esce that one must ask why, in the months which followed, there
was a considerable amount of border fighting. What was it that caused
the Albanians in the region of Scutari to make their violent onslaughts
of December 1919 and January 1920, the renewed offensive of July 1920 at
the same places--after which the Albanian Government forwarded to that
of Belgrade an assurance of goodwill--and the organized thrust of August
13 against Dibra, which was preceded on August 10 by a manifesto to the
chancelleries of Europe falsely accusing the Serbs of having begun these
operations, and which was followed by the Tirana Government promising to
try to find the guilty persons? The 19th of the same month saw the
Albanians delivering a further attack in the neighbourhood of Scutari,
and then the Yugoslav Government decided that their army must occupy
such defensive positions as would put a stop to these everlasting
incidents. But a voice was whispering to the Albanians that they must
not allow themselves to be so easily coerced. "You have thrown us out of
all the land behind Valona," said the voice, "and out of Valona itself.
You must, therefore, be the greatest warriors in the world, and we will
be charmed to provide you with rifles and machine guns and munitions
and uniforms and cash. We will gladly publish to the world that your
Delegation at Rome has sent us an official Note demanding that the
Yugoslav troops should retire to the 1913 line, pure and simple. Of
course we, like the other Allies, agreed that they should occupy the
more advanced positions which General Franchet d'Esperey assigned to
them--and to show you how truly sorry we are for having done so, we
propose to send you all the help you need. In dealing with us you will
find that you have to do with honourable men, whereas the
Yugoslavs--what are they but Yugoslavs?"

Anyone who travelled about this time along the road from Scutari down to
the port of San Giovanni di Medua would inevitably meet with processions
of ancient cabs, ox-wagons and what not, laden with all kinds of
military equipment. Some of these supplies had come direct from Italy,
while others had been seized from the Italians near Valona. The
detachment of Italian soldiers at San Giovanni, and the much larger
detachment at Scutari, may have looked with mixed feelings at some of
these commodities, but on the other hand they may have thought, with
General Bencivenga,[74] that it was good business--"_un buon