enslaved
anybody and kept him enslaved through a bloody regime five hundred years
long as the Turks, the German allies, did with the Balkan Christians.
Second, I never have been told that the Japanese are more barbarous
people than the Magyars.
Third, I doubt very strongly that there is any madman in the world who
will even try to make a comparison between the noble soul of India and a
blood-thirsty subject of Ferdinand of Coburg.
And fourth, if Kaiser William with the Prussian junkers should govern
Europe through the superman's philosophy and Krupp's industry, let us
hurry to open the door of Europe as soon as possible for the Chinese and
Japanese, for Indians and Negroes, and even for all the cannibals, the
innocent doves, who need more time to eat up one fellow-man with their
teeth than a trained Prussian needs to slaughter ten thousand by help of
his "kultur."
If England is doing anything right she doubtless is doing right in
mobilising all the nations, yea, all the human beings upon this planet,
cultured or uncultured, civilised or uncivilised, of every colour of
skin, of every size, to protest in this or another way against a
military and inhuman civilisation which is worse than the most primitive
barbarism of man. All the races of the world who are fighting to-day
with England against Germany may not understand either each other's
language or customs, religion or traditions, but they all understand one
thing very well, _i.e._ that they must fight together against a nation
which despises all other nations and tries to conquer them, to govern
them, to suppress their language, their customs, their traditions and
their belief in their own worth and mission in this world.