e Mirditi, gave themselves up to the Serbian
authorities on the Black Drin. They had with them a dozen officers of
whom two were Italians, and these accounted for themselves by saying
that they had come out to organize and to lead the Albanian army.

* * * * *

Now, would this be the best solution of the Albanian problem, that the
Mirdite Republic and that of Tirana should both be recognized, since it
is quite clear that it would be immoral--and very useless--for Europe to
try to persuade the Mirditi to place themselves under the Tirana regime?
But there appears to be no doubt that the Moslems of northern
Albania--however much they may now sympathize with the Mirditi in their
attitude towards Tirana--would just as strenuously resist their own
incorporation in a Christian Republic.... Down at the bottom of their
hearts all the Albanian delegates who came to Geneva must know that if
an Albanian State is larger than one tribe it will go to pieces.
Whatever good qualities may be latent in the Albanian, he is as
yet--with rare exceptions--in that stage of culture which has no idea of
duty on the part of the State or of duty towards the State. As an
example of his views on the exercise of authority we may instance the
case of the 82 Albanians, led by Islam Aga Batusha (of the village of
Voksha), who stopped Pouni[vs]a Ra[vc]i['c] and his companions in the
summer of 1921 while they were riding one day from Djakovica to Pe['c].
Pouni[vs]a enjoys the fullest confidence of the border tribes because he
has never been known to break his word; they are very conscious that
even their vaunted "besa" is not nowadays observed as it was, say fifty
years ago, for the Austrian and Italian propaganda schools have had an
unfortunate effect. Well, as the 82 sat round Pouni[vs]a and his friends
in the courtyard of a mosque, where they spent the whole day
confabulating, they said they hoped that he, a just and wise man, would
help them; and their principal grievance was that the Serbian police no
longer allowed them to kill each other. Why should the police interfere
in their private affairs? Recently the police had arrested a man whom
one of these protesters wanted to kill, and therefore he thought he
would have to kill one of the police. Even those who have spent their
lives in Serbia are too often at this stage of development--a few years
ago, in the village of Prokuplje, an Albanian assassinated his neighbour