We reached Koshumlja at about eight in the morning and remained there
for a couple of hours. We had fondly imagined we should find an inn
of sorts where we could obtain some breakfast, but there was nothing
of the kind, nor could we purchase any food or wine, as we had relied
upon being able to do. We were, however, most hospitably entertained
by the family of the local chemist, whose shop we had merely entered
to make some small purchase. They gave us bread, cheese, sausage, and
coffee, had our muddy boots cleaned for us, and generally provided
for our comfort before we started off again. They were genial, kindly
folk, true Serbs, and later on we had frequent occasion to contrast
their hospitality with the rough and money-grabbing methods of the
Montenegrins.
They told us a lot of interesting things, among others that a few days
earlier they had been asked by the local authorities to prepare a meal
for a couple of distinguished travellers. No names were mentioned. They
had done as they were bid, and were now quite sure that it was the
King himself whom they had entertained.
On leaving Koshumlja that morning we ourselves saw the King. He was
riding with a small retinue, hardly an assumption of state, and to one
of us particularly the little cavalcade had something about it that was
infinitely pathetic. A brief quotation from one of our diaries will
explain why:--
"At Koshumlja to-day we saw the King. Curiously enough this is the
first time that I have come across him since I have been in Serbia,
though Alice saw him at Tarpola. He is a fine old man, and trouble,
sickness, and age have not bowed him. And meeting him thus my mind
goes back--how many years it may be I should be afraid to guess. I was
a small boy spending my holidays with my people at Vevey, on the Lake
of Geneva, and at the hotel we struck up an acquaintance with Prince
Peter Kara Georgevitch. He was then in the prime of life, tall, dark,
handsome--not yet married. He used to talk to us quite unaffectedly of
his hopes and ambitions. King Milan was, of course, the prime enemy.
"'One day I shall come into my own.' I can quite well remember him
saying that.
"And it was true. Destiny--call it what you will--gave him the coveted
throne. And now, a dozen years later, he has lived to see a fresh
shuffle of the cards. How they will fall it is still for time to show."
We made but poor progress that day, and it was not to be wondered
at. The congestion of traffic was amazing. It would hardly be an
exaggeration to say that from Koshumlja to Prishtina there was an
unbroken stream of vehicles of the most varied kinds, though the
ox-wagon predominated enormously. With these were soldiers and
civilians on horseback; soldiers and civilians on foot; oxen laden
and unladen; pack-horses; buffaloes, donkeys, and mules; dogs on the
leash or running with their masters; men, women, children, and beasts
jostling each other in the confusion of hurried flight. It was not so
much the retreat of an army as of a whole nation.
Yet all was orderly and in the main good-tempered. The soldiers were
kept to their respective "trains," and were well under the control of
their officers. There were as yet no ghastly roadside sights, but now
and again came presages of what was to be--the fall of a tired horse,
the overturning of a cart, and once we were sickened by seeing a couple
of frightened oxen, with wagon attached, precipitate themselves over
the low parapet of a bridge into the torrent that flowed below. There
was little or no excitement, and the empty space was rapidly filled up;
it was not well to fall out of rank, if one could help it.
We soon gave up hope of reaching Prishtina that night. Midday
to-morrow, the chauffeur promised us. In this confidence we consumed
two of our tins of sardines during the day--it was not much for
lunch and dinner--leaving the third for breakfast. And therein lay a
catastrophe, for when we came to open the tin, hungry after another
wakeful and uncomfortable night, the contents proved to be hopelessly
bad! We made a meal off dry bread, and it did not improve our tempers
to see our companions devour a pig's head between them. There was
something revolting in the way they picked the bones.
That day progress was slower than ever; we did not seem able to
make any headway at all. By midday we could scarcely have advanced
half-a-dozen miles. It became increasingly clear that we should have to
spend a third night among the petrol-cans--if not a fourth and fifth.
That was bad enough in itself, but what about food?
Our companions did not seem to mind a bit. They were in no hurry and,
considering that they had lost practically all they possessed in the
world, wonderfully cheerful. But we were anxious to get to Prishtina
and rejoin our friends who might be concerned about us; we were nervous
on their account, too, since, though there had been no attack upon
the main road, we had heard a great deal of firing going on among the
hills, and we knew that the route by which they proposed to travel
came at times--especially at the old Turkish frontier which we were
approaching, very near our own.